Personal and practical solutions
for Family Health and Home

A 5 step solution method

Hi, I'm Petro

Like you, I am passionate about keeping my family and home healthy. But what does ’healthy’ mean? And how can health be made practical enough so one can sustain it day by day through rain and shine and wind? What practical do-able solutions are there for feeding your family and cleaning your home that is good for them, good for the environment and above all, good for you?

I would love to have my own organic garden to supply our fruit and vegetables, but I don't like gardening.

I would love to only buy organic food but I can't afford it and it is not readily available.

I would love to sustain a wheat free, dairy free, partially-hydrogenated-fat free diet for my entire family, but - because I am partialy sighted - I cannot drive around to shop for suitable products.

I would love to use only lemon juice and baking soda as cleaning products, but they are not as effective as chemicals and they don't leave a pleasant lingering fragrance.

I would love to have a clean and pleasant home, but I hate housework. Fortunately, I also work and do not have time for it.

On top of all that any alternative solution costs money and I work with a limited budget.

What am I to do?

You also have your own practical constraints, because we are all unique with very real very heterogeneous contexts. You may work full time or are trying to work from home. You may be a single parent with two jobs and two kids. You may be wheelchair bound, or bound to living on a farm and can only go to town once a week. Perhaps you have 11 children or 11 dogs or only 11 minutes a day for cooking.

What are you to do?

I experiment with diets, nutritional supplements, cleaning solutions, ways of keeping your child happy, fed and busy while retaining your own peace of mind and I share them with you.

I share with you healthy but above all practical solutions for feeding your family, cleaning your kitchen and organizing the activities in and around it from my own experience. These solutions are good for your family, good for the environment and above all good for you - because they are do-able.

What I offer is my method and my means for finding those creative and practical solutions we so desperately need in order to make our lives run smoothly. Mine is a 5 step method. I am sure you have seen versions of it in other contexts, but here I offer it as a way of finding practical solutions for everything that happens in and around your kitchen.

  1. Reach the point of no return. Unless you reach a point where you are so dissatisfied with the current state of affairs, you will not be motivated to change it sufficiently for the change to make a significant difference.
  2. Gather info until you understand the problem. It is very hard to fix a problem unless you understand and are able to define it clearly. Gather info until you know exactly what is worrying you about your running of your kitchen, your eating or cleaning habits or all the work and play activities that happen in and around the kitchen?
  3. Make a step by step plan. One can get stuck on step 2 and never make a clear choice as to your course of action. So make a plan. A plan is a step by step sequence of things you can try. Make sure every step is small enough so you can start implementing it immediately.
  4. Execute the plan one step at a time. The planning stage is just as easy to get stuck on, especially if you like devising plans and programs. No plan is useful unless it drives you to action. Implement your plan one step at a time so you can discover which p[art of it works and which does not.
  5. Evaluate and adapt the plan to your practical context. You may have a 7 step plan and discover that you have made a significant enough difference by step 3. That is great; you have successfully implemented the plan. You may also find that step 6 flowed naturally after step 2 and 3 to 5 was obsolete. Great, let practicalities dictate the shape of the plan. Never get stuck on the plan as you devised it in theory. Practicalities will always have a say in its execution. Conversely, don’t abandon a plan because it is difficult to implement, there is a difference between adapting to practical constraints and being lazy or being a pushover. This brings me back to step 1. You really must have enough motivation to carry you through. So pick a plan that matches your levels of motivation so you can successfully execute it and make a real difference in your life.

The fact that you have found this site is probably a sign that you have already passed step 1. Your frustration and motivation has taken you to the internet and brought you here in search of information and solutions. This site will help you find the info you need in order to understand and define the problem. It then offers some plans you can try. You can follow them step by step as is, or make up your own combination of steps that matches your level of motivation.

I would love to hear from you about what worked for you and what did not. Your own practical constraints will be different from mine, but may overlap with those of another reader. So contact me me and share your step 6’s, your evaluations and adaptations.

And thank you for joining me in searching for the best practical solutions for our families.

Petro Janse van Vuuren

Petro Janse van Vuuren


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