My Vegan Family consists of my beautiful family of three: Myself – a 40-something year-old (young) woman, mother, artist, writer and educator, living in beautiful British Columbia with my partner and my 11 yr old daughter.  All posts are my own personal point of view, and not necessarily my family’s – although I do like to think I know them pretty well…

Me: I have been vegetarian since around 13 yrs old, and vegan for around 23 years now- ish.  I had been toying with the idea of moving to veganism for some time, and then one year, whilst in the US and eating too much processed cheese, I started to develop an intolerance.  Although this helped me take the leap, it wasn’t the reason I became vegan. I initially avoided milk and cheese, and it took another half a year or so for me to fully become vegan and not eat things that contained eggs as well.

Him (AKA The ‘Other Half’!): I met my partner over 20 yrs ago (wowee – how’d we manage that?!).  He was not vegan / vegetarian when I met him.  In fact, his diet was downright abysmal, if I recall (sorry hon!).  But I remember him being intrigued by my diet and being vegan.   Fast forward 2 – 3 years later and we were living together and he had made the leap and was a fully fledged vegetarian!  He is currently ‘almost’ vegan – in that he eats eggs – but is contemplating removing those from his diet shortly. [UPDATE: Feb 2018] Other Half is now fully vegan…no more eggs = woohoo!

Her: Our daughter is now a young teen (another wow).  We made the decision together to raise her vegetarian.  She has been vegan (her choice) since she was 11 yrs old – and is extremely proud of this.  She (as most children are) is an avid animal lover, and cannot conceive why anyone would want to eat an animal, when they don’t have to.  She is a healthy, active, curious, funny, intelligent little human being, and we are super-proud parents.

Part of the reason for this blog is to share some of our experiences as a vegan/veggie family – not just restaurant/food shares, but also emotional experiences, social issues, etc.  It’s not smooth sailing when the majority of people we work, play, go to school with are not vegan, and raising kids with their own fussy eating habits can also be challenging.  But by sharing our experiences, then we (and you) can maybe make a difference and help some others out there with what might lay ahead.