Cleaning Eating Living at home - in the organic vegetable garden

Clean Eating & Clean Living with a working family - sharing how & why we embrace it

I am a big believer in clean eating & clean living but what does that mean? This is a little bit about our family philosophy and how my husband and I try to raise a happy, healthy family when we both work.
What I know is we have made Clean Eating and Clean Living a priority in our family home. Our number 1 choice in raising our children has been to be there as much as possible in the informative, 'mouldable' habit and skill-forming years of early childhood (0-7 years): to show and to share with our children how to live a more mindful and nourished life. I have always hoped that we will create a happy, healthy home if
  • we eat unprocessed foods and prepare food from scratch with my little ones helping (even it is to set the table or pick some herbs) and we eat our meals together,
  • every week I take my kids to shops and markets (so much fun if there is a bric-a-brac one attached) and give them a basket to pick out the 'good' foods,
  • spend lots of time outside as we build and dig the kitchen garden (even if it does not produce that much or look like a designer patch!),
  • have a pet that produces - in our case chickens and a worm farm instead of a dog which you can't use its waste or cat that frightens and kills the native birds we try to attract with our Australian native garden
  • recycle, re-use, re-purpose everything from food to the toys they have (second hand toy auctions are fab for money making skills too!)
  • spend as much time as possible outdoor in the bush (not just the park with set play equipment) and taking walks that they will embrace a more carefree and mindful way of living.
  • use environmentally friends cleaning and personal care products, don't have carpet and live with white clothes that are a shade of grey because we don't use mainstream detergents.
It has been during these activities I have been able explain or show why we do what we do: to make things from scratch, to care for our garden and home, to help each other as a family, to share conversation and to research, explore and discover. It's not easy, especially when there are the pressures of money and 'society' and how your friends and colleagues live. Somewhere along the way you have to make a call as to what is most important. I was an accomplished entrepreneur travelling the world - I could not figure out how to do both. My husband has his own business - he is out the door at 7am, home by 6pm for the family dinner, he does the bath, book, bed routine and before returning to his desk til midnight. (Tuesday we don't see him ...that is yoga night, has been for over 25 years) I now on the other hand work the school hrs and have arranged for extra time a couple days a week for this business...I also sneak out several mornings a week for a rise and shine power walk & stretch when everyone is still in bed. And I make daily dates in my diary that are not broken: green smoothie production, wholesome baking, nut milk making. If my children & hubby start the day with avocado, green leaves, lemon, apple, ginger, parsley....and go off with a well stocked wholesome lunch box then I feel OK if the rest of the day falls apart! So how do we fit all this in with other standard practices of a modern living. We don't. My kids rarely do after school activities (nor after school care, I am the pickup mum) or sport on the weekend (yet!). We have done nippers this summer on a Sunday morning - but that was for water skills and survival & they were so exhausted for the rest of the day it actually worked in our favour, we did a few semesters of french lessons at the pre-school but that was about it. AND we don't see our dear pre-kids friends much anymore nor do we go away for all those spontaneous kid free weekends or dinners like we use to. We have simply chosen to take the time and make it a priority to in still in our children the good value in clean eating and living a clean, nourished life. As my children get older they are starting to say things that bring a smile. Mum..."I'd like take some healthy veggies sticks to school to give the little boy who always has chips what he should eat so he can read better." Here is wishing they are subtle when they do it...unlike their mother! I hope you enjoyed this post, I have so much to say but just wanted to share a little of my philosophy as we kick off this month's theme at luk beautifood, as you may have guessed it is all about Clean Food & Clean Living. Live happy. Live healthy....and don't forget about 'clean beauty' and nourish your lips with our lip-loving natural lipstick. Love Cindy x be delicious.... inside and out
Clean Eating & Clean Living in the city - growing organic food Meet one of our 5 chooks - Emma is a prolific layer so we always have a package of perfect protein to whip up a meal. We don't live off our garden but what we produce always adds a delicious dimension - fresh herbs, citrus, green leaves and the organic produce we grow bails us out of a 'there is no food in the fridge' situation so we don't have to comprise clean eating for overly processed convenience food.
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