Eating as much as I need to is hard work.  I pretty much eat all day long, and in-between-meal snacks are something I have to plan out lest I get caught without real food.  Here are some of my favorite snacks these days:

Green apples and almond butter (I ate half of it before I thought to take a photo)

Apples and almond butter are very high on the list.  Such a lovely contrast between the crisp, slightly sour apple and the thick, creamy almond butter.  The almond butter is a fantastic protein source, too.  Why not peanut butter?  Pregnant women are advised to avoid peanuts while pregnant because it may contribute to peanut allergies in their babies.

Baby carrots from the Downtown Growers Market

Raw veggies of any kind: celery, bell peppers, carrots, broccoli.  Right now, you can find carrots at almost every stand at our growers market.  The baby carrots are delightfully sweet and aren’t they cute?

Finally: smoothies and milkshakes!  Especially during the warmer months, these are a staple.  We’ve always loved smoothies (even pre-pregnancy).  Smoothies get yogurt or kefir, bananas, a touch of honey or agave nectar, and whatever fresh or frozen fruit we have around the house.

Milkshake with strawberries and raspberries

Milkshakes have two essential ingredients: whole milk and ice cream.  (Milk and especially whole milk is a prego thing.)  We might throw in some fresh fruit if we’re using vanilla ice cream. Milkshakes are not something we made pre-pregnancy but rather an occasional indulgence at our local coffee shop.  Now, they are something I can easily accommodate when I am not feeling hungry but know that I need to eat.  For example, if I don’t eat something between dinner and bedtime, I wake up starving around 3:00 AM.  Although I’m usually not hungry during this post-dinner period, I can somehow muscle down a milkshake with no trouble at all.

And finally, a comment on purchasing decisions:  I wish we could buy ONLY organic products (Actually, I wish there was no alternative and that everything was organic! I wish no one was dumb and greedy enough to spray poison on food for short term increased productivity and boosted profits…), but alas, it is just not possible.  So I use the dirty dozen list as a guide for which things MUST be organic and which things might be OK as not-organic.  Real food is always better than fake food, even if it can’t all be organic.

Now, off to find my next meal…