It's the cheap foods that have all the fillers w not so much nutrition that cause the weight gain. And sluggish kids. The good foods that I pay more for are what keep your sodium down. Keep less estrogen from your body (causes fat storage).

Buy simple and keep things simple. Flavor w garlic, onion and pepper instead of salt. Use Olive oil or canola instead of vegtable oil. Use real butter that comes with natural nutrients, instead of soyoil with added in flavoe and nutrients (margerian). Carrots, broccoli, apples, bananas... keep the staples in the house. Chicken, pork and steak are good things to eat. And maybe use that smaller "salad" plate instead of the 10"-12" dinner plate for portion control.

My market bill is actually less then if I was buying all the processed stuff. Learn how to shop and what to watch for. My kids (and friends) love the stuff I cook. MSN.com also has great meal ideas usually w nutritional info attached.

PS Read the article. Washington does a lot of BS stuff (lived in area 8 yrs). But at least Michelle Obama has peoples attention on this. Leave the DVD on the store shelf and buy what is needed not just wanted.

Sincerely a 40 yo out of shape yet still fit mom of 3 who is on an already very limited budget.

If you had read the article, you would see several examples of how her campaign has already spurred changes in the food industry. I rather agree with your assessment that people will continue to buy cheap foods, but her campaign has addressed that issue by going directly to the manufacturers and grocers.

Not mentioned in the article is the GOP is attempting to block her nutrition bill because it means "big government." I'm not try to be partisan here, but some bills just make sense. So why kill a bill that requires schools to remove the red bull dispensers and actually serve healthy food? GOP says that the feds are imposing on the "state's rights." Red Bull gives money to the schools to have their machines in there. Why not just sell crack to the high school students? We can do away with lunches all together as all the crack head teenagers won't be hungry, and I'm sure there is a huge profit margin on crack if you let the free market have a stab at it? Ok, so maybe not much substance to this particular post of mine, but this is just stupid to try to deny this bill.

This is not "government" passing a law, do this or else, this is a celebrity using her influence as a "bully pulpit" to persuade people to eat right. I've no problems with this, in fact, I applaud it.

That being said, my sister is a 5th grade teacher in a poor area of rural Colorado. She says that the free lunch is the only decent food many of her children get and she believes that, if they are not allowed to serve potatoes and their district can't afford anything else, her kids in danger of going hungry. Common sense must be used sometimes - if you're hungry, potatoes are much, much better than the alternative of nothing.

Mike........

I agree with you post of many children only getting a real meal while at school...and of course the affluent areas offer more healthy choices.

But I would like to have the understanding that all foods served to kids impact their health both now and in the future as they are seeing what is a standard set before them.

In short.....

Let's keep the foods that are found in nature and are colorful....not BROWN!

Not allowed to serve potatos? Now isn't that just stupid! Did someone forget to tell them that potatos are vegetables? They don't have to be deep fried either to be good.

Potatos are veggies.....but not very healthy ones. Thats the point....potatos are a starchy carbs, which is really sugar that turns to fat if not utilized immediately.

One apple will give one snack to one person for one afternoon. In my house, a bag of cheetos will give my family small snacks for two months or more (or until they go stale- which is what happens most of the time).

Apples are pricing between $1.79-2.99 per pound. A pound lasts our family a week or so. The price of a pound bag of Cheetos is around $1.79 per pound bag.

What's cheaper for us? The math is pretty simple.

...

I call bulls@#t on a bag of cheetos lasting 2 months. A single serving bag of cheetos from a vending machine is about a buck. A single apple is around 40-50 cents where I live. Apple<Cheetos, and better for you.

cheetos may be cheaper now, but what about all the expenses of multiple copays when children are sick because they have poorer immunity from malnutrition, develop insulin resistance, high blood pressure...what about the cost to them as adults when they are dealing with heart attacks, diabetes, strokes? what about all the copays for medicines they have to take every single day for things that are preventable by good nutrition and exercise? invest in your kids good health...fight for cheaper healthier snacks, easily accessible fruits and veggies. be a voice. help the rest of us that are trying to be that voice as well. make sure your kids are getting good nutritious food in schools. ask questions. be a voice.

amen!!

If it takes a family of four a month to eat a bag of Cheetos (and any other junk food- my kids simply would rather eat more healthy things BY CHOICE- not by force!!!), what's the gripe? Get a LIFE people!!!! Really...a tiny serving is going to lead to obesity and illness due to disease. Seriously??!!!

