Category Healthy Recipes

Hi Friends!

Since you guys enjoyed the posts I put together about What Registered Dietitians Feed Their Kids (Click to read Part 1 & Part 2), I decided to keep it going for a while and have reached out to a few of my favorite busy moms to share some more insight! Hopefully these posts will spark some ideas for you!

This is mostly a toddler edition, with a little info on younger kiddos from parents of multiple kids. Next round covers a few kiddos under 18 months so stay tuned for that!

Rachel
The Avid Appetite (theavidappetite.com)
Penelope, 20 months

1. What do your children typically eat for breakfast?
Penelope loves eggs (scrambled or fried, with cheese), yogurt, cream cheese & jam on whole wheat bread, fruit, or some organic dry cereal, and of course, her whole milk.

2. What do they typically eat for lunch?
Soup, mac ‘n cheese or pasta w/mixed vegetables, organic hot dogs, cherry tomatoes, bell peppers, cucumbers. Always with water on the side; I don’t give her juice right now.

3. Do you all sit down as a family for dinner?  
Unfortunately, I don’t arrive home from work until 7pm so Penelope has already eaten dinner by then. On the weekends, we do our best to have family breakfast together. We are typically on-the-go for the remainder of the day, so we eat together when we can.

 4. What happens if they don’t like what you’re making for dinners?
Though we don’t sit together for dinner, we try to give Penelope whatever we are eating. We are lucky that she’s a champ and eats almost anything we will give her. If she doesn’t want it, then we will try something else…but usually if she doesn’t want it, it means she just isn’t hungry and I don’t force her to eat.

5. What are the kids’ favorite snacks? What are some snacks you never leave the house without?
She loves fruit of any kind and that is always a go-to, even at home. For on the go, I like to have bananas or blueberries, which can usually stand being in my bag for a few hours. Applesauce and cheese sticks are great options, too. The reigning champion snack of all time for Penelope is yogurt melts. I always have bags of them everywhere. That would not be my first choice of snacks for her, but she truly loves them so much and they are my secret weapon for meltdowns or to keep her occupied. We also like organic fruit snacks (YumEarth are great and only come with 5 or 6 pieces per pack), and organic, healthy cookies from MySuperFoods, which are packed with whole grains, chia seeds, flax seed and more

6. Are any foods off limits?
No. From the get go, I wanted Penelope to develop a real love of food…all of it. So that means she gets bell peppers to dip in hummus (she LOVES her dip!), but also bites of cake at a party. If I’m eating something that Penelope is interested in (from iced tea or steak to blue cheese or peanut butter on a spoon), she gets to try it.

 7. Any tips for picky eaters?
We are lucky that Penelope is interested in food and so I wouldn’t consider her picky (yet). For those times that she isn’t, I will take her plate and start eating the food on it, ignoring her reaction. She will often come around, want to sit in my lap and try it. And if she doesn’t? I don’t push her. When she is hungry, she will eat.

 8. Do any of your kids have food allergies? How do you deal with that both at home and when in public?
Luckily, no. I really feel for parents who have to deal with this. It’s a scary notion, especially when sending your kids to daycare or school!

Kath Younger, RD
Kath Eats Real Food (www.katheats.com)
Mazen, age 2

1. What do your children typically eat for breakfast?
My son’s favorite breakfasts are scrambled eggs with whole wheat toast and sliced fruit or banana oatmeal with a dollop of peanut butter. He takes after his mama : ) We also do smoothies from time to time, and a green smoothie is a great way for me to sneak in some berries and veggies.

 2. What do they typically eat for lunch?
We rely on leftovers a lot for lunch. It’s hard for my 2-year-old to eat raw veggies, and he’s usually too hungry to wait for a whole meal to cook, so I most often re-heat something from the fridge (we plan for this by making extra at dinner). Some of his favorite lunch foods are currently (because they change every day!): mini quiches, carrots and crackers in hummus, noodles of any kind, sweet potato fries, fruit, quesadillas and nut butters.

