Life had been so busy after moving and school starting and I have not been taking the best care of myself. I don’t find the time to always exercise, I am not eating the most healthy meals and I snack too much. I have been thinking a lot about how to instill healthier habits in myself and in my family. I know there’s a lot I need to work on for myself and I want to be a better example of having healthy habits for my children. I was thinking of all the different things I could do to help them to be more healthy and active, but I can’t teach them unless I am doing it myself. My kids are pretty active for the most part, but all of us could be doing a little better!! I’ve been thinking of things I need to do myself to be more mindful about my health. Here is what I came up with!
5 Ways to Instill Healthy Habits in Your Children
Drink Lots of Water – Make sure your kids are drinking at least 7-10 glasses of water every day. Water is so important for them to be drinking. I know a lot of kids that have said they don’t like water and that they only drink soda or juice. It is so important to cleanse our bodies and give it the water that it needs.
Unplug and Get Active – I recently read an article about getting our kids off of electronics and how it is ruining their brains. In the article it said children these days are looking at a screen between 7 and 8 hours a day. I could not believe that fact although I’m sure it is true for the most part. I feel like the less screen time my kids have the happier they are. Even though they might not think that that is true.
Image from LDS.org
I have one son, he’s 5 ,and he loves screen time, especailly the LeapPads, and he could play it all day. We let our kids do about one-and-a-half hours a week plus they get to watch a movie when we go out on our date night and maybe one family movie a week. I’m not telling you to do what to do in your family, but limiting our kids from screen time is super important! Our kids should be playing with friends, being outside, playing games or doing something productive! We tried to spend at least two hours a day outside of our home although I think most of the time, except in the hot hot summers, we are outside more than that. My kids love being involved in outside sports so we spend a lot of time at games and practices! My son started tackle football this year and my mother heart is nervous ever game, but he LOVES it! We love to go to the park, play in our backyard, jump on the trampoline and go swimming!
Play is disappearing at home, in school and in communities. 70% of moms played outside when they were kids, 31% of their kids play outside today. Balanced and active play lays the foundation for a skilled, healthy, resilient and human being!
Eat 3 Healthy Meals a Day – Eating 3 healthy meals a day is so important Don’t skip breakfast because your body needs that food to create energy throughout the day! So many people either skip meals or snack way too much. It’s important to not skip meals and to eat 3 well balanced meal each day.
Make Sure Snacks are Healthy Snacks – All kids get hungry for a snack now and then. My boys, I have 4, are eating us out of house and home. They love snacking, but I don’t buy the typical ‘snack food’. I buy fruits, veggies, cheese sticks, yogurts and whole grain crackers. Occasionally I do like buying yummy bars with no processed sugar in them. I have two kids that eat totally sugar free and we love these CLIF Kid Zbars.
They are made with organic ingredients, are Non-GMO, and have good nutrients for active kids. They also appropriate portion sizes for kids in flavors they love and have no high fructose corn syrup, artificial flavors (or synthetic preservatives). 
This is how my kids feel when there aren’t any more…
Be an Example as Parents – We as parents need to be our children’s main example of incorporating healthy habits into our lives. We need to show our kids by example that they need to be active, eat healthy, drink water instead of soda, and unplug and get outside!
Image from LDS.org
Insuring that our kids are active and eat good foods isn’t all that hard. Get them off of their electronics and teach them why they need to be active and eat healthy food and be an example as a parent of these things! If we start young it makes it a lot easier! What are you going to do to get outside and get active today?
I was selected for this opportunity as a member of Clever Girls and the content and opinions expressed here are all my own.