Smoker's addiction is obvious; you can see them smoke. What about a person who is overweight purchasing a snack for friends (and not themselves)? I buy things that would be considered "unhealthy" yet don't eat them; many! I will sometimes get them at the store for other people, say, for an office food day.

So if a person in a store gets something "not approved", they need to be stopped in the store and assaulted? Every person you don't think fits YOUR perception of "ok" needs to be driven out of society? Unless it is to give a strange glance to them if they get the Big Gulp and fries by themselves (and this would be a change exactly how? I see this done to folks all the time- they're already stared at, laughed at...etc)....If they are overweight it is likely not obvious what underlying issues could be there. The key here is unless they tell you, you cannot tell.

The ad-nauseum repetition of the FALLACY that "there is no possible underlying condition" for a person to be overweight does not make it FACT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

News flash "Mom of Four" if you want to see people "shamed" due to their weight; go to any grocery store, restaurant, or other public location. Carefully watch how others react to an overweight participant/customer. It might open your eyes. It happens often, every day, most everywhere. It does, on occasion, even turn violent.

Fat people always have a huge beverage in their hand. Carrying all that weight makes them really thirsty apparently.

Until portion sizes are regulated, weight gain is a losing battle. People are hard-wired by evolution to finish whatever is put in front of them.

There is no way Starbucks should be able to sell a 30 oz cup of coffee. Fat people can't say no to that. And then we all pay for their triple by-passes. Waist line inflation = Health care inflation.

Sure; I am well known for my "extra large" beverage. I take it with me twice a day. To the water cooler. Where I fill it with ice, and filtered water!

I never have, and never will, drink coffee.

I'd love to see how someone would "regulate" the portion size that comes in one's own home; Big Brother anyone? Cameras? Spies? Interesting...

Mom of Four, I feel for your kids and oldpeoplesuck, you must be related to her right???

I'm a big girl, and I carry BIG glasses of WATER. I eat out I get water, I sit at home I drink water, when I try to workout I have water. I am destroyed by people daily when I attempt to make a difference in my life!! I am treated like filth, and a disgusting vile object when I try to work out at a gym. You people tell us to workout, to eat less and loose weight well tell me HOW when you destroy a person emotionally??? There should be a law passed that would allow me to slap each person who tries to rip me to pieces. Though I don't go quietly, I am PROUD to say I have now dropped 70 pounds!! I still have a ways to go and every day I put up with Elitist jerks like you.

Mom of four, I just have to ask, do you make your kids cry?? Do you say mean things to them if they eat that piece of chocolate or if they have something other than water to drink??? Are you the kind of awful parent who goes and pats their child on the back if they're projecting their previous meal in the bathroom??

@NyNy, I know how you feel. I had people insult my weight before. I'm still too embarrassed to go out and excercise, so I've been doing pushups, situps, leg raises, tricep exercises, and working out on my elliptical machine in the privacy of my home. I've lost weight, and I don't go quietly either when hassled about my size. Most people who make that mistake don't repeat it. I hate people who shame the overweight, because we're already trying to drop the pounds and get into shape without them being so insensitive and shoving it in our face.

Mom of four-I believe the drop in smoking was because they became so expensive. Perhaps we should put an extra tax on junk food. Then perhaps people would make better choices because the price would be about the same.

To those that have said that people are critical of larger people-please don't sterotype, not all people do this. While I am not a large person, I have several loved ones that are. I see the looks that they get, but I also see the compassion from those that want to help and encourage.

I believe in the rights of individual rights....but for goddness sake, let's move!

Taxes won't do it, and you won't get by 'big brother' anyway because the majority of obesity occurs in the poorer sections of society. However, for everyone of you 'water-drinkers' there are 12 giant soda-suckers. When my kids were younger and had friends to dinner, they (friends) would ask where the coke was, my kids would tell them that we had milk or water for dinner, we had soda 1X/ week--that's all.

We went out for hamburgers or pizza maybe once a week, my family was an anomoly, but they weren't fat. And they weren't at the Dr's being sick.

Maybe the answer is education, limiting what types of foods can be purchased with food stamps, bring phys. ed back to regular curriculumn in the schools, etc.

