We try to make good choices for our kids whenever we can. In the grocery store, there are all kinds of cartoon characters peeking out from the shelves, proudly announcing this low-fat snack or that iron-enriched one. If my daughter sees Dora the Explorer anywhere on the shelves, she screams for whatever it is (I try to hold her off until we get to the canned veggies, where I know I can find Dora corn).

But are the so-called healthy kid-friendly foods really good for our children?

A Canadian study says not always.

Researchers did not include junk food in their analysis, but they found that nearly 90% of kid products still did not meet established nutritional standards. What’s more, 62% of the foods that researchers deemed to be of “poor nutritional quality” made positive nutritional claims on the package - such as being low-fat, containing essential nutrients or being a source of calcium.

I’m guilty of falling for that ploy myself. If I see “50% more calcium!” but the product doesn’t seem to have a ton more sugar or anything else compared to similar items, I’ll put the one with more calcium in my cart. It’s easy to be fooled into thinking you have a wholesome product in your hand when really, you have the same overprocessed crap — just with added calcium. The bottom line is, it’s still crap.

But it has Dora on it…

I give my kids nutritious food when I can; that doesn’t mean they never have chips or ice cream. But a few foods, like gummy bears, are strictly prohibited (for now at least, and for as long as I can get away with it) in this household. I’ve heard that gummy foods like that can do a real number on little teeth because they stick so well.

I may have to rethink my anti-gummy stance in the future. Investigators are checking into whether sugarless gummy bears containing xylitol can actually help prevent cavities in children.

Xylitol is a natural sweetener found in various berries, corn, birch and other plant sources. Research has shown that the sugar substitute reduces levels of mutans streptococci (MS) bacteria, which are known to cause cavities.

Is there hope, then, that candy might actually become a cavity-fighting ally? All I know is that if they make a good-for-your-teeth Milk Dud, I’m there.

Posted by Sunshine.

You already know that your parenting style is either more permissive or more authoritarian than some of your friends’ styles. But did you know that your general approach to parenting could greatly influence your child’s diet and eating habits?

I’m not sure I ever really thought of it that way, but it makes sense. Extremely authoritarian parents probably don’t let their kids slide with eating half a chicken nugget and then moving along to dessert. Very permissive parents are less likely to stress a ton about what their kids eat, as long as they’re eating something. (Yes, I’m sure there are exceptions.)

Experts are now suggesting that neither extreme is particularly productive when it comes to instilling healthy eating habits in our children. Better is the authoritative parent — the one in the middle. She is more likely, they say, to have children who eat more balanced meals because she uses positive reinforcement and sets a good example with her own diet, which therefore lowers her children’s risk of childhood obesity.

Well, I have to admit that my diet isn’t the greatest in the world, and I probably err on the side of permissive parenting at times. Maybe if I crack down on my own eating habits, my children will eventually adopt those new, healthier standards as they get older?

In sum, the researchers conclude that that efforts to control childhood obesity need to consider family dynamics.

Posted by Sunshine.

The Center for Science in the Public Interest has asked the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to consider banning certain food colorings because, according to its studies, these colorings can cause children to display hyperactivity and other behavior problems.

Dyes are used in countless foods and are sometimes used to simulate the color of fruits or vegetables. The additives are particularly prevalent in the cereals, candies, sodas, and snack foods pitched to kids.[…]

The center’s petition asks the FDA to require a warning label on foods with artificial dyes while it mulls the group’s request to ban the dyes outright.

The FDA has repeatedly stated that these food additives are safe for the general public, and notes that its European counterpart holds a similar view.

Thoughts? Do you think the additives in our food could be harming our kids, or is this consumer advocacy group crying wolf?

Posted by Sunshine.

I’ve been watching my sodium intake (and thus, my family’s since three of the four of us eat the same foods) because my blood pressure was on the rise. One of the foods we’ve learned to be very careful on is soup. We use soups in various recipes; I’m a soup person in general anyway. But have you SEEN the sodium levels in your soup lately?

If you use 1/2 a cup of Campbell’s condensed beef broth, that’s 860mg of sodium. The Recommended Daily Allowance (RDA) for sodium is 2400mg! There goes more than a third of all the salt you should have in a day!

I don’t feel bad for singling Campbell’s out because I’m about to praise them. Campbell’s does offer low sodium soups and other smarter choices (look for the “Healthy Request” line). And they just announced that they are lowering the sodium levels of soups marketed to kids. It’s the second salt reduction for these soups in just three years, and will allow Campbell’s to legally label them healthy foods.