 3. Do you all sit down as a family for dinner?
We try, but at age 2 this is pretty difficult. Sometimes when he takes a later nap and I’m really organized with dinner we can time it perfectly, but more often than not he’s hungry before dinner is ready. About half the time he eats while I’m cooking and then we eat while he plays, but the other half we all sit down together. I can say without a doubt that he tries more diverse foods when we eat at the same table, so I am working to make this a priority. He is also getting better at waiting a little later to eat, so that is helpful too.

 4. What happens if they don’t like what you’re making for dinners?
I try to go by the recommendation to have a few things we know he likes along with 1-2 new foods. We usually offer him the new food enthusiastically and model eating it ourselves. It’s a toss up if he’ll try it, but sometimes he does! We recently had chicken and pepper kebobs with orzo salad and he decided that night that he loved roasted red peppers but wouldn’t touch the orzo! He always surprises me. J We try to go with the flow as much as we can and keep offering and modeling.

 5. What are the kids’ favorite snacks? What are some snacks you never leave the house without?
One of our favorites this summer was yogurt frozen into a popsicle. I even let him have one for breakfast! I either make a smoothie popsicle with plain yogurt and a little fruit blended together or I buy the Siggi’s kids squeeze pops and freeze those. They are low in sugar, so I think it’s an excellent choice for breakfast, snack or dessert. I’ve also been making homemade whole grain bars (nut free for school) and freezing them so I can put one in the diaper bag and it will have thawed by the time he’s ready to eat it. Mini Larabars are great to keep too – the portion size is good and Mazen thinks they are a cookie!

 6. Are any foods off limits?
I’ve been more laid back about what my son eats than I might have predicted, but we try to avoid anything that is heavily processed or full of artificial ingredients. If another mom feeds it to him (like at a birthday party) I’m not going to freak out, but we don’t buy those kinds of things ourselves.

 7. Any tips for picky eaters?
Mazen has started to want to help me in the kitchen, so we pull up a chair and he helps stir the pancake batter or whisk dressing. The other week I had arugula in the salad spinner (which he loves to spin) and we had made a dressing, and I asked if he wanted to try the salad. He said yes and dipped about 20 arugula leaves in the dressing and eat them up. Let me pause to say: My child does not like salad! So my tip is to just be patient and involve them as much as possible.

8. Do any of your kids have food allergies? How do you deal with that both at home and when in public?
Thankfully no!

Brittany Dixon
A Healthy Slice of Life (ahealthysliceoflife.com)
Hailey (3 years old), Kaitlyn (4 months old)

 1. What do your children typically eat for breakfast? 
Kaitlyn is exclusively breastfed and I hope to do baby led weaning with her starting at 6 months, so I’ll just answer these for Hailey!

Hailey breakfast- Plain Greek yogurt topped with honey, fruit and chia seeds (she calls these sprinkles and loves putting them on herself!) is a favorite. She also loves scrambled eggs and cheese toast or pancakes.

 2. What do they typically eat for lunch? 
We are big fans of snack plates around here. I find lots of little options work well for us. Some common players are boiled eggs, olives, grapes, carrot sticks, chickpeas, cheese toast, red pepper slices, hummus, cheese cubes, cherry tomatoes and leftovers.

 3. Do you all sit down as a family for dinner?  
We don’t currently due to my husband’s work schedule. However, I do sit down with Hailey while she eats her dinner.

 4. What happens if they don’t like what you’re making for dinners?
I have a pretty adventurous eater, but she is still a toddler and her tastes change by the day. If she doesn’t like a particular item on her plate, I don’t make a big deal about it. She can eat all the other items on her plate and I’ll try the disliked item again another day.

5. What are the kids’ favorite snacks? What are some snacks you never leave the house without?
We love homemade lara balls , almonds and raisins, banana and peanut butter. I still buy the fruit and veggie pouches to have for a quick option on the go!

 6. Are any foods off limits?
Nope! As far as Hailey is concerned, everything is fine in moderation. However, I do my best to keep foods with artificial colors and flavors out of the house and most of what we eat at home is non- or minimally processed.

 7. Any tips for picky eaters?
Don’t make it a power struggle. Get kids involved with shopping and prepping and don’t be afraid to try foods they “don’t like” prepared in a new way! If all else fails, just keep at it. Consistency is huge!

