Did you know 5% of children age 2-5 were obese in 1980, and today that number has grown to 12.4%!  While I don’t like to spend much time on this blog focusing on the problem, this blog post (sent to me by Lisa) offered many solutions!

Runnerdude said, “Another big culprit is our busy, non-stop lifestyles providing much less time for meal planing and preparing meals at home where you have better control over content and portion size.“

Are we too busy as a family that we don’t have time to make a decent meals for the ones we love?  If so, some things need to be cut from your life.  I am currently guilty of this one.  (which may get worse because I did not do well on my first chemistry test!)   On busy days, I simply don’t take the time to prepare healthy food for my kids or myself.

Second solution:

Exposing kids to a variety of fresh foods and eating them with your kids will help. Kids watch what you do. If they see you eating healthy foods, they’re more apt to eat healthy foods.

Couldn’t agree more!  Kids should be exposed early and young to a variety of foods!

And here is my favorite one:

Take a walk with your kids each afternoon before dinner (even if it’s only 15 or 20 minutes). This also provides you time to talk to your kids about their day.

I am going to do this!  I think this is the best way I can get away with my kids and connect with them after we are away from each other all day.  There are so many things at home that distract me.. the phone, email, dinner, etc. that my kids don’t get my full attention.  If I can’t spare 15 minutes to walk with my family, then we really have too much going on!

Remember: Teach healthy habits to your kids young.    Kids overweight by the age of 8 will most likely become overweight adults.

Related articles:

Childhood obesity with Jared

Friday: Activities and Exercise

I purchased sidewalk chalk with the intention of drawing fun pictures on a sunny warm day.  My kids couldn’t wait however.   It rained for a whole 30 minutes the entire week, right when they got home from school. But they couldn’t wait for the clouds to clear.

Ketchup boy and flip-flopper grabbed the bucket of sidewalk chalk to see what it would do on a wet sidewalk, and they had a blast.  Each one drew a line to follow.  Ketchup boys line was full of twists and turns.   The flip-flopper drew a very careful, but straighter line.  Then they had a contest between the two of them who could follow their lines exactly and get to the end first.  Of course the flip-flopper, being older and wiser, knew a straight line would be faster to follow than a twisty crooked line… so she won.

FRIDAY: Exercise and Activity Ideas

When I read Liz Rosenbaums post about her whole family having an exercise party, I was delighted!  I love when families exercise together and enjoy each others company!

I’ve had my kids try to copy whatever exercise I’m doing (which is super funny to watch when they are toddlers!).  I’ve seen my kids do various strength training routines through soccer and gymnastics.  And sometimes they can be WAY stronger and have more endurance than me.

So, what are some good exercises for them to do?  We recieved in the mail a small, palm size, deck of exercise cards from Nuru.  My kids decided they would blindly choose a card and try the exercise.  Here is a very short (because I know you like short) video clip of them “playing their little game”. You need to click over, because I don’t think my video’s feed into a feedburner.

These cards are great for home exercise, taking to the gym, taking on vacation, etc.

I have two more decks to giveaway!!! Leave a comment below through the weekend, and I’ll choose a winner on Monday morning.
Have a great weekend.

Thursday: Health Issues and Ideas

I’ve never considered particpating in Turn off TV week.  I love my evenings curling up on the couch, watching my favorite shows with my husband in the quiet darkness of the house.  Law and Order, the Office, Chuck, Heroes, Food Network Challenges… I’ll stop there.

BUT, According to Screentime.org,

1. Seventy percent of day-care centers use TV during a typical day.–Tashman, Billy, “Sorry Ernie, TV isn’t Teaching,” New York Times, Nov. 12, 1994
2. In a study of preschoolers (ages 1-4), a child’s risk of being overweight increased by six percent for every hour of television watched per day.  If that child had a TV in his or her bedroom, the odds of being overweight jumped an additional thirty-one percent for every hour watched.  Preschool children with TVs in their bedroom watched an additional 4.8 hours of TV or videos every week.–Dennison, et.al. 2002
3. Research now indicates that for every hour of television children watch each day, their risk of developing attention-related problems later increases by ten percent.  For example, if a child watches three hours of television each day, the child would be thirty percent more likely to develop attention deficit disorder.–D. Christakis, Pediatrics, April 2004
4. One in four children under the age of two years has a TV in his or her bedroom.–Zero to Six: Electronic Media in the Lives of Infants, Toddlers and Preschoolers, Kaiser Family Foundation and the Children’s Digital Media Centers, 2003
5. The more TV preschoolers watch, the less well they do academically in the first grade; also, The more TV preschoolers watch, the less well-socialized they are in the first grade.–Burton, Sydney, James Calonico and Dennis McSeveney, “Effects of Preschool Television Watching on First-Grade Children,” Journal of Communication, Summer 1979 
6. Children in households where the TV is on “always” or “most of the time” are less likely to read than are children in other homes. Zero to Six: Electronic Media in the Lives of Infants, Toddlers and Preschoolers, Kaiser Family Foundation and the Children’s Digital Media Centers, 2003
7. Children six and under spend an average of two hours a day using screen media, about the same amount of time they spend playing outside, and well over the amount they spend reading or being read to (39 minutes).–Zero to Six: Electronic Media in the Lives of Infants, Toddlers and Preschoolers, Kaiser Family Foundation and the Children’s Digital Media Centers, 2003

So, are you ready to turn it off from April 20-26th?  For anyone willing to take the plunge, and SUCCEED, for one whole week, I will send you a Healthy Habits Plate!!! Just email me with your address and tell me your story after April 26th so I can share it with our readers.

