WELLNESS WEDNESDAYS
"ONLY TOGETHER CAN WE REALLY MAKE A DIFFERENCE."
-- Blake Mallon, Project 10 Kids
This week Growing Healthy Kids, Inc. kicks off a new nutrition education after-school
program. Remember last week’s column about superfoods? We will be featuring those foods and others
as we create a new generation of NUTRITION DETECTIVES. For the next 6 weeks, we will be sharing highlights from the program. If you have ideas for what you would want
your own kids to learn, let us know!
September is National Childhood Obesity Awareness Month. One in three kids in America is overweight or
obese. Everywhere I look, I see kids of
all ages at risk for obesity-related diseases like diabetes and sleep
apnea. Childhood obesity is not the kids’
problem – it is our problem. As parents,
as teachers, as adults who run after-school programs, as business owners who
offer health care benefits for dependents, we all have a responsibility to
improve our own health literacy and awareness about what foods to put on our
own plate.
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| What's YOUR favorite veggie? |
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| Stuffed portabella mushrooms (with whole grain couscous, spinach and yellow peppers) from the GROWING HEALTHY KIDS' Recipe Collection |
This month make a personal
commitment to start looking at your own shopping cart and make at least half of
your food purchases vegetables and fruits.
As you and your family plan your dinner menus, plan for at least half of
your plates to be filled with vegetables and fruits. Make the commitment to eat more of the good
foods (see last week’s column: "Ten Foods to Eat More of") and less of the bad foods (like white flour, Pop
Tarts, and sodas). If every parent in
America’s makes this simple commitment, then it is possible that we will not
need to have a National Childhood Obesity Awareness Month.
In gratitude,
Nancy Heinrich
Growing Healthy Kids, Inc.