 8. Do any of your kids have food allergies? How do you deal with that both at home and when in public?
Hailey does not and as far as I know, neither does Kaitlyn. My heart goes out to those that deal with food allergies because I can only imagine how stressful that must be. I gave Hailey her first taste of peanut butter sitting in the car in the parking lot of the hospital because I was so paranoid!

Liz Della Croce
The Lemon Bowl (thelemonbowl.com)
Asher, 3 years old and Jacob, 10 months old

1. What do your children typically eat for breakfast?
Both of my boys love whole milk plain yogurt sweetened with a little tart cherry juice, raspberry preserves, or applebutter for added flavor. My older son loves it with muesli cereal and fresh berries and the baby has it with fortified baby cereal. Other days we eat scrambled eggs, homemade frozen pancakes, or oatmeal when the weather gets cooler.

2. What do they typically eat for lunch?
Lunchtime is usually leftovers from dinner the night before. In the fall we love making soups like Lemony Chicken Soup with Spinach and Chickpeas or Italian Sausage and Bean Soup. It’s a great one pot meal full of protein, vitamins and nutrients. Plus, the food is already cut into small, bite-sized pieces, which is easy for the kids to eat.

 3. Do you all sit down as a family for dinner?
We sit down for dinner as a family every single night. We always ate dinner as a family growing up and I hope to always eat as a family as my boys get older. Cooking dinner is my favorite time of the day because all four of us are in the kitchen listening to music, singing, making the boys giggle as we dance, etc. It’s relaxing to unwind away from technology and I like investing the time to create nourishing meals for my family.

 4. What happens if they don’t like what you’re making for dinners?
If they don’t like what we are having for dinner, they simply don’t eat as much. My boys are not starving, I assure you. 😉 Some times they are hungry and eat three portions, other times they don’t eat a lot. I think adults should eat more like kids sometimes and not eat just because of habit or schedule. Kids follow their hunger/stomachs and I think we should all do more of that.

 5. What are the kids’ favorite snacks? What are some snacks you never leave the house without?
My toddler loves dried fruit like figs, tart cherries and raisins. He hasn’t been introduced to candy yet and I’m thinking he is going to have a sweet tooth one day. 😉 He also loves hummus and could eat it by the tub-full! My baby doesn’t really snack much yet because he usually nurses between meals but he really loves everything we are eating so far.

 6. Are any foods off limits?
Since I still create/buy all of the foods my kids eat, it has been pretty easy to control their diets. With that, I’m not buying candy bars, pop, juice, cookies, etc. Can they have ice cream at a party? Of course. Am I going to go out of my way to give them sweets all the time? Definitely not. Since I don’t eat those foods, I’m not going to serve it to my kids but I’m not unrealistic to think that they will never have a candy bar. 😉

 7. Any tips for picky eaters?
I think it’s important to put a little thought into the foods we serve kids. Instead of steaming cauliflower, try Curried Roasted Cauliflower with Coconut Oil. Instead of boiling green beans, try Za’atar Roasted Carrots and Green Beans. Don’t be afraid of using spices and at the very least, be sure to properly season with a good amount of salt and pepper. Remember, no matter what, when you’re cooking foods from scratch at home you will never have as much sodium as you find in processed packaged foods so don’t be afraid of salt.

 8. Do any of your kids have food allergies? How do you deal with that both at home and when in public?
So far no they don’t, knock on wood. Our baby hasn’t had nuts yet but fingers crossed he will be like his toddler and able to eat anything.

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That’s all for today! Stay tuned for part 2 coming in a few weeks!

Enjoy!
–Lindsay–

PS. Don’t forget to join us for the PIN IT PARTY tomorrow!!! You can see all the details in the last Pin It Party post (CLICK HERE) if you’re not familiar with how it works!

LEARN HOW FOOD AFFECTS YOUR BODY.

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Hi Friends!

