Veggie Might!

I was thinking about my vegetable consumption while taking my shower today. What? It's not completely normal to think about spinach while washing one's hair? :P
I was trying to think about how many fruits and veggies I eat in a typical day. I think I usually get one serving of fruit at breakfast (there is usually some thawed frozen fruit in my yogurt or oatmeal), 2 servings of veggies in my lunch (I most often have beans and rice for lunch- I'm counting beans as one serving, and the veggies or salsa I add to the beans as another), a serving of fruit in the afternoon, and 1 or two servings of vegetables with my dinner (I need to determine if I'm eating half a cup of veggies (1 serving) or a cup (two servings). So that's 2 servings of fruit and 3 or 4 of veggies. I think I can do better than that!
I've read that active women need 4 servings of veggies and 3 of fruit. I'm also sort of hoping that eating more nutrients will help me catch fewer colds. I'm tired of coughing!
It's a little late to set a goal for Lent (confession- I had bacon pizza for dinner on Ash Wednesday), but I think I'm going to use Lent as my excuse and say that for the next 40 days I am going to try to eat at least 5 servings of vegetables a day. Bonus points for more than 2 servings of fruit.
I will do this in the following ways:
Green Monsters- I will have a Green Monster for breakfast several times a week
Veggie Lunches- I will be more vigilant about making sure there are lots of veggies in my lunches (salsa shouldn't really count). I will add a side of veggies if needed to my lunches. Also, if I want to eat out for lunch, I will hit up the grocery store salad bar, which I love to do anyway. :)
Snacks- I will try to add veggies to my snacks. (I'm not promising anything because I don't really like to snack on carrot sticks in the afternoon- I've tried. But I will try again!) I will also make a point to eat fruit for a snack every day.
Dinners- I will make sure to eat at least a cup of veggies at dinner, and try to cook two different veggies instead of 1.
Fun- I will try a new veggie each week. Yesterday I picked up a new salad mix. It has Mache (pronounced "Mosh," according to the front of the package) which was in all of the salads in Switzerland and is delicious!
Accountability- I will write down my servings of veggies each day and maybe blog about my totals on a weekly basis. I don't want to bore my readers too much! I'll also blog aboutveggies I ate that were particularly yummy.
Today since I've only had breakfast, I have only had one serving of fruit. It was in the form of cherries in oatmeal with vanilla, cinnamon, and almond butter. I bought some food at the Vietnamese New Year celebration we went to last night which is what I will be having for lunch. It is roast chicken with shredded cabbage. There is also cilantro and shredded carrots in the mix. I'm pretty sure there is a cup of veggies in there, but if not, I will eat some more carrots to account for the difference. So we'll say so far today I've had 1 serving of fruit and will have had 2 servings of veggies in a few minutes.

p.s. If anyone wants to join me, let me know and I'll share my google spreadsheet of veggie tracking awesomeness with you. :)