Moving Forward

Here I am 3 years later. The PURE Bar launched in 2006 and now my kids have something fun and brightly colored to open in their lunch. They also have a delicious way of getting Omega 3 fats, vegan protein, lots of high antioxidant organic fruit and NO refined sugars. I believe so strongly in the PURE Bar and what it stands for. My kids make their own lunches now and they still choose one almost every day. I eat one all the time for breakfast and my husband always has them in his car and golf bag. My friends and their kids eat PURE Bars. My parents and in-laws eat them. My goal is to get a PURE Bar into as many hands as possible. This is why I will NEVER compromise on the ingredients or the nutritional profile. I truly believe The PURE Bar represents the way we should all be eating, as much as possible. And all this stemmed from a 6 year old’s curiosity turned into conviction.

My day to day consists of a lot of running the Pure Bar company, but also continuing to educate myself on good nutrition and of course being a mom and wife, friend and daughter. Trying to do what we all try to do -live a balanced fulfilled life, focus on what’s important and not stress about the little things, (like my husband making half the bed…his half. Who does that??), trying to find joy in whatever I can ( can joy be found in my husband making half the bed? Maybe tomorrow he will make 3/4^th of it?)

All of this is a “one day at a time” thing. And the older I get the more I really try to savor each day and enjoy the little things; like today when Noah (5) said, “Mom I’m glad you have me.” That was cool.

Birth of PURE Bar

Through researching vegetarian eating with my daughter, I began to become educated on true pure nutrition. I learned about Organic, about eating whole foods in their natural state, as close to the farm as possible. I learned the science behind raw foods (L)and why eating Organic, Raw, and Vegetarian was so healthy and so important I began to experiment with different recipes and cook in a very different way. My husband bless his heart was supportive “You just cook your vegetarian way and if I want meat I’ll eat it for lunch or something” (4 years later he eats almost all vegetarian-some fish. A true healthy flexitarian diet + Oreos J).

I began to cook almost exclusively vegetarian and incorporated raw food into every meal. (Please know that there was and is nothing gourmet about this, we’re talking pasta, a salad and fresh peach cut up). Baby steps were the key, no pressure, if we ordered pizza one night I added cut up veggies, and some fruit to the kids’ plate.

Lunch box food was a real challenge for me. How many peanut butter sandwiches can a kid eat? I did fresh fruits, veggies, hummus, chips and salsa, but honestly, Anna was feeling really out of it…

The other kids: EWWWWW what’s that?

Anna: It’s called hummus

The other kids: That’s gross

She wanted a packaged food like everyone else. Something fun with bright colors she could open like all the other kids. I searched the natural stores for a healthy organic energy bar, something convenient that contained whole foods, no refined sugar . Big NOTHING. At the time there was really one organic bar and she hated the taste.

So back at home a few weeks later I was making a raw peach pie. The crust was organic dates and almonds. I thought it would be a great consistency for a bar and I just started adding things I thought were healthy- walnuts for Omega 3 fats, brown rice protein, agave nectar to sweeten it up and cocoa to make it taste like a brownie. It took a long time to get it just right, but I was kind of on a mission. I would make a pan of these raw chocolate brownies and cut them with a reindeer Christmas cookie cutter that I reshaped into a square (the reindeer cookies never turned out anyway-ears always fell off). I would wrap them in wax paper and put them in the fridge and pull them out for lunches and treats. “Anyone want a brownie?” hahaha if they only knew what they were eating. The first PureBar had been born.

Daughter Becomes Vegetarian at 6

At the age of 6 my oldest daughter declared herself a vegetarian. It went something like this:

“Uh mom, what am I eating?”

“That’s chicken sweetie”

“Chicken? Like Chicken from the farm, like Chicken Little?”

“Um well yes chicken from the farm”

Long pause.

“So do we wait till they get old and die and then cook them?”

“Well, no”

Long pause

“Mom, what else do we eat?’

At this point I could tell this was not going to be good. I could see her little mind spinning and making connections…beef-cow pork-pig lamb, duck, etc. After I explained to her what we typically eat and don’t eat (dogs cats) I could tell she was horrified. And seriously I could see it through her eyes. We humanize animals in all the story books and then we serve them up for dinner, kind of freaky if you think about it. So a few meatless days later she approached me and very excitedly announced she was going to become a vegetarian (and then proceeded to explain to me that there are these people in the world called vegetarians who actually don’t eat meat… heard it on Animal Planet…)

So what does a mom do? I will say I have made some poor mom decisions in my life (like the time I MADE my daughter go to church “Get your butt in the car NOW” because I thought she was faking illness and she threw up all over my car) but this time I pulled out a good one. I told her we would research what it would take to become a healthy vegetarian, what foods we needed to eat, how we would have to change our diet. So we sat down and started to Google. I didn’t know it then, but this was a start of a drastic change in my family’s life. One I am grateful for everyday, and the coolest part is that it came to me through the wisdom of my child.

Hello World!

I bet you’re wondering who I am and why I’m here…… I would say I am pretty typical. I love my kids with all my heart; I struggle to balance life, work, family, and friends. I try to focus on what is important…really important (dishes out of sink: not so important, kids off to school happy: important). It’s not always easy. I am 37, married to my best friend, or friend, or just the guy I married depending on the day.

I am the founder of the PURE Bar which adds meaning, lots of stress, and a certain amount of ego and positive reinforcement, to my life. All necessary I’ve realized for me to feel balanced. I am a better wife and mom, a better friend when I have something that engages me outside of my relationships. I think that is pretty typical of all of us.

I am blogging because I am passionate about the thread that links us all together, how my ideas about purposeful eating and balanced living can connect with others and their ideas can connect with me and on and on. One of my favorite videos is the guy dancing with people all over the world. I get emotional whenever I see it because it shows how alike how connected we all are. I see people all around me embracing change for the better, living more eco-consciously, rejecting the fake and the processed for the simple, the real and the important. This makes me proud and ultimately reinforces the idea that we are all more similar than we realize, we are working toward a better world, and we are connected in so many ways.

Thank you for taking the time to read my blog. It’s who I am and what I believe. I hope you will take the time to share with me who you are and what you believe in too.

Veronica