I’ve been meaning to do one of these posts for a while now, as I’ve gotten several requests, but I always seem to forget to take pictures. Plus, every day is different for me so it’s hard to capture exactly what it is that I do all day in just one post. But this week I got my act together and snapped a few pics and figured I’d do my best to give you a glimpse into my day.

Here we go:

12:00am – bed (usually I’m falling asleep anywhere from 11pm – midnight.

2:ooam & 3:30am – up to pee – blame the baby

5:15- Up to feed the animals and let the dogs out. I also have a bad habit of checking my email at this time, which I know I shouldn’t do.  Hubby is a sound sleeper and can sleep through the animals getting restless and wanting to be fed. I’m a light sleeper and it’s easier for me to just get up and feed them then fight them on it. Usually I don’t have much trouble falling back to sleep, but it’s not unusual for me to be up for 30-45 minutes feeding them, answering emails and tweets, etc. If I have a super busy day ahead with appointments, etc, I often just get up and start working at this point and try to squeeze in a nap in the afternoon because I’m much more productive in the morning. However, if it’s a fairly normal week, I”ll go back to bed.

7:05- Alarm goes off and I get up and eat breakfast.

7:15- Walk to the “office” – ie 10 steps from the kitchen.

7:15 – 8:15 – Read and respond to emails, read blogs, schedule social media posts for my blog and to share the posts of others. This is a never-ending task and I do it pretty much all day long, but I try to get a relatively big chunk out of the way in the morning so when I check in throughout the day it doesn’t take as much time.

8:15- 9:15 – Daily tasks for Regan. I work 15 hours a week for Regan as a Nutrition Communications Coordinator. This involves A LOT of different things-  social media work, projects for clients,  recipe development and photography, organizing sponsored campaigns for the Healthy Aperture blogger network and Recipe Redux, writing blog posts and roundups etc. There are some things I do every day and then I tackle other projects as they come. I’ll be taking 6 weeks off from this part of my job when baby comes so I’ve been working to train the girl who will be filling in for me. It wasn’t until I had to put together a procedure manual a few weeks ago that I realized what a wide variety of things I do!

9:15-10:30 – Moderate images for Healthy Aperture. I spend time doing this every day. This is usually interspersed with social media responses and scheduling, answering email, etc.

10:30 – Snack time. I’ll eat a muffin, throw the ball for Tucker a few times, stretch my legs, put medicine in Abner’s ears, empty the dishwasher, etc.

11:00 – 11:45 – I made a rare, mid-week trip to the grocery store to get some things I needed for a few upcoming blog posts. Usually I try to get everything I need when we shop on the weekends, unless it’s for a freelance project where I need everything on a separate receipt, in which case I will go during the week because it’s easier to keep things separate. After running to the store I came home and started working on a few recipes. If I didn’t have to run to the store, this time would likely be filled with projects for Regan, freelance work, etc.

{recycled photo but typical lunch spread for us}

11:45 – 12:45  – Lunch and finalizing the stuff I was cooking. If I’m not cooking a recipe, I usually take about a 30 minute lunch. Hubby comes home and we eat and do the crossword puzzle together.

12:45 – 1:15 – Photograph one of the recipes I was working on.

1:15- 3:30 – More general work time. Freelance projects, Regan projects and I work on getting posts written, photographed and scheduled for my own blog , answer more emails, blog comments and social media stuff and organize/plan ahead etc with my editorial calendar. I also do some work for Holley when she needs me so this time could be filled with projects for her- like this social media presentation I helped her put together this week.

3:30- Feed the animals, head out with the dogs for our daily walk and grab an afternoon snack.

4:15- 5:45 – Several days a week this is when I head to Crossfit. I go to a class that runs from 4:30-5:30 and try to make it 3-4 days a week. If it’s a rest day, I usually take a nap (baby makes me tired!)

6:00 – 8:00 – Post-crossfit snack, shower, spend time with hubby, play with the dogs, read for fun, more emails and social media stuff.

8:00 – 8:30 – Dinner.

8:30 – 11 – what I try to do- watch TV/lounge around/play on Pinterest etc…what sometimes ends up happening: I work more- whether it’s blogging, answering emails, doing some recipe development. I’ve gotten much better about sticking to “work hours” than I was when I first started working from home, but sometimes stuff still spills over into evening hours, especially lately since we’ve had a lot of doctor’s appointments, etc to fit in during the day.

