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snack board spread with colorful fruits and veggies and meats and crackers

Dinner for Snack Lovers

This month our blogs are all about making a meal out of your favorite snacks. Whether you enjoy cooking or not, sometimes you just do not want to spend time in the kitchen preparing a meal. Turning snacks into dinner allows you to have a tasty and nutritious meal for minimal effort.

Hard-Cooked Eggs

What an Egg-cellent Idea!

This month I’m sharing with you a recipe that is a bit unique. It’s our recipe for Hard-Cooked Eggs. Most people call them hard boiled eggs, but when I started working with Spend Smart. Eat Smart. I learned about this recipe and that eggs shouldn’t be hard boiled. To hard-cook eggs, the water comes to a full boil, but then the pan is removed from the heat and the lid kept on. The eggs continue to cook gently in the hot water. This method produces tender eggs. It also reduces cracking and the green color that can form around yolks when eggs are hard boiled.

children running on a trail in a wooded area on a sunny day

Finding Joy in Movement

Over the past several weeks, our Spend Smart. Eat Smart. team has been sharing some of our favorite ways to stay physically active. One of my goals as a parent is to help my kids develop a love for movement- something that feels fun, not forced. As Justine shared in last week’s family blog, finding activities that get your body moving and bring you joy is key to staying motivated.

family riding bikes together on a path

Moving as a Family

In our blog series this month, we are sharing about some of our favorite ways to be active. Last week Jody shared about her favorites on the blog. Jody is a hard act to follow because she is a physical activity pro. Check out our physical activity videos on the Spend Smart. Eat Smart. website for proof. I am not a pro at being active, but I try to move my body most days of the week. For me, being active is important because it gives me more energy, it improves my mood, and it helps me sleep better at night. Some of my time spent being active is alone, but I also enjoy being active with my kids. I have noticed that they experience the same benefits of being active as I do. Below are some tips I have learned over the years of us being active together.

two women riding bikes outside in the summer

My Go-To Ways to Stay Active

As the weather warms-up and the days get longer here in Iowa, I am looking forward to being active outside more. Over the past couple of years, one of my favorite ways to be active outdoors is going on bike rides. Last year was my first time riding a day of RAGBRAI. I rode with my colleague and fellow Spend Smart. Eat Smart. blogger, Justine Hoover. If you haven’t heard about RAGBRAI before, it’s a week-long bike ride across Iowa with overnight stops in different towns. Find out more at ragbrai.com. I like that it’s not a race and all ages and abilities participate. We had a lot of fun last year and are planning to ride another day this year. To prepare, I’ll spend some time on my bike on local trails.

A woman looking at canned food on the grocery store shelf

Can Processed Foods be Good for You?

As Heart Health month comes to an end, let’s talk about processed foods. We often hear that processed foods are bad for us. So, are there any benefits to processed foods?