About Me

Project Veggie started with a suggestion from my daughter, Claire. She wanted to try being vegetarian for a month. With some reservations, I agreed. My son, Luke, was on board too (mostly). After our initial month of being very well fed vegetarians, we made the decision to continue eating meat, but we have substantially reduced the amount of it we eat. We still do many vegetarian meals, and even when we have meat, the veggies are often the highlight of the meal. I now have a much greater focus on cooking with whole and natural foods, eating locally and enjoying a cleaner, healthier diet. I truly believe good food can heal the body and soul. I won’t pretend that everything I cook is super healthy, but I would say I lean toward healthier dishes, with the occasional indulgence.

My name is April Arnold. I’m a single mom who loves to cook (and eat!), paint and make all sorts of cool stuff. I work as a graphic designer and muralist. You’d think being a graphic designer means I get to be creative all the time but that’s not always the case. So my creativity most often comes out at home. Food is a relaxing, fun outlet for me. It’s something I enjoy doing with the kids, who are both adventurous eaters, and like to help me cook. I love cookbooks but I also like just throwing things together. I’m lucky enough to have my kids and a few friends who don’t mind being used as guinea pigs for my experiments. My budget doesn’t allow for much eating out so we play with different foods at home instead and I can get my foodie fix without the big bill at the end of dinner.