Hubby and I also take the boys on a walk together. Tucker knows it’s time when he sees us start putting on our socks. Making the “wanna go for a walk” announcement is a big entertaining production every night.

11:00 – 12:00 – read in bed and go to sleep.

Repeat.

So there you have it! A glimpse into my day to day life currently. I’ll have to do another one of these once baby gets here 🙂

Enjoy!
–Lindsay–

LEARN HOW FOOD AFFECTS YOUR BODY.

Get my free Table Talk email series where I share bite-sized nutrition information about carbs, protein, and fat, plus bonus information about snacks and sugar!

This post contains referral links. I was not compensated for this review but I will receive credit to my account if you sign up using my referral link. As always, all thoughts and opinions are 100% honest and my own.

Hi Friends!

Just wanted to pop in a share a little bit about a blogging tool I recently started using! It’s called CoSchedule and it has replaced the previous editorial calendar plug-in I used.

I’ve been aware of CoSchedule for several months now, but since it is a paid service, I’ve been hesitant to take the plunge. I finally signed up for the two week trial and I was hooked even before the trial ended.

Here’s a look at what CoSchedule looks like:

It’s basically a calendar you can use to help plan your blog posts. You can start a draft on one day and then if you decide you want to publish it on a different day, simply drag and drop to the preferred publishing day. I’ve been using an editorial calendar for my blog for a while now and it’s helped me tremendously with planning ahead and keeping track of various post deadlines, etc.

The cool thing about CoSchedule is that it does a great job of integrating social media. My previous calendar was just a calendar and that’s it. This tracks your shares once the post is published and it also lets you connect various social media accounts like your blog’s Facebook page, your Twitter account, your Pinterest boards, etc. Once they’re connected, you can pre-schedule posts to these various social media sites and CoSchedule will publish them for you at the desired times.

You can preview what your social media posts will look like, choose if you want to include a link or an image and then specify what date and time you want the tweet or FB post to be scheduled.

The social media aspect is really what sold me on CoSchedule. Now, when I write a post, I also pre-schedule several tweets, a Facebook post and a pin for the day the post is to be published. You can also easily pre-schedule social media posts for a week, month, etc after posting to give your post a little refresher after it’s been published for a while, or if say you wanted to schedule a Pinterest post for the weekend instead of the day the post is published.

While I still use free programs like Hootsuite and Buffer to preschedule tweets, I really like the convenience of being able to pre-schedule a lot of my social media stuff for my own posts from one central location.

In addition, you can personalize the calendar colors, the number of weeks shown on your calendar at one time, what day you calendar starts on etc. You can also integrate bit.ly, google analytics and google calendar with CoSchedule, as well as the Click to Tweet program you may have soon people using that puts a pre-composed tweet into your blog post so all people have to do is click to share.

Interested yet?

I’d definitely encourage you to sign up for the two week trial to check it out. CLICK HERE to get started. If you like it after the trial, it’s $10/month, or save $20 by signing up for an annual plan. (*Disclosure* If you share a review of your thoughts you save 50% on your subscription)

Although I was doubtful it was worth the money before I checked it out myself, after trying it out, it’s definitely worth the money for me and I think it would be a great tool for a lot of my fellow bloggers as well!

Enjoy!
–Lindsay–

LEARN HOW FOOD AFFECTS YOUR BODY.

Get my free Table Talk email series where I share bite-sized nutrition information about carbs, protein, and fat, plus bonus information about snacks and sugar!

Hi Friends!

Let’s chat.

Hubby’s surgery went well. They did some cleanup on his rotator cuff and actually ended up also repairing his labrum, which was not part of the original plan, but that’s what he had his surgery on the other shoulder for. SO, hopefully between those two things, now all will be well. The good news is that they didn’t have to do anything to his bicep tendon, which is what we were most worried about.

