Bring on the Veggies! Kid Power!

Paradise greetings,

What a busy week this has been for Growing Healthy Kids. So many veggies to chop. So many salads to make. So many flatbreads to roll. So many kids to get healthy!!!
The pictures you see are from our latest project, in partnership with Kiwanis Club, at Hibiscus Children's Center in Vero Beach. Last week's classes were great and the gardens are growing. The kids were not shy about stepping up to be the master chefs. They learned about reading food labels and how easy it is to make really healthy sandwiches that taste great. We used the "Flatout" breads with 90 calories per flatbread and a whopping 9 grams of dietary fiber! These makes EXCELLENT pizza crusts!!

One girl, watching the other kids chop yellow and red peppers, tomatoes, spinach, and English cucumbers, asked if I'd brought any "lunch meats" for the sandwiches. I told her I didn't, but she could make the rollups with her favorite meats. When she decided to make a rollup with the ingredients provided for the class, she had a bite, smiled and said the best thing ever, "This is GOOD!"

Focus on making one small change a week. Make this week's change to eat one more fruit or veggie each day.

Growing Healthy Kids is about improving the health - and lives - of children, one child and one garden at a time.

To your perfect health!
Nancy Heinrich
Founder, Growing Healthy Kids

Four More Gardens for Healthy Kids

Paradise Greetings,

Thank you Growing Healthy Kids and Kiwanis Club volunteers: Katherine, Joe, Lou, Katy and husband. Thank you to Amy and staff at Hibiscus Children's Center. Thank you to all the kids at Hibiscus. You are now the proud owners of four new gardens! What an awesome morning of energy, enthusiasm and sweat equity! We built the gardens, filled them, and planted them. Now, with water, sun, and love the butterflies and vegetables will come!

It is an honor to be able to create some new spaces for the kids at Hibiscus. I'm excited about the butterfly gardens. Within an hour of getting the first butterfly garden installed for the kids, one of the boys came running over to me and exclaimed that he'd just seen his first butterfly!

When I was there yesterday for our first healthy cooking class, most of the seeds had germinated and were already a couple of inches high. Our first lesson was that fruit is a healthy snack, not fruit juice. Now to teach the adults who serve those children...

It is fun to play in the dirt! The adventure continues! What is YOUR favorite butterfly?

Growing Healthy Kids - improving the health - and lives of children, one garden and one child at a time.

To your perfect health!
Nancy Heinrich
Founder, Growing Healthy Kids

Growing Healthy Kids Promotes Recycling, Garden Art, and Healthy Snacks

Paradise Greetings,
Whirlwind trip to New York City over the Easter weekend to witness our amazing Vero Beach High School band kids play on stage at Carnegie Hall! WOW!! I'm so glad I was there! The sound quality at the Performing Arts Center will never be the same compared to the Isaac Stern Auditorium at Carnegie Hall. Our music program is such a gift to these children. We must protect all children's access to music programs such as the one at Vero Beach High School and its feeder schools. Thank you, Mr.Sammons and Mr. Howell, from a very grateful parent.

Another gift we, as a community, can give children is the knowledge, ability, and skills to eat healthy for a lifetime. One of today's pictures is from a recent "indoor picnic" Growing Healthy Kids had with one of the Boys and Girls Clubs of Indian River County: the menu was fresh fruit slices dipped in vanilla yogurt mixed with cinnamon. Did you know that up to 1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon a day can help reduce blood sugar and bad (LDL) cholesterol according to USDA study?

The kids LOVED the "Fresh Fruit Dippers". I, however, did NOT love the concrete picnic floor!

Other picture: 2 very large palm containers saved from county landfill and brought to art volunteer at the Boys and Girls Club with request to have kids decorate for use as outdoor vegetable containers. The results BLEW ME AWAY! Way cool! What do YOU think---- let's recycle lots of these and start THE SALAD REVOLUTION.

Growing Healthy Kids - improving the health and lives of America's children - one garden and one child at a time. Let's start a revolution. A health revolution. THE SALAD REVOLUTION.

To your perfect health.

Nancy Heinrich
Founder, Growing Healthy Kids