Cutting salt may also help to keep children slim, because a new study shows that kids who don’t snack on salty foods don’t drink as much soda, which is a huge source of empty calories (and caffeine kids really don’t need).

My daughter is on a raspberry and strawberry kick right now; you’d better believe I’m all over that! Hopefully she won’t notice that a lot of her old favorite snacks, like the chips we both love, are no longer present in our house. Even if she does, I can deal with the whining, knowing that I’m keeping her healthier whether she likes it or not.

Posted by Sunshine.

That’s not funky punctuation on my part. We Can! is a new national program designed to put the brakes on America’s rising obesity rates in children. We Can! (short for Ways to Enhance Children’s Activity and Nutrition) is a partnership between the National Institutes of Health and the Association of Children’s Museums.

This program focuses on several lifestyle changes (such as portion control and daily exercise routines) that, when accomplished together, can lead to much healthier weights for kids and an increased activity rate, both of which have enormous benefits across the board. Bad habits in childhood often stick with people right on into adulthood, and before you know it, you’re an overweight, sedentary adult with big health problems. The best time to curb unhealthy habits is during childhood, before they’re so deeply ingrained.

We Can! can be a model for overcoming the challenges of childhood obesity and overweight, [acting U.S. Surgeon General Rear Admiral Dr. Steven K.] Galson said. “Its partnerships are demonstrating how physical activity and sound lifestyle choices can make a difference and how communities can work together to make those lifestyle choices real,” he said.

We Can! is an education program to help children aged 8 to 13 years old to maintain a healthy weight. It’s being implemented in more than 450 communities in 44 states.

The newest cities in the program are Boston, Las Vegas, and Pittsburgh.

A full third of American adults are overweight. Let’s do something now so that our kids won’t follow in our too-heavy footsteps.

Posted by Sunshine.

Overweight mom equals overweight kids? Doctors in England are trying to figure out why women who are overweight tend to have overweight children. They have found that there is no metabolic programming in young children - so moms are not passing that down directly to their kids.

They studied thousands of families in 1991-1992, and their conclusion was that if children are obese, it is more likely that the mother is obese than the father. Doctors, being unable to conclude that it is metabolic driven, are considering whether other factors could impact. Her are my thoughts - what about obese mothers passing unhealthy eating habits to their children? Arguably, moms are more “in charge” of food than dads are, and they tend to be around children more hours during the day to teach them unhealthy snacking habits, etc. I wonder…

1 in 4 teen girls has an STD. Shocking. No parents wants to think this is accurate (especially myself with a 12 year old knocking on the door of puberty!) But that is what it is. So, to me, it is time to face reality and not keep our parental heads buried in the sand to what is going on in teens’ lives.

I know that sex education — and how to raise your child in general — is an individual thing, but many parents are relying on sex-ed to teach their children. These programs are not effective. So please take your child’s sexual learning into your own hands and ensure they are well informed about not only what is happening to their bodies, but to their emotions and mind as well. And please don’t skip the chapter on condoms and safe sex. Now is a good time to get them to regular checkups, even if they are not sexually active- it is a good safe habit to start. Don’t let your child be one of the 25%.

Tiny reader! I saw this and it really amazed me. A 17 month old girl who can read. Actually read and not memorize/mimic. It appears she has a gift, and mom and dad have been good at stimulating her and helping to develop this. Wow!

I think of myself as a bit of a safety-obsessive, so imagine my chagrin when I happened upon an article in a recent Good Housekeeping and learned that I didn’t know squat about how to safely use nonstick pans. I didn’t even know there was an unsafe way, outside of chipping off the coating with metal spoons.

If you’re as clueless as I was, here’s the dope: Nonstick cookware is safe, experts note, so long as they’re not overheated.

“There’s a whole chemistry set of compounds that will come off when Teflon is heated high enough to decompose,” says [chemistry professor and Teflon expert Robert L.] Wolke. “Many of these are fluorine-containing compounds, which as a class are generally toxic.” But fluoropolymers, the chemicals from which these toxic compounds come, are a big part of the coating formula — and the very reason that foods don’t stick to nonstick.

If the danger begins when pans overheat, then how hot is too hot? “At temperatures above 500ºF, the breakdown begins and smaller chemical fragments are released,” explains Kurunthachalam Kannan, Ph.D., an environmental toxicologist at the New York State Department of Health’s Wadsworth Center. DuPont, inventor and manufacturer of Teflon, agrees that 500 degrees is the recommended maximum for cooking.