He didn’t get a nerve block this time, since we had such a bad experience with it last time….so he was in a lot more pain after surgery, which meant we had to stay at the hospital longer while they gave him some IV drugs. But once we finally got home and got him started on his prescription meds, he’s doing much better today and the pain is under control. We head back to see the surgeon in a week and depending on how he’s recovering, he’ll be in the sling for 4-6 weeks. Keep your fingers crossed it’s only 4!

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We sold our old couch. A couple months ago we bought a new couch and in a fit of impatience, I posted our old one on Craigslist a bit too early. The buyer ended up falling through, but then we almost waited to long to post it again. We got a call that our new one would be delivered yesterday, but we needed to have the old one out by Tuesday since that’s the last day hubby could help me move it. We didn’t have the same amount of interest when we posted it the second time and I was almost ready to just have a donation center come pick it up, but at the last minute- literally like 8pm Tuesday night, a couple said they would take it and could come get it that night.

So, out with the old and in with the new!

We’re getting a smaller coffee table and a side table to fill that corner so it will look more complete once we have those!

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Anyone else watching? Hubby and I are so excited Season 2 is here. We didn’t watch right away so we could save for surgery recovery viewing so we started watching last night! (No spoilers)

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Random thought:

I wish my belly button didn’t have to pop out. It hasn’t yet, but it’s getting less deep and I know it’s coming. I don’t really have a good reason…just never been a huge fan of outie belly buttons.

That’s all for today, friends! Happy weekend.

Enjoy!
–Lindsay–

LEARN HOW FOOD AFFECTS YOUR BODY.

Get my free Table Talk email series where I share bite-sized nutrition information about carbs, protein, and fat, plus bonus information about snacks and sugar!

Hi Friends!

Time for some more random ramblings.

Long time readers might remember a few of these scenes from last June…hubby had surgery on his left shoulder to repair a torn labrum….Well, next week we’re doing it all over again. Except this time it’s the right shoulder and it’s a torn rotator cuff. His first surgery and recovery did NOT go well…so we’re both a bit apprehensive about this one. (More like- HOLD ME I’M SCARED!) However, the hope is that this one will go more smoothly and he’ll be well into his recovery by the time baby bean comes along. He’ll be in a sling for six weeks again, except this time it’s his dominant arm which makes things more complicated. Anyways, the big day is next Wednesday so please send positive thoughts our way. And meals. And a cleaning lady. And someone to mow our grass 😉 Pregnant wife and recovering hubby is going to make for an interesting combination.

Several of you have asked about my spiralizer. I bought the Paderno Spiralizer from William Sonoma a few months ago and I love it. It’s the only one I’ve ever used so I don’t have anything to compare it to, but it’s worked really well for me so far! Plus it’s only $40!

I’ve been looking for a glider for the nursery and I scored a pretty sweet deal on the model above on Craigslist. It’s a Dutailier and it comes with an ottoman, plus it reclines and locks. We’re getting it in like-new condition at about half the price! It’s not my first choice of color, but to me it’s worth it to save the money. Plus, throw a blanket over the back and it can be pretty much any color you want, right?!

My mom got me a Flipbelt for Christmas and after forgetting about it for several months, I’ve been using it on my walks with the dogs lately. I like to take my phone with me and in the winter I just throw it in my coat pocket. Now that it’s warmer, it’s annoying to carry, so I like being able to put it in the flipbelt to keep my hands free. I also started keeping a few dollars in it because last week, I was passed by the ice cream truck twice and had no money to buy a treat! AND there was a lemonade stand that I couldn’t visit! So now I’m prepared.

Ok, I think that’s all for today!

Let’s chat:
Have anything fun planned for the weekend?

Enjoy!
–Lindsay–

LEARN HOW FOOD AFFECTS YOUR BODY.

Get my free Table Talk email series where I share bite-sized nutrition information about carbs, protein, and fat, plus bonus information about snacks and sugar!

It’s a Boy! If you follow me on social media, you already know…because we just couldn’t wait to spill the beans!

We had our appointment Monday morning and everything went well. We asked them to put the boy/girl pic in an envelope for us and when the appointment was over, we went out to breakfast and opened it.

