THE STORY OF MY ONGOING WEIGHTLOSS JOURNEY

About 8 years ago, I lost 40 pounds - I guess it was "baby" weight but I was well passed that stage! I worked really hard, walked daily, used Weight Watchers to help me keep track of every little thing I ate, and felt amazing. 

About 4 or 5 years ago, I began gaining back that weight. I hadn't changed my eating habits much and I was still working out. I was puzzled as to why I began gaining back my weight and started realizing my addiction to sugar and breads and thought that I needed to figure out a way to get that under control. Meanwhile, in the last 5 or 6 years, I have discovered all things natural, clean, organic, and wholesome! Our family now does as much clean living as possible. 

3 Ingredient Baked Egg Casserole

Weekday mornings can be crazy and I'm always trying to make thing easy for breakfast, but I don't want store made or processed food for our family. So, I've found something easy that my teenaged son, who has to leave at 6:30 each morning for school, can make himself and I know he gets a good breakfast.

This is an Easy Bake Egg Casserole and you only need THREE ingredients!

How to Make 10 (Pressure Cooker) Freezer Meals In A Day

So you've seen those pressure cookers and instant pot recipes and heard all the hype but you're not sure if you're ready to take the plunge.  After all, you're just a "normal Mom,"  do you really have time to cook for hours, bag and then freeze it all just to save a little time?  Are you longing for an honest opinion about just how doable this "power cooking" actually its?  I was wondering the exact same thing so I tried it, and I'm going to share the whole truth with you today.  

How to Meal Plan with My Favorite Paleo Dinners

If you like meal planning and are looking for healthy dinners, my favorite Paleo dinners will be great for you whether you like to eat Paleo or not. What is Paleo, you ask? Well, it's a way of eating and I basically tell people that there are basic rules about eating like the ancestors did WAY back when, but that's not why I eat like that. You see, I was ADDICTED to sugar and breads and wanted to get unaddicted. I have been dairy-free for 20+ years because I'm lactose intolerant, so I looked for a way of eating that was unprocessed, no-calorie counting, and going to get me off sugar and breads. So, Paleo was the answer for me. Paleo basically is:

1. No grains
2. No dairy
3. No legumes
4. No sugar

It's sounds terribly restrictive but it's not that bad and you just have to change your way of setting up your pantry and learn to substitute certain ingredients and you can make most any meal "Paleo". I haven't had sugar or bread in nearly TEN months and that's saying a lot. 

My Favorite Pinterest-Pinned Summertime Grilling Recipes!

I rarely post about cooking or food, but this is one thing we LOVE to do in the summer and I wanted to share with you! We truly love to grill! And, this summer we have determined to grill as many foods on our grill as we possibly can to avoid using our {vintage} very, hot oven.

In order to get started, where did I begin? Of course I went to Pinterest! There is a TON of great recipes and ideas of grilling food on there. I started a whole Pinterest Board called BBQ that you can check out and follow, if you like to grill stuff too! All the direct links to the recipes are highlighted for you to click right over to them and check them out!

1. Rotisserie Chicken and pasta salad. If you have a rotisserie attachment on your grill, you really need to use it! It's super easy, this recipe, and the chicken is so tasty. Buying a whole chicken on sale is cheap, too - and there is nothing like doing it yourself. Yum! 

2. Grilled Pizza. This is super yummy and such a great twist on regular pizza. I can't eat dairy, so I grilled mine with goat cheese, chicken, and added a little basil on top - very tasty! It doesn't have to be round and it can be fun to have individual pizzas for each person to choose what to put on theirs.

3. Grilled pork tenderloin and bruschetta on grilled bread. Oh, my goodness! This was such a yummy meal! I don't like tomatoes just plain or even much in salads...but I LOVE bruschetta. It's just amazingly yummy and I devoured this bowl of it! We took some sourdough bread and buttered it and tossed it on the grill, too.

4.  Grilled Ribs {from Costco} and grilled sweet potatoes on skewers. Whenever Costco has a "sale" {aka, coupon} for ribs, I snatch them up cause my family LOVES ribs! The directions for grilling are on the package. We also love sweet potato fries but in the summer it's WAY too hot to cook in the oven because it heats up the whole kitchen. So, grilling them is a great alternative and keeps the heat outside. They are yummy!

5. BBQ meatloaf and fried potatoes. I promise this tastes better than my picture can do it justice! My family loves meatloaf but there is no way I want to turn on the oven in the heat of the summer to make it, so we usually just skip it! Well, barbecuing it is the answer! I made two loaves {also substitute with ground turkey} and we had leftover meatloaf to eat, too! The fried potatoes are something my mom always made growing up. They are just cubed {or cut triangular} potatoes and fried in pan with oil - we have an outdoor burner so I use that, too!

6.  Grilled Tilapia. I'm not into fish, but my Hubby and son love fish. However, tilapia is not so bad for me. Grilling it makes it even better. I like this recipe, too and use a fish basket to grill the fish in - so it doesn't fall apart on the grill. 

7. Chicken, Shrimp, or Steak Kabobs {kebabs}. An all time favorite, we had kabobs for our son's 13th birthday with family and a few close friends. It was SO fun. We had all kinds of toppings set out along with shrimp, steak, and chicken cut up. Everyone loved putting whatever they wanted on their kabobs, while my hubby grilled them up! Super yummy!

If you've recognized some of these photos, perhaps you follow me on Instagram? If not, you are missing out on some great behind the scenes action and daily fun I share!

You may have noticed some of the table settings...those are done by my daughter on our outdoor patio. We have some {cheap} plastic dishes I've picked up here and there and keep in my outdoor buffet, so my daughter has a lot of fun decorating the table {even putting our names at each place} for dinner. We've got more ideas to grill now, too! I want to attempt some desserts on the grill. We bought my Hubby a BBQ Griddle for Father's Day, and it goes on top of the grill, so I'm anticipating even more yummy things on the grill. How about you? What are some of your favorite things to grill?

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A Bowl Full of Lemons
House of Hepworths
Tidy Mom
At the Picket Fence