Hello and welcome!!
Welcome to my little corner of the web! My name is Amanda and I’m so excited to share my love of cooking and eating with you! My goal with this site is to help folks create a lifestyle for themselves and their families that encourages healthy, but still delicious eating. And doing it a way that’s realistic for the busy world I know we all live in.
I’ve always loved to cook. There is nothing I enjoy more than creating something delicious and sharing it with my family and friends. I collect cookbooks, pour over recipes, fantasize about building my dream kitchen, and get as much excitement out of getting a new kitchen gadget as others do a pair of designer shoes (though don’t get me wrong, I love those too).
My husband and I live in Vancouver, WA with our combined five kids, ages 13-7, and our two giant Norwegian Forest cats, Bjorn and Linie. In addition to raising our huge family, I also work full time as an Investment Advisor, as does my husband. We have a hectic schedule that includes acting as our kids’ personal Uber drivers, traveling for work at least once a month, and somewhere in there, trying to run a household and keep everyone thriving (or some days, just keep everyone alive).
When the COVID pandemic forced us all to camp out at home, I decided it was finally time to commit to getting myself as healthy as possible. I have struggled with weight issues since I was a child and I saw this forced slow down as my opportunity to make some big changes. I signed up for the Health Management Resources (HMR) diet after doing a ton of research. The program took a lot of commitment, but it worked wonderfully and I lost over 50lbs. Once it was time to move out of the super restrictive phase one of the HMR program, I knew I needed to have a plan to make sure I could maintain all that hard work, but I also saw that I needed to make a commitment to helping my family get healthy too. At the time two of our five kids were classified as overweight, and two were classified as underweight. Trying to feed everyone in a way that was right for them seemed insurmountable. But through countless hours of research, trial, error, tears and successes, I finally feel like I have my arms around it and we are all enjoying the new healthy lifestyle. Through hours of talking with friends who were experiencing the same type of struggles, I decided to start this site to share my experiences and the things that worked for us in the hopes of helping even one other family make a change.
Cooking should be enjoyable, and planning healthy meals for your family shouldn’t be an overwhelming challenge. I don’t have it all figured out yet (who does, eh?) but I’m excited to share my experience with you!
Bon appetit!
Amanda, with assistant chefs Bjorn and Linie
