Lent is Over.

Well, some of you might be wondering how my lent went. If you don't remember, my goal was to be vegetarian for as many days as possible during lent. Well, there were weeks it went well, and weeks it didn't go so well. Since I'm cooking for my entire family, including my meat loving husband, father, and brother, I didn't push for vegetarian meals as much as I would have liked. I tried as much as I could to focus on vegetarian meals, and I've hardly bought meat (trying to save on the food budget), and usually only use what my mom buys on sale and sticks in the freezer.

It's one of those things that gets under my skin about living with my parents. My mom will eat anything, dad won't. He's picky, he's old fashioned, doesn't like to try any new foods and expects dinner ready when he comes home. He comes home by 4pm each night. Mr. Skinny doesn't come home until anywhere from 4pm, if he's only working 8 hours, to 6:30 or 7pm some nights. He misses me waiting until he comes home to have dinner together. We miss dinners together. It's so hard to balance it. I also miss splurging on certain ingredients because my dad is more of a quantity over quality guy. He's rather have cheaper food in larger quantities, while I'd rather spend time making just enough for Mr. Skinny and I. There are recipes that I would really like to try, but I know that I can't because we don't have the money to buy enough food for all of us. It's hard to find a balance.

Sometimes I go through spurts and say that Dad can find himself something to eat if he doesn't like my food, but we live here for free, and mom usually buys the staples (milk, bread, lunch meat, pantry staples, etc.) so I feel it's our responsibility to make dinner for all 5 of us, and on their schedule, not ours.

Anyways, sorry about the tangent. Needless to say, I didn't do as well this year as I was hoping. But, I've come to a conclusion, eating meat doesn't make me feel bad. My goal is to buy meat from a source I trust, and once we have our own house, and we're buying our own meat, I don't think we'll ever get there. My mom isn't on the same page as me in that aspect, and I can't force it on her. She knows I like to cook, so she'll buy things just for me to cook. I can't force my family to eat less meat, so right now I'm stuck. I'm focusing on more healthy, not as meat focused meals, but we're going to eat meat.

Also, when I go for a few days without meat, I don't feel like a changed person with so much more energy. Maybe it's because I'm pregnant, and not eating the healthiest of foods otherwise, but that doesn't bother me. I'd like to try this experiment every so often, and see if that changes. Especially once I'm working out again - I'd love to see how certain foods affect how my body feels. I'll revisit this again, but for now, I'll stick to eating meat, especially when someone else buys it and asks me to cook.

Did you give something up for lent?
What are you feelings about vegetarianism/veganism? Bandwagon or something to it?

Lenten Sacrifices.

I'm sure this isn't the first blog post you've read about giving up something for lent, and I'm almost positive it's not going to be your last. Sometimes, I feel like lent is a chance to break up those New Years resolutions that we all put on our ourselves, the eat better, be a better person, workout more resolutions. Considering that my New Years goals were pretty broad, this is sort of true for me, too.

Since lent is really based on a religious practice, a lot of people think we're crazy to give something up for 40 or 46ish days (depending if you go by Sundays are the exception philosophy), but it's to focus on the ultimate sacrifice that He gave. One that makes me teary eyed each time I think about it in my pregnant hormonal state. Since I am pregnant this year, and don't know exactly where I'll be in 46 days, I wanted to be an easily bendable ish sacrifice for myself.

My mom would give up sweets nearly every year. She never made us give up anything, but once I got old enough to realize what lent was really about, I always toyed with the idea of giving something up. Last year, I kind of mentioned on the blog about going vegetarian 2 days a week. This year, I'm going to be following the same routine, although trying to step it up. Since I am pregnant, if I get a craving for a big juicy steak, I'm probably going to indulge, but Mondays & Wednesdays will be vegetarian nights in this house. Honestly, only my mom and I are on board with this idea, and I'm sure the men in the house will complain about it each Monday & Wednesday. I'd really like to try to be a vegetarian the majority of the next 46ish days. If I eat meat, I'm going to try to only do it at dinner time, which shouldn't be too hard.

Being a vegetarian is something I toy with quite often, mostly because I don't agree with how the animals are treated that I'm eating. Ideally, I'd love to only eat meat products that I know where the came from, and be a vegetarian in all other cases. Hopefully, some day I'll get there.

In addition to going meatless as much as possible, I found a devotion that's specifically about lent, and will be reading that each morning. Moreso that just sacrificing something, I want to really focus on what this time is all about in my relationship with God. I've been pretty good about reading the devotions from my woman's Bible, but I want to focus on these next weeks and what that means to me. I want to grow closer in my relationship with God and be the best Christian and follower of Christ that I can be.

Tell me:


What are your feelings about lent?
Are you giving anything up this year?