It's a New Dawn, It's a New Day, It's a New Life for Me and I'm FUEEEELIN' GOOD!

I'll just come out and say it:  I HATE writing.  I love the end result, I love reading, but I absolutely 100% hate the actual process of putting my thoughts on paper.  I've always struggled with getting everything out, the way I want to say it...how I want to present it...and for most of the time will sit in front of the computer, staring at a blank screen.  Then I'll "find" something else to do - like straighten/organize the pencils & pens holder on my desk.  Or maybe stack papers & receipts on top of each other so that they are perfectly straight.  I might even be willing to bundle up all the recycling, because clearly it has to be done at some point (even if recycling isn't until next week)...until I absolutely, unequivocally MUST put my fingers to the keyboard and just GO.

So, with all that I just said, you may ask, "Why on Earth are you starting a BLOG?  Don't you know you have to write in order to have a blog?  Are you nuts?"

I have a feeling I may have a very neat desk and working space going forward.

Any-hoo...back to the task at hand.  I'm starting this blog because I love food.  I love food that is good for  my family and me...and dairy free due to my firstborn's allergy to dairy protein. That just might be what kick-started this whole good-for-us revolution in the first place.  I'm not saying I don't eat dairy (I love cheese & yogurt), but rather than torture my kid with sorry-you-can't-have-this-but-we-can, I've learned to make mostly anything without milk/cheese/sour cream, etc.  It's actually been fun and I've felt absolutely triumphant when I've finally figured out how to make something such as pudding without milk!

Long story short, when my daughter was 5 months old, she was diagnosed with a dairy and soy allergy.  Since I was nursing her, that meant all those allergens were coming from MY diet...so, I decided that rather than put her on formula (finding the right one can be difficult) I'd cut out all dairy and soy from my diet.  It was a huge wake up call to find that nothing I had in the house was dairy OR soy free, thus began my obsession with reading food labels.  Do you know they even put dairy in hot dogs?!  It took roughly 30 days to figure out the diet, another week or two to get it out of our systems, and viola!  A happy kid - no up-all-night crying fits, no crying-until-passing-out fits, no red bumpy rashes!  It also meant no more frozen dinner from a bag....no more soup from a can...which in retrospect was probably the best thing that ever happened to us.

So...it's been 9 years since that first foray into the world of whole, healthy food and I'd like to share my journey with anyone who might like to know.  Who knows what path this blog will take, or whether I might develop some sort of obsessive/compulsive disorder with cleaning during the ride...but I'm sure my family won't complain.