Kids & Fitness

~by Jenna McCarthy

We don't have any family in town. A babysitter would be too expensive. And what if something happened to the girls while we were gone? Plus they're so young. And even though flying with them is no joyride, I truly cannot stomach the thought (as irrational as it may be) of getting on a plane without them.

"You have to do it," my sister insists. She means get away with my husband and without my kids. Easy for her to say. Her kids are ten years older than mine and her husband's entire family lives within a two mile radius of her house. She can count on one hand the number of times she's paid a babysitter. Her children see their aunts and uncles and grandparents on a weekly basis, whereas my kids know the UPS guy better than most of their non-nuclear relatives.

So when my sister-in-law offers to drive fourteen roundtrip hours to spend a few days with our daughters, my husband Joe is online booking a hotel room faster than you can say "complimentary continental breakfast." He wisely chooses a spot a quick two hour drive away, so factoring in the free babysitting and the fact that the girls are now old enough to wipe their own bottoms and operate the remote control, I'm out of excuses. I am going away without my kids.
I've got to tell you, I'm ambivalent. What will we do all day? ("Have sex!" Joe informs me cheerfully.) What if I can't relax? ("You'll drink more wine," he suggests.) What if the kids are sad and miserable? ("We won't be there to see it!" he roars. When he sees my horrified reaction, he quickly backpedals. "They'll live. Juli can handle it. It'll be good for all of us." Hrumph.)

Three weeks later I'm sprawled out on delicious ten-zillion thread-count sheets that are luxuriously wrapped around the Ugg boots of beds. It's two o'clock in the afternoon, or maybe it's eight-thirty at night. Who knows and who cares? I haven't filled one sippy cup, nuked a single dinosaur-shaped chicken nugget or chanted a rousing chorus of "clean up, clean up" all glorious day. My watch sits in a dish on the bathroom's cleaned-by-someone-else marble vanity, because I have nowhere to be but where I am. I've been rubbed with hot oil and warm towels, watched an entire uninterrupted, R-rated movie and let's just say that when holed up in a locked room for hours on end, it turns out Joe and I have no problem finding something enjoyable to do.

We stayed for three glorious days and I fell in love with my husband all over again. The girls were fine. Aunt Juli appeared unscathed-although it was sort of hard to tell as she blew past us, waved goodbye and peeled out of the driveway. Best of all (and I'm not proud of this or advocating thievery in any way) there's now a handy "Do not disturb" sign hanging on my bedroom door. I just wonder why we didn't think of that sooner.

--- 

Jenna McCarthy is the author of the upcoming book The Parent Trip: From High Heels and Parties to Highchairs and Potties. When she's not buying and returning bakeware, she can be reached at  jennamccarthy.com.

Play this fun and wet fitness game at the beach, at some other body of water, or set up your own "water source" using buckets. There are several ways to play and each will have you and your kids working out while having a great time. You will get wet, so have some towels handy. Perfect for summertime.

Equipment: water launcher, water cannon or turkey baster (your choice, it just needs to be able to suck up and squirt water) OR plastic cups. Buckets: target buckets should be about 1 gallon size, and source buckets (if needed) should be about 5 gallon size; 1 marker per team.

Goal: to be the first to fill your bucket with water.

Setup:

• Teams - teams of two. Players stand as teams at their team's target bucket a distance of 10-20 yards from your water source (ocean, pool, 5 gallon bucket of water, etc). At the signal, the first player in each team races to the ocean (water source) with their water launcher and sucks up water into the launcher. If using a water launcher or similar, race back to shooting line marker (place at a challenging distance from target bucket and teammate). Teammate holds the target bucket and "helps" the water get in. If using a cup, the first player runs to marker within 5 feet of the target bucket. From there they toss the water from their cup into the target bucket. After shooting or tossing water into target bucket, teammates switch roles. Continue this way until a team has filled their bucket. Adjust target bucket size and shooting/tossing distances based on ages, abilities, and equipment used.

• Individuals - Each person with their own target bucket, water launcher (or cup). Target buckets placed 5-10 yards from water source. At start, race against others out to water. Fill your water launcher or cup, race to shooting/tossing line, get as much water in your bucket as possible. Continue until someone fills their bucket.

Adjustments - if you need to handicap for size or age differences, make adults hop, bear crawl, or run backwards to water source or shoot from further distance.

For a little extra incentive... winner(s) gets to drench loser(s) with water in the target bucket.

~Rachel Fierro, Personal Trainer

What would you do to save your child's life? Anything, right? I'm a mom too and there's nothing I wouldn't do to save my kids' lives if they were in danger. You can brush off what I'm about to say and call me a fanatic. Fine. When you're done, go do some research and you'll see that I wasn't exaggerating at all. You're kids are in danger right now - well, most kids that is. The worst part is, most parents aren't doing a thing about it either - mostly because they are in the same boat.

Something that tastes delicious, comes in bright packaging, and has a marketing campaign that makes it look harmless, is putting your kids' health (and your own) at terrible risk. Soda is garbage. It is the enemy of your body. There's nothing in soda that is good for your body and especially not for your kids' developing bodies.

Oh sure, soda doesn't seem to have any immediately obvious ill-effects. You don't cough, gag, break out in a rash, or fall down with convulsions. It may not be immediate, but soda is damaging us. For example, a recent study has shown that for every soft drink or sweetened beverage your kid drinks per day, increases their risk of obesity by 60%. Is that what you want for them?

Did you know that 20% of toddlers are now drinking soda? That's just plain wrong, folks. First of all we, adults, shouldn't be poisoning ourselves with the stuff. And to give it to kids is so much worse. Now we've got statistics showing that kids are drinking twice as much soda as they were 10 years ago. The average teen age boy drinking 3 sodas a day and the average teenage girl is drinking 2 a day, with some teens chugging down as much as seven cans a day. Most Americans are downing 56 gallons of soda a year.

Soda is pretty much just loaded with sugar (even if they use other names for it) and chemicals. There's about 10 teaspoons of sugar in one can of soda. Refined white sugar is about 99% pure calories - no vitamins, no minerals, no good stuff at all. And, no, diet soda is not any better. Aspartame and other artificial sweeteners are linked to all sorts of horrible diseases and conditions. Then there's all the caffeine, artificial colors, and sulfites in soda.

Want to know what all that stuff does to your body, to your kids' bodies? How about obesity, diabetes, and weakening of the bones, behavioral and attention issues? Is it good parenting to give your kids those maladies? Okay, parents, time to be a hero. Your kids may not like it, at first, but we are talking about their lives, here.

Start with you. Kick the soda habit . . . TODAY. Then (and I don't mean in a few days, weeks, or months, when you've got it down perfect) save your kids' lives and health. Explain it to them and then just cut that poison out of their lives. Give your kids the tools they'll need to have a healthy life - information, a good role model, and guidelines.

Don't replace that soda with more sweetened drinks either. Henry David Thoreau said "Pure water is the best drink for a wise man." That is indeed, the way to go. Some fruit juices (not just fruit flavored), but not too much. Pretty much, water is the way to go. You'll be doing yourself and your kids a world of good.

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