Welcome to the category of my blog simply called ‘Healthy Tips.’ Many times, when I write articles for various publications, I need to find sources for the story as seen in Yahoo Shine (click here) or PBS (click here) about staying healthy. I was looking for experts and non-experts to chime in and give their favorite ‘tips’ to help kids and adults lead a healthy lifestyle.

The feedback for various stories was amazing. The sources had some fantastic points of view that could not be ignored, and I thought their opinions should be viewed on the Your Health Journal web site.

So, enjoy my new series, with some ‘great’ insight from some ‘great’ people giving exceptional and educational points of view.

The importance of families exercising together

I feel it’s important for your health and also for quality time with our children. My husband and I find out tons of information about our daughter by actively listening while we’re working out. She laments about her day, her new friends, schoolwork and what is going on in her life. Since we are confined to the small areas in the gym, there’s not much to pass the time except talking. We love it. And we’re happy that we are all learning healthy habits and protecting our health.

Suggestions / creative ideas to get families to exercise together

We started with using the dog as an excuse. Our daughter always understood that he needed to be free to run and needed walking. We took walks around the neighborhood. As that becomes routine sometimes, we tried the local state parks. Hills and new scenery worked. We now make it fun and try different parks.

Reasons why families are not exercising together as much in our modern day era

I’m not really sure but I think it’s because as a society we have gotten away from spending time together, any time together, as a whole. Many families spend so little time together and when they do, it’s usually doing a fun activity like movies, not hard work like exercising. Kids barely see their parents and when they do they want excitement, not sit ups. It is sad but true. I do notice that exercising [albeit] electronically is making a comeback…a la the Wii. Kids and parents can now spend time playing, yet ultimately moving their bodies.

– C. Lee Reed [“sealy”]