Hubby has been saying boy since the beginning and he was thrilled. The look on his face when he opened the envelope was absolute joy. So priceless.

I’m happy as well. I would have been happy either way, but I’ve always thought if I was going to have a boy and a girl, I’d prefer to have the boy first – protective older brother for the win!

After breakfast we spent the morning shopping….I got some maternity clothes and we picked out a few outfits of baby as well!

We also totally randomly happened to watch an episode of Coach on Monday night that totally related to our day. This is pretty much exactly how hubby reacted to our news:

You should be able to click the embeded  video above to hear it. So funny.

So there you have it! Let the name planning begin 🙂 We’ve actually started looking at names and have several boy names we both like…so I think it will just be a matter of narrowing it down.

That’s all for today! Moms of boys, feel free to leave your advice, recommendations, send clothes and toys (kidding!) We’d love to hear it!

Enjoy!
–Lindsay–

LEARN HOW FOOD AFFECTS YOUR BODY.

Get my free Table Talk email series where I share bite-sized nutrition information about carbs, protein, and fat, plus bonus information about snacks and sugar!

Hi Friends!

Time for another Foodie Penpals Reveal Day.

I skipped out again this month, but a couple hundred others didn’t! In case you’re interested in joining for June, here are the details:

-On the 5th of every month, you will receive your penpal pairing via email. It will be your responsibility to contact your penpal and get their mailing address and any other information you might need like allergies or dietary restrictions.
-You will have until the 15th of the month to put your box of goodies in the mail. On the last day of the month, you will post about the goodies you received from your penpal! 
-The boxes are to be filled with fun foodie things, local food items or even homemade treats! The spending limit is $15. The box must also include something written. 
-Foodie Penpals is open to blog readers as well as bloggers. 
-Foodie Penplas is open to US, Canadian & European residents.  Please note, Canadian Residents will be paired with other Canadians only. Same with Europeans.  

If you’re from the US or Canada and are in participating for June, please CLICK HERE to fill out the participation form and read the terms and conditions. 

You must submit your information by June 4th as pairings will be emailed on June 5th!

If you participated this month, link up below and go check out a few other posts to see what they got!

Enjoy!
–Lindsay–

An InLinkz Link-up

LEARN HOW FOOD AFFECTS YOUR BODY.

Get my free Table Talk email series where I share bite-sized nutrition information about carbs, protein, and fat, plus bonus information about snacks and sugar!

Hi Friends!

I have a very special guest post for you guys today. For the past few months, my friend Danielle has been helping me improve SEO for my blog. She’s phenomenal to work with and a wealth of knowledge so I asked her if she’d be willing to share some of her top tips with you guys since I know a lot of my readers have blogs of their own! Danielle is also a business coach, so if you need help with business strategy, social media management, SEO or blogging, definitely go check out her services on her website Danielle Zeigler!

So, are you ready to learn? Here we go:

What is Search Engine Optimization? This means optimizing your posts for search engines like Google and Bing so they can better understand what the post is about and what questions it will answer for readers. A nicely optimized post will rank better and reach a wider audience. “Organic search traffic” means visitors who find your blog through typing a query into a search engine.

When you’re thinking of optimizing your posts, you should be thinking of how to help your target audience, not just how to rank better or reach more people in general. Start thinking like your audience. What do they want to know? What questions are they asking?

How to optimize your posts:

First, let me stress that shareable, engaging content is more important than keywords. However, following a few easy steps can help increase your organic traffic and reach more relevant readers.

1.  Keywords: Choose a keyword phrase or two that best represents your post idea.  Ex: “How to cook spaghetti squash”

a. Use Google Keyword Planner and Google Trends to find the most popular (most searched) way to phrase your keywords. Compare multiple phrases to see which has the highest traffic (low-medium competition is best). There are tons of keyword tools out there, but these are quick, easy and free, so start here.  For the example above, other search phrases might include “best way to cook spaghetti squash” and “how to bake spaghetti squash”

2.  Title: Your post title is possibly the most important aspect of your blog post. This will entice people to click, shows up in social media sharing, is usually your H1 tag for SEO, etc. Titles with the most clicks often include: “How-to”, “Mistakes,” “Secrets,” Questions (people are typing full questions into Google more often now) and lists. Examples include: “3 Ways to Cook Spaghetti Squash,” “The secret to cooking perfect spaghetti squash,” or “4 mistakes people make while cooking spaghetti squash.”  Keep your title under 60 characters and be sure to include your keyword phrase. This will most likely be used for your title tag.

