If your family did not reach the conclusion to become vegan by unanimous vote then you may have to do some convincing. Then again maybe not! Whatever the situation here are a few reasons to share with your family why going vegan is good.

1. You will save money. Replacing meat with more vegetables and fruit is estimated to cut food bills by an average of $4,000 a year. That’s a family vacation a year or some other type of fun.

2. You are saving your heart. Heart disease is running rampant; not only among adults but children as well. Children as young as age 3 who are raised on fast food and junk food show early signs of heart disease, according to the Bogalusa Heart Study done at the Louisiana State University. Cardiovascular disease is found in one in nine women aged 45 to 64 and in one in three women over 65. The average American male eating a meat-based diet has a 50 percent chance of dying from heart disease. So heart disease is now targeting everyone in your family.

3. Longer life. According to a study done by Loma Linda University, vegans live about 15 years longer than meat eaters. I don’t know about you but I look forward to living and enjoying life as long as I can.

4.  You can eat the cookie dough raw and not worry about salmonella. Now that is a plus for the kids and well, maybe the adults too. The one thing I love about preparing vegan meals is the option to taste before I cook to make sure that it is just right.

5.  For the children this one is a biggie. You can help save animals. I would demonstrate this by watching Animal Planet, going to a nice zoo, or just talking about it because kids love animals. If you have a pet that helps as well. Tell your children that by going vegan you are eliminating animals and that going vegan will help save them. Ask them if they want to see their favorite animal killed and eaten.

There are many reasons to become vegan. What you have to do is decide which ones are best to share with your family. Visit vegan and vegetarian sites like Vegan Society and GoVeg.com and allow your family to learn more about becoming vegan. You can even order their free Vegetarian Starter kits to share more information with your family.

In my experience in working with vegan families, I have found that the adults tend to be more resistant than the children. So in the event of a spouse or other adults in the house, I suggest that you gather the research and plead your case.

If you have a hard time convincing your spouse to go vegan seven days a week, see if he will be okay with eating vegan a few days of the week. If he challenges that the kids will not get the nutrients they need, then show him the “Get Your Nutrients” section of this e-book and direct him toward the Physician Committee for Responsible Medicine where he can read about a group of doctors, (not quacks, but real doctors), who encourage the vegetarian/vegan diet and provides information and resources for those seeking to know more.

For the life of me I will never figure out why it is so hard for people to accept change, but it is. Being a vegan is no different than being a meat eater. Meat eaters do not get their proper nutrients just because they eat dead flesh. It is the live food that matter most.

Of course you can share that as well.

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This article is an excerpt from Transitioning Your Family With Ease. For more ideas and advice on moving your family to a healthy vegan diet, including a sample meal plan, recipes, and planning tools. check this e-book out today.

One for the first items you will want to remove is those packets of Kool Aid and other dry juice mix products. Unless they are made from whole fruit, you can forget any nutrition being a part of it. Juice is not a big thing in my home. I make fresh lemonade, herbal teas, and hibiscus punch. Green tea has many beneficial antioxidant effects which help fight disease in the body and as an extra bonus has been shown to help speed up weight loss. Every now and then we buy juice but it is always 100% with no extra additives. A wise thing to keep in mind with juice is that frozen brands of juice have more 100% versions than the bottled.

Most juice has been sweetened and even 100% natural juices make it easy to consume more calories than when you eat fresh fruits. Some fruit juices have up to 150 calories or more per glass.  If juice is not 100% fruit juice it is usually loaded with high fructose corn syrup which gives you a false sense of energy and then brings you way down. Plus, what it converts to in your body is nothing but fat and possibly bad teeth.

And as far as soda, the bottom line is that it is toxic for the body (even the sugar free varieties). There is zero nutritional content in a soda and yet we seem to drink tons of it per year, causing a possible 8 to 20 pound weight gain. This stuff really isn’t good for your body and if you are a soda drinker you should make a pact to give it up altogether.  If that’s too much to start, than limit yourself to one per day until you can eventually wean yourself off it for good. I left sodas alone in November of 2005 and it has been a wonderful change in my life.

Why not just switch to water?

By switching to water as your main source of fluids you may be cutting out a huge number of hidden calories you didn’t even know you were consuming.  If you get bored of water add some lemons, lime, or other fruit for a different flavour. You can also try La Croix carbonated waters. Or add cranberry juice concentrate for some added colour.

The next thing you need to do is remove all hydrogenated cookies, cupcakes, and junk foods. Can you say sugar high?

Even most crackers are bad for us. There are a lot of artificial ingredients in a box of crackers, not to mention that the sodium intake is usually out the roof.

A serving of 5 Keebler’s Original Townhouse cookies has 80 calories with 40 of them being fat calories. There are 140 milligrams of sodium and a transfat issue. Transfat is that fat that does not run through your arteries like saturated, but rather it lingers and collects causing issue with the heart and arteries. Now that is only for 5 crackers. I used to eat an entire row of those crackers.

Then there are Oreos, Chip Ahoy and other cookies. Another fat converter!  Forget about how appealing they may look they are full of junk!

Why continue to put these items in your pantry?  It may satisfy you for a moment but the long term effects are not worth the efforts.

There are wholesome alternatives on the market.

If you want the cookies and crackers, look for product lines like Newman’s Own, Late July, and Yum Yum Snacks. No one said you couldn’t enjoy snacks, just get rid of the bad stuff.

What about peanut butter and jelly. I love a good peanut butter and jelly sandwich, however we use only all natural brands or make our own. My husband, Rupert, made a wonderful peach jam for breakfast one morning and it only took him about 20 minutes to make it with fresh peaches.

Other ideas for healthier snacks are nuts, raisins, hummus and pita bread or chips and salsa. Also try having a couple of pieces of fresh fruit on hand daily as a quick healthy snack.  Keep these items on hand so you aren’t tempted to grab something less appealing for a healthier home.

One thing I do is grab a handful of nuts like almonds or pecans and an apple. I eat the two together and have a glass of water afterwards. This combination keeps me full until my next meal time.

Snacks are fun, but they need to be healthy and wholesome as well.