The problem is, it’s very easy to get your pans to the “too hot” state. In Good Housekeeping tests, a lightweight pan hit 514 degrees after 2 and 1/2 minutes of preheating two tablespoons of oil on high. And at very high temperatures, above 660 degrees, nonstick cookware can even start to give off fumes that can induce a flu-like illness in people (and can kill pet birds).

So how do you keep the chemicals out of your food and air? Some tips:

• Never preheat an empty pan (and even preheating a pan with oil in it can be risky).
• Don’t cook on high heat when using nonstick pans. Go no higher than medium.
• Ventilate your kitchen when cooking to clear fumes.
• Don’t broil or sear meats in nonstick cookware.
• When buying nonstick pans, choose heavier models, which are less likely to overheat.
• Don’t use metal utensils that can chip the nonstick surface.

I’m sticking (so to speak) with my Teflon pans for pancakes and bakeware, but I’ve decided to save up for some good quality uncoated pans for when sticking is more or less a non-issue. In the meantime, it took me about a week to break the habit of turning the burner to high when cooking with nonstick, but now I’ve got it down pretty much. It takes longer to cook on medium, but sacrificing a little convenience to keep my family safe is a no-brainer.

Happy - and safe - cooking!

Posted by MommaSteph.

Strange cravings… not only for pregnant gals. If you thought your cravings will be over once the baby comes, that is not necessarily true. Sure those pregnant hormones can trick you into eating some really weird stuff, but people who aren’t pregnant sometimes do as well.

Why do people crave strange stuff? It was originally thought it was because the body was missing some important nutritional vitamin or mineral. “Cravings are believed to be emotionally or psychologically driven. People also tend to crave foods they enjoy and associate with pleasurable times and places.”

In the linked article, people shared some of their very unusual cravings. Me? I can’t say I eat too much strange stuff. I think the most exotic thing I eat is french fries dipped in my hot fudge sundae sauce. What about you?

Orgasmic birth? No, that isn’t a typo. Or-GAS-mic birth. What does it mean? Ina May Gaskin says that women experience a euphoric sensation at the moment of childbirth, and likens it to an orgasmic feeling.

Ina May Gaskin - her name may be familiar if you saw Rikki Lake’s movie about childbirth. She is a 67 year old midwife who established a commune in the 1970’s, and has done an incredible amount of work to advocate natural childbirth. She is frustrated that there are so many caesarian births, and is now writing a book about natural childbirth and the “orgasmic” euphoric feeling. She is hoping to get women to feel passionate about the birth experience and their bodies, and figured she needed something catchy to get the attention of modern women.

It certainly got my attention! And I have to say that even though I would never liken it to an actual orgasm, I do recall a distinct level of euphoria each time I pushed through that dreaded “ring of fire”, so I think I understand where she is coming from.

Watch out for salt! There are many reasons why. But just to remind you - when kids eat salty snacks they get thirsty they usually reach out for sugary beverages loaded with empty calories. What you may not be aware of is that putting away the salt shaker does not help much. People get 80% of their salt from manufactured foods. It’s everywhere - not just that MSG in Chinese takeaways. Campbell’s has just announced that they are reducing the sodium content in about 50 of their soups. That is one small step in the right direction. But we all need to be aware of how much sodium we have each day.

So how much do you need per day? An adult requires 500mg per day. They should not exceed 2,400mg/day. And unfortunately, the average American consumes 4,000-5,000mg/day. I did a bit of net searching, and much to my dismay my favorite fast food meal - a McDonald;s Quarter Pounder with Cheese - is one of the worst offenders with 3,200mg of sodium. Yikes!

Stay in school to reduce Alzheimers risk. Studies indicate that people with higher levels of education may have reduced risk of contracting Alzheimers when they get older. They are not sure why, but they believe that highly educated people just might have some “reserve” brain power that they can use when memory begins to fail.

A study of seniors over the past decade has shown that their average level of education has increased by one year, now at 12 years and we can expect that to go even higher for the next generations. They also are wealthier, which suggests that they held more mentally stimulating jobs.

There are other things that can contribute to Alzheimers - cardiovascular disease (including high blood pressure and clogged arteries) can cause periods of time when blood does not flow properly to the brain, as well as obesity with complications such as type 2 diabetes and again those clogged arteries.

I guess the lesson is - get yourself educated, keep yourself stimulated and watch your general health. I am sure it will provide benefits beyond Alzheimers prevention!