3.  Title Tags: Google will show about 60 characters. Include keyword phrase(s), but don’t overdo it.

4.  URL: Include your keyword phrase(s) — you can shorten it to use just the main keywords, use dashes rather than underscores, and use all lower case letters.

5.  H1 tags & Header tags: The H1 tag is usually your post title. Make it engaging and include your keyword phrase(s). Secondary headers are a great way to break up the content. They also cue readers (and search engines) in on what your post is about if they quickly scan it. Use closely related keywords in the header tags.

6.  Meta-description: Google shows about 160 characters. The meta-description is not used for ranking in search engines, but what you put here will encourage people to click on your link. Use an alluring snippet from your post, a call to action, or write a short introduction to the post, such as, what problem will reading your post solve for readers? Google won’t always use what you enter. Sometimes it will pull text related to the search query, but it can still be a good idea as a backup.

7.  Content: I mentioned having engaging content. Make sure you also use your keyword phrases within your blog post. You only need to use a few related phrases once or twice. Focus on your writing and don’t keyword stuff*.

Bonus Tip: Use phrases to link to other posts you’ve written, too. This will keep the reader engaged in your blog longer and will signal to search engines that your blog is cohesive and organized. Make sure to have the link open in a new window.

8.  SEO Plugins: If using WordPress, grab a free SEO plugin. Yoast All-In-One is highly recommended.

Visual Example:

When searching for “how to cook spaghetti squash,” this is what the post looks like in Google. Lindsay appears on the first page for this search.

In no time you’ll get the hang of optimizing your posts and be able to draw more organic traffic to your blog!

*A note on keyword stuffing: Keyword stuffing is when you use your keyword phrase as much as you can. Not a good idea! Google has evolved and it’s now recommended to use similar phrases so Google can get an idea of what your post is about.

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Huge thanks to Danielle for sharing her expertise today!

Enjoy!
–Lindsay–

LEARN HOW FOOD AFFECTS YOUR BODY.

Get my free Table Talk email series where I share bite-sized nutrition information about carbs, protein, and fat, plus bonus information about snacks and sugar!

Hi Friends!

I’m gonna let you in on a little secret. Not everything that comes out of my kitchen is a smashing success! Shocking, right?! Every once and a while, I like to share some of my recipe fails so we can all have a good laugh!

Ready?

These were some sort of baked black eyed peas…with cranberries…it didn’t end well.

Banana oat pancakes that did nothing but stick to the pan.

Buffalo cauliflower that tasted nothing like the buffalo wings  it was supposed to replace.

This is what you call a biscuit fail.

Sweet potato chews- good in theory, bad in practice.

Multiple baked good mishaps…Looks pretty, tasted like cardboard.

Edamame hummus that looked really good but had zero flavor.

Toffee explosion…didn’t make for good pictures (but I did still eat this one!)

I tried to modify my tried and true pot pie recipe several times. No good!

The eggs did not stay contained like they were supposed to.

Lentil Oat Crackers. Made about 4 batches and got pretty close but couldn’t get them just right…

Low sugar pear sauce fail.

Cheesy bean dip that just wasn’t quite right, even after 2 attempts.

So there ya have it! What’s been your biggest recipe fail lately?

Enjoy!
–Lindsay–

LEARN HOW FOOD AFFECTS YOUR BODY.

Get my free Table Talk email series where I share bite-sized nutrition information about carbs, protein, and fat, plus bonus information about snacks and sugar!

Happy Holidays!
–Lindsay–

LEARN HOW FOOD AFFECTS YOUR BODY.

Get my free Table Talk email series where I share bite-sized nutrition information about carbs, protein, and fat, plus bonus information about snacks and sugar!