Summer is over for my family here in Germany, for my relatives in Canada and the rest of the Northern Hemisphere. Make no mistake, I am not melancholy about the return to school, to routine, to grey skies. No. This time of year is full of opportunities to start fresh, to think anew, to harvest what we’ve planted.

There’s a seed of hope and inspiration in each of the carnival posts this month. As usual, the ten best of all submissions received are full if thought-provoking, practical tips for staying fit and getting healthy as a family. And, as an added bonus, the health of the planet comes into everything.

The Thoughts We Think

How to manage family, work, stress, stress and more stress. Really, is attitude everything? It probably is, say some bloggers.

Dancers have a culture of weight and control issues, Ballet Shoes and Pointe Shoes wants the rest of us to learn from it.

Terri talks about seashells and the secret to giving your child a long and healthy life.

The Food We Eat

Inside Fatherhood is watching out for the expecting father condition couvade syndrome.

Want to save oil stores, protect global food supplies and save the environment? Then be a 21st Century Citizen and eat locally grown food.

You know, I’ve never been able to figure out why buying in bulk is considered thrifty if you’re buying more than you need. Wenchy has also thought of a few reasons why Buying in Bulk is Unhealthy.

Nature Mom is packing a healthy lunch box.

The mom of My Two Boys is making applesauce.

The Things We Do

There is no healthy or fit family whose lives don’t include exercise, fresh air, and fun.

The blogger at Fish Creek House tells us how to be happy campers.

And Tree Hugging Family has launched to tell us how to get more of all three while living in harmony with nature.

Ten bloggers told me how they spent some time together getting all three on their family vacations.

The Sixteenth Healthy & Fit Family will run on October 2 at the Health & Life Mixing Bowl. Submissions are now open.

Post from: Babylune

July and it’s already time for the thirteenth Healthy & Fit Family. There are plenty of people who still believe that 13 is unlucky, but I am feeling pretty confident about this edition. As usual, the carnival is limited to the ten submissions I thought were most family-oriented, health-oriented and fitness-oriented.

I know, I know, most carnivals publish everything bloggers send them. And, if it weren’t for that kind of democratic spirit, none of my submissions would ever be featured in a blog carnival. That said, when was the last time you read a carnival post with 50 or 60 links?

Ten posts is a manageable number to read, and since so many people have their kids home on vacation, even 10 might sound like a stretch of stolen time.

If you’re tempted to let the kids watch as much TV as they like, the Midnight Raider has a lesson for you. If you’re thinking video games, the Grrl Scientist has a warning for you.

Speaking of vacations, a number of us have carefully planned and expensive trips to take. The closer we get to our departure dates, the more we need to follow Ruby’s advice about how to prevent illness.

Meanwhile, Nature Mom’s care never takes a holiday. She has learned a lot about packing her son’s lunch to take to kindergarten.

Therapy Doc’s classroom doesn’t close for the summer either. She has already started teaching her little grandson about asking permission.

I ended another term of the English classes I teach by learning a lesson about how to include other people’s children with allergies in a cookie-oriented class.

One of the most positive things about taking up exercise is the opportunity it presents to strengthen our awareness and do good in our communities. Most races support charities and other runners launch their own campaigns. Richard ran to save a local river.

A Crazy Wisdom Grandma (her words) is eating to save herself, her family and the planet.

Mama is ranting again, but this time she’s been talking to a healthy eating expert.

Crazy Grandma, Ranting Mama and everyone else, you can’t always bend kids’ eating habits to your will and knowledge. Hueina wants to teach us how NOT to take it personally.

The Fourteenth Healthy & Fit Family will be held on 7 August at Sports Girls Play. Submissions are now open on our Blog Carnival page.

Post from: Babylune

The First of May is Labour/Labor day in Europe. It’s a chance for unions to parade, families to relax and outdoor swimming pools to open. Not that I am going near the cold, cold water in our local park. No, I have other ideas for how our family is going to splash around in warm water this afternoon. Have I become a temperature wimp? Probably, but it’s a great way to introduce the Eleventh Healthy & Fit Family.

