~guest post by MRS

As a rule, I don’t make resolutions, mostly because I’m terrible at keeping them. Like a lot of people, I think about things I need to change, activity levels, eating healthier, keeping our house cleaner, etc. Then I try really hard to accomplish these things for a few weeks, but before I know it I’ve missed a few days. Then a few weeks pass and I’ve slid back into the old habits. Our house is cluttered, I’m spending too much time on our couch and I’m thinking, “What diet?”

I know I’m not the only one who does this.

But as I think about what our life is going to look like this coming year, potential job changes, growing kids and more involvement in our family farm. I realize, that eating healthy foods plays a huge roll in our ability to accomplish those things.

Blue is a very busy toddler. He loves to play in the mud and is obsessed with trains, but he struggles with constipation. If we don’t give him enough fruits and vegetables to eat, he has painful bowel problems. So I buy fruit, lots and lots of fruit. And I feed it to Blue like it’s going out of style, but I don’t eat it myself. I sit down to lunch with Blue and he’s eating fresh fruits and veggies and what do I have? Generally, I’m eating a turkey sandwich, potato chips & drinking a can of pop. What am I teaching him by doing this?

Daisy is 6 months old now and we’ve recently started introducing her to solid foods. She is still deciding whether or not she likes them, but over the next few months we’ll transition her from a liquid only diet to a diet that isn’t just pureed fruits and veggies, but also finger foods. By the time her birthday rolls around, she’ll be eating mostly table foods. It’s hard to imagine that now, but the next 6 months will bring a lot of changes to Daisy. She’ll practically be a whole new kid!

As my kids grow, it’s increasingly important that HandyMan and I teach them what it means to be healthy. We need to drink water and not pop, eat fruit and vegetables instead of potato chips because if we just tell them how to be healthy without actually showing them what being healthy is, what are they learning? So it’s time to make some changes, to start practicing what we preach and leading by example.

Here goes nothing.

What are you hoping to change in 2012?