I agree that overweight people are already being shamed, and that it is not and will not help them lose the weight. In most cases there are likely complicated issues involved. I personally have been both overweight and literally anorexic. Society is such that when I was so anorexic that I was just about to be put into treatment everyone was telling me how great I looked and asking how I lost the weight! When I became overweight it was because of a medicine I was taking that caused me to be hungry all the time. As soon as I stopped taking the medicine, my weight dropped-in fact it dropped so fast, my nutritionist started to panic, thinking I was going into some kind of anorexic hyper metabolism. What people eat and why can be complicated, and I think all facets need to be addressed for each person. Of course I'm dreaming if I think there will be funds to pay for that. Still, the problem of obesity cannot be reduced to the simple things that have been stated here-at least I don't think it can.

This whole campaign against smokers and people of a larger size is just ridiculous and will be written about in history books like they do about old time snake oil salesmen and charletons. Another embarassing and shameful period in the history of humanity. It is analogous to the campaign to turn gay men straight, to make left handed children write with their right hands, to stop women from voting, to keep women from entering the workforce. Society used to think people who were left handed were criminally inclined! Seriously, it has to stop, there are so many more important issues to deal with in this state and country then to try to socially engineer certain groups of people.

Ugh, here we go again with Michelle Obama being called "obese". By NO medical standard could she be called "overweight"!! Really, get some help folks, you need it if you feel she has a problem with her weight. Wow. Prime example of what is wrong with this country; who could ever live up to the standards of the "model" proper size 0?

Only in the USA could a size 4 be overweight (not saying that Michelle is a size 4- this example comes from the movie "The Devil Wears Prada"). This elitist attitude is very detrimental to good programs that are really trying to help; setting up 3/4 of the population, who could only get to a size 0 by crash dieting to an extreme level and exercise more than 8-10 hours per day, for failure. More fodder for those who wish to bash others for their own amusement.

This is part of the reason we have so many problems with weight and image in this country.

Michelle Obama is at a perfectly healthy weight. She's fit, toned and muscular. Have you seen her biceps and shoulders in a gown lately? She in phenomenal shape.

Not every body is going to be a willowy, lean, size 2. People come in all different sizes and shapes. Until we get over this nonsense of clothing size, the number on a scale and bmi (which is the biggest load of horsesh*t), we are never going to figure out how to be healthy.

If you eat a ton of fruits and vegetables, limit processed foods and don't eat a pound of meat with every meal AND combine that with some physical activity most days a week, you will be healthy. And not necessarily rail thin. Not everyone has that body shape, nor should they try to achieve it if their ultimate goal is HEALTH.

Anne laws..........

Are you serious? You deem Mrs. Obama overweight?

Lets keep in perspective here about obesity and body image. She is in no way overweight or in need of loosing 20 pounds. She is the pillar of height to weight ratio with excellent tone.

Get a reality check and stop watching celebrity TV as facts.

you r correct it is not working. dont look at shoppers parents are not being held responsible for what they feed there children.changes are bein made in the schools need it or not. r they blind its not a hidden problem.

Nancy, it's going to take much more than just a year to see any results. Obesity is a problem that's been long building in this country. Our kids don't have sports or Gym, they have Xbox and cell phones. They don't bike to their friends house or to the park. The Soccer mom drives them.

What they should do is focus on particular schools. Lets say, first and 2nd graders. And work with THEM over the course of years. And see if the benefits are shown

I think it's a great idea. I'm not an Obama or a Michelle fan at all, but this does sound good. Lets see if it works.

Michelle Obama is not making laws. She's simply offering a good common sense program that everyone with any logic, would know that she's right with her suggestions of better eating!

Too many Americans look like they have burgers 'n fries for every meal!

Let the anti-Obama crowd begin....!

The government is only putting regulations on government-funded food (like Federally subsidized school lunches). Walmart and other companies are making these changes on their own, largely because their customers are starting to demand it.

everyone is grouped together because of the obese. i eat correctly at home now i cant have a treat at school because of the obese cant smoke because someone else does not like the smell or afraid of what the smoke may harm you thats all you and i am still punished whats next?

If you don't have anything constructive to say then don't bother posting. I'm really sick of hearing ignorant people make rude comments and lower themselves to name calling in order to feel superior over others.

A little weight issue or an obesity problem can be caused by several things. Chronic illness and poverty are 2 of the most common.

Let's face it, pasta is cheaper than chicken, and many households these days have to make hard choices between shelter, utilities and food. It's not necessarily a want, but a need to choose where sacrifices must be made. Look at the stories where an elderly person ends up eating cat food.

Work to find a solution instead of embarrassing yourself with rude, infantile, and cruel behavior...It just might make you a better person.

good for u.speakin the truth

What about the thin ones???