On Monday I got a call from the famous Jared Fogle of Subway! I’m such a lucky blogger!  He has a new foundation for childhood obesity and a blog.  I asked him some questions about his weight loss journey as well as advice.

You say your weight gain began when you turned 8 years old. What started it?

When I turned 8, I begged my parents for a Nintendo!  And unfortunately, I got one.  Once I got it, it consumed my life.  Everything else fell by the wayside.  What started out as 30 minutes, grew to one hour, then two, then all day long.  I spent all my time trying to beat the game to show my friends that I beat it.  I’d play with my friends at my house, then if we couldn’t play there anymore, we’d go to another friends house so we could keep playing the video game, then another friends house etc.   I didn’t understand the concept of moderation.  The weight began to escalate.  A lack of activity, led me to eat more and more food. The less  I moved, the more bored I got, the more junk food I ate.  The more I ate, the heavier I got which led me to not want to move even more. It was a cycle.

What do you think the solution for childhood obesity is?

There is not one solution to childhood obesity.  Education is critical and to begin early in life.  Kids need to learn the importance of making good decisions for their own bodies.  The word moderation has been lost in our society.  Video games and Internet are fine, when used in moderation and in proper amounts. It can’t be a free for all.  Rules and boundaries need to be set by parents.

What motivated you to lose weight?

When I was 20 years old, I was a 400 pound college student.  After years of denying that I had a problem, I was faced with health issues such as sleep apnea and edema.  Health problems that should not be present in a 20 year old.  It scared me enough that I wanted to change.

What is your advice to kids? 

I have to live with the regret of missing out on my childhood.  There were lots of things I missed in high school and college due to my size.  Kids can take control of their lives and make better choices than I did so they don’t have to miss out on all the fun.

Why did you choose Subway as the means to your weight loss?

I tried cooking my own meals, but at 400 lbs it was too difficult to navigate around the kitchen.  Bending down to get something was difficult, shopping for the food was hard, and I didn’t like cleaning up either.  There was a Subway right next door to where I lived. I went in and picked up their nutrition guide.  A light bulb went on and I realized I could eat there, no clean up, low calories when I chose the right foods, and easy to do.  The first 3 months, I lost 94 lbs.  It was very exciting and motivating. I worked with a physician during the entire process and he checked that everything was fine.

What advice do you have for parents of kids who are already heavy?

1. Consult with a physician.. Identify any reasons for the weight gain.
2. Love and support your kids for who they are.
3. Lead by example
4. Work on prevention and be proactive, rather than reactive.
5. If you eat out, know you control the menu! Don’t let the menu control you. Ask for things prepared your way, or things that aren’t even on the menu. 

Subway is offering two readers of my blog a $15 gift card to Subway. Leave a comment to enter today only, and I’ll choose a winner tomorrow.

FRIDAY: Exercise

This is my THIRD exercise ball since having children.  The ball from this post, probably popped (or got lost) March 23… the day after I posted I will never let the ball out of my site.  They are compelled to play with my exercise balls!   No matter how many other balls we own!  I guess I should consider that a good thing (and never pay full price for one).

Just by the mere fact of owning the oversized ball gets the kids active!  They love throwing it around to each other, sitting on it to bounce, doing somersaults over it.   All you have to do is hand them the ball, and they will find an activity to do with it on their own.

Don’t want to shell out $15-$40 for a ball your child will inevitably pop, the oversized bouncy balls (I’ve seen them for $2.50 at Target) are just as exciting!

Make sure your child has access to fun things like different size and types of balls. 

• Use a BIG ball for a game of soccer
• Hit an oversized ball with a baseball bat.
• Use a large ball to play golf (we got some golf clubs for $1.00 at our local thrift shop).
• Teach them four square.
• Use a laundry basket for a basket ball hoop, and shoot a large ball in there.
• Let them play their video games on it or watch TV to encourage balance and mid section strength!

For a good laugh today, check out Megan’s picture of ladies on a ball!

Tip of the day: Let kids regulate how much food they will eat.

I get a lot of questions regarding how much children need to eat in a day.  The problem is there are so many answers to this question, and your child is the one that should be answering it.  Even the new food guide pyramid is more customized than in the past.  There are certain guidelines, and you can view them at www.superhealthykids.com.   Here’s the thing; if kids are eating healthy, whole, natural food, they will be better able to sense fullness and hunger.  When kids are given high-calorie, low-nutrient food, they lose their sense of satiety.  Kids today consume large quantities of calories, without fiber and vitamins, so they don’t feel full.  Then, they are trained that whether they are hungry or not, it’s noon and time for lunch, or the clock says it’s dinner.  The disconnect continues until as they reach adulthood, they have lost all sense of listening to their bodies.

What is the solution?  The solution is to provide healthy food when they are hungry.  Not make them “clean their plate”, and ask them to evaluate how much they need to be full.  Two nights ago, the flip-flopper had three helpings of chicken and rice! WOW, she must have been hungry. Last summer, Cereal boy was swimming an hour a day and he was eating tons of food.  However, some days I can hardly get them to eat a thing.  This is O.K.  When we had breakfast with my husbands family this morning I started to clear the plates from the children.  It was interesting that so many of them were able to leave one or two bites of their pancakes on their plate because they got full.  But adults hardly ever do that.  Every adult plate was licked clean.  I tend to eat everything on my plate, even when I get full halfway through.  Oh, if we could only become like the little children and get our sense of hunger and fullness back.

So the bottom line; you decide WHAT they eat, let them decide HOW MUCH they eat. Of course than if your kids are like mine, they’ll say, “I’m too full for more dinner, but I’m not too full for dessert?” Of course they’re not. lol