It seems to me that the old adage “no pain, no gain” is especially destructive when you want to be active as a family. Nothing is going to turn independent thinking kids off exercise more than parents who behave like the phys. ed. teachers of old. Families need to support each other’s efforts with love and warmth. When I read through the 22 submissions to the carnival this month, I was looking for that support. These are the ten best posts representing health & fitness information combined with the love and compassion that drive family interaction (or that should drive family interaction) from the first days of infancy to the last years of our lives.

We all know that “breast is best” when it comes to feeding babies, but Angela at Breastfeeding 1-2-3 has also found convincing evidence that its also best for protecting mothers’ mental health.

I know that my mental health is threatened more by the little illnesses my pre-schooler brings home. Project Paradox has some ideas about how I, and parents like me, can cope. It’s not all about pre-school. The Mad Kane’s husband brings home colds too. I wonder if Be A Good Dad’s post about how to give kids medicine can be used on spouses too?

Did you know that April was Autism Awareness Month? I had no idea until My Name is Mommy brought it up.

The Expatriate’s Kitchen (her symbolic spelling) has a series of very informative articles about children’s nutrition.

Zen Habits is all about avoiding extremes and being gentle as you try new things in this post about gradual vegetarianism.

Dr. Hal reminds of the phrases we need to use in order to have successful relationships and accomplish any goal together.

Hueina reinforces the priorities behind those phrases through life balance lessons.

And finally, when any life comes to an end, there is grief to deal with in healthy ways. Anna has one idea of how both children and adults can do that work.

The Twelfth Healthy & Fit Family will be hosted by Wisdom of Healing on June 5. Submissions are now open.

Post from: Babylune

A healthy weight gain during pregnancy is usually between 25 and 35 pounds (11 to 15 kg) a little less if the mother-to-be is overweight, a little more if she is underweight, double the recommendation if you’re a fashion model whose pre-pregnancy diet included tissues. For obese pregnant mothers, there are no-gain eating plans to be followed under close supervision of their doctors or midwives.

By now, you’ve probably seen at least one article about the study April’s issue of the American Journal of Obstetrics & Gynecology. It’s the study that says women who gain weight toward the upper end of the healthy limit, may still put their children at risk for childhood obesity. The study compared the weight women gained during pregnancy to the weight of their 3 year-olds. Apparently, the study controls allowed for the influence of a mother’s unhealthy habits being passed to her child.

Now, I achieved the height of my scientific career in grade 6 when Jason Payne and I shared the science award at Victoria School in 1985, but I can’t imagine a scientific study with perameters wide-enough to eliminate all the results of an unhealthy home environment, especially on topics most people tend to underestimate (like, how many hours a week do you spend watching television versus how many hours of the day is your TV turned on).

And really, I would believe these study results.

If they told me that children can recognise the McDonald’s logo a little earlier than the age of two as previously believed. Maybe the ads are projected on the walls of the womb during interuptions in normal fetal development?

Post from: Babylune

I do worry about the decision to limit the carnival to 10 spots sometimes, but I want it to be completely readable. Parents who want to head healthier families are often overwhelmed with blame guilt information and it can often seem impossible to counteract the billions of dollars in advertising budgets that create experiences designed to make our kids crave food and drinks that don’t nurture their growing bodies (it’s actually just food in disguise says Al Nye) and even leads to high-colesterol in teens. I wish the best marketing minds in the world would try selling nine superfoods in one bowl to kids.

Even a step in the right direction toward a healthier, fitter family life can have its drawbacks.

In an effort to make my family a little healthier and a little fitter, we joined the YMCA in my hometown for the month of our visit. They have excellent programs for 3 to 6 year-olds and last week my four year-old learned all about the difference between healthy & not so healthy food choices for a few days last week. As soon as I picked my son up, he showed me his “healthy foods” artwork and said, “I like chocolate donuts and milk.”

Lifestyle changes are hard to implement for everyone, says John Peter. Especially if we aren’t motivated for the right reasons. That’s certainly something Arun learned through personal experience. If you are motivated, getting or staying fit doesn’t have to cost a cent. Hiking is free.

The Eleventh Healthy & Fit Family will run on May 1st here at Babylune. Submissions can be made via the blog carnival submission form. There are only 10 spots in the carnival. To control the number & quality of submissions, only one per blog may be submitted for consideration.

Post from: Babylune