First Day of Spring

Well, it's officially the first day of spring, but if you live in Northeast Wisconsin you wouldn't know it by looking out the door.  The ground is covered in a thick layer of white, and after yesterday's whipping winds the snow drifts across our driveway were inhibitive this morning, to say the least.  In fact, Hubby came in from his requisite snow blowing duty grumbling quite a bit more than usual, reporting that the 2-3 foot drifts were the worst he's had to snow blow all winter.  Add to that a temperature of 9 degrees and a windchill of 8 below, and that's definitely a harsh spring greeting.

Even the kids are getting tired of winter.

LG and I are stuck at home again today.  After optimistically thinking he was getting better yesterday, he proved me wrong.  It's not that he's sick sick, but he is not eating well and his energy is still low.  So, it's one more day at home for him to rest and recuperate.  Unlike yesterday and Monday, though, he does not have unbridled access to the cartoon channel.  Today really is for rest and recuperation.  That should hopefully bore him into wellness and a return to school by tomorrow.

In the meantime, I am not much fun for him either, as I seem to have caught some element of the kids' colds.  Either that or I read myself hoarse reading to the kids when they were down and out.  With a sore throat and stuffy nose and generally feeling a bit run down, I am unfortunately not in a position to spend a lot of time entertaining the little person.  After he's done resting here in a few minutes, though, maybe I can think of something for us to do that doesn't involve television or staring at the walls.  We'll see.

So, no workout for today.  With symptoms above the neck, I suppose technically I could run on the treadmill, but I really just don't feel like doing it.  Strangely, though, I feel a nice walk might do me good, so if LG is amenable to that I might give it a go later.

Otherwise, it's more cleaning, errands, and recipe experimentation for us today.  I didn't get around to the chocolate peanut butter spread, so I will definitely try that later today.  I need to whip up some peanut butter anyway, so why not?

Speaking of food, a little while ago, I was introduced to a site/blog called 100 Days of Real Food, and I was completely inspired by it.  As a whole food advocate but rather uninspired cook, I have really found this site incredibly fun to browse through the past few days.  Although Hubby and I tend to eat healthfully (in our minds) and eschew processed foods and junk for the most part, we are more lenient where our kids are concerned.  Dinners are more or less healthy for them, because they eat what we eat, but breakfasts and lunches tend more towards the processed crap that we ourselves won't eat.  Poking around 100 Days of Real Food has gotten me excited and determined, though, to see if I can't clean up the rest of their meals a bit more.

Of course, I am not perfect, and that is why I am playing with the idea of doing a cleanse of sorts....not a juice fast or anything extreme like that.  Rather, I am thinking for the first two weeks of April I will cut out the following and see how it goes: processed foods, sugar, dairy, alcohol, coffee, and gluten.  Will I have the courage to try that?  We'll see.  I am giving myself over a week to chicken out, but I do kind of like the idea.  I see it as a type of spring cleaning for the body.

Does anyone else do that sort of thing?