Health Challenge- Week One

The health of my kids are important to me. I want them to know how to make good food choices. I want the to stay active and fit. I want them to live life hydrated, contrary to my perpetual state of dehydration. I want them to enjoy foods, love their fruits and vegetables and know the difference between foods that help them grow and those that don't. Beyond knowing that sugar is bad and avoid fast food. I want to them to understand and embrace what it means to live and be healthy in all their lifestyle choices. This is why I am starting a 8 week Health Challenge.
I have been reading, yet again, The Family Nutrition Book by William Sears. I first borrowed this book from the library when I was pregnant with my first, 7 years ago. I insisted I own it and received it for a Christmas present during my second trimester. I devoured it then and made some great early childhood choices for my kids and their nutrition. As time has passed, fast food and many processed foods have crept into our diets. Candies and sugar, convenience foods high in fats and hydrogenated oils. I know that I can make the change in our families eating habits. Already in the last 3 weeks we have improved so much. Thankfully the kids are embracing it.
So the Health Challenge. Each week I will choose and area of our health or fitness that we can improve. Something very specific. This week it is drinking water. My kids like water. Most of the time it is what they ask for but I am never sure if they are drinking enough. As I was reading about it I came across a couple guidelines. Infants should be drinking, 1 and a half ounces per pound of their body weight. A 20 pound baby should be drinking 30 ounces of fluids. Breast milk, water, up to 4 oz of 100% juice. Adults should drink half an ounce per pound of body weight. So a 150lb adult should drink around 75 ounces per day. This includes liquid in soups, fruits, beverages and of course the preferred WATER.
So the challenge to my kids this week is to drink a 20oz bottle of water every day. They have the entire day to drink it. Each day they if they complete the challenge they get a sticker. Seven stickers at the end of the week and they earn a prize. Yesterday they each drank their bottle with no problem. Ideally their water intake would be a little more than the 20 ounces but I felt this was a good start and know that they get other fluids by fruit, soups and some juice.

So there you have it. Week One's challenge- Drink 20 ounces of water each day.

Stay tuned to see how it goes and what's next in our families health challenge. Oh yeah, one more thing, if you don't already own the above mentioned book. You should! It is an excellent resource. At the very least go out to the library and borrow it, to see for yourself.