 The summer heat is here, and with it comes the challenge of staying active while keeping cool. If you live in the Valley, it can be especially difficult to squeeze in physical activity while avoiding extreme temperatures. Health still happens in the summer! Beat the heat and get moving all season long with these fun and affordable activities.
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Even though we think Mother’s Day should be celebrated daily, our Pinnacle Prevention team took it as an opportunity to celebrate parenthood and mothers all month long. We’ve spent the last few weeks talking about womanhood, motherhood, work-life balance, family-friendly workplaces, self-care and more. We value working parents everywhere, and we put these values into practice every day.
Here at Pinnacle Prevention, we’re dedicated to growing healthy families and communities, and we recognize that change starts at home. Our team of registered dietitians, researchers and social scientists practice what we preach, and that means supporting our working moms in every way we can.
We value families and mothers, and strive to put these values into practice every day. We encourage our new moms to bring their babies to the office and to meetings, and we foster healthy work-life balance with flexible scheduling. Our Pinnacle Prevention littles tag along to help at markets, and we encourage them to get involved in our projects. One of the best ways we know how to support the moms at Pinnacle Prevention is by helping them support their families.  Mothers come in all shapes and sizes. Mothers come from every ethnicity, every sexual orientation, and from every socioeconomic background. We may have given birth. We may have adopted. We may just serve as maternal figures and role models to those who need us. We may work, or we may stay home with our children. We may be single moms, married moms, or harried moms. But this world wouldn’t exist without our mamas! And though we should be celebrated every second, Mother’s Day is that special day to give extra thanks.
Springtime is officially here! Sunshine is abundant, flowers are in bloom, and cool breezes fill the air. While Arizona in the spring is difficult to beat, springtime in the desert seems to come and go in the blink of an eye. In just a couple of months, triple digit temperatures will make it nearly impossible to exercise for very long outside. As the weather here hits a comfortable balance between hot and cold, now is an excellent time to get out and be active outdoors. Celebrate the last week of National Nutrition Month with a healthy dose of physical activity!
Regular exercise and a balanced diet do wonders for mental and physical well-being, but did you know that simply spending time in the great outdoors touts many of the same benefits? It’s true: nature offers boosts to mood, energy levels, and immunity. This spring, add an extra boost of wellness to your workout with some open-air fun, and be sure to fuel that fun with nutritious snacks.  We all remember what it was like to be a teenager. Most of us can also appreciate the roles our parents, teachers, and other important figures played in helping us get through those sometimes-awkward transition years. Along with puberty, pressure to fit in with peers, and school-related stress that teenagers experience, today’s teens face some new challenges. They’re far more connected to their social networks via social media, and they’re privy to the seemingly endless storm of information and advice (both good and bad) on the web.
With Valentine’s Day just around the corner, it’s easy to feel overwhelmed by advertisements that make it seem imperative for us to express our love for friends and family with purchased goods. From staples like flowers and candy to bank-breaking jewelry and five-star restaurant reservations, decades of Valentine’s Day marketing have effectively equated love with flashy gifts and showy displays of affection.
Valentine’s Day as we know it in the United States primarily focuses on romantic love, often downplaying or outright excluding the relationships we have with family and friends. Alternatively, the Valentine’s Day equivalent celebrated in many Latin-American countries is “El Día de Amor y Amistad,” or “The Day of Love and Friendship.” In countries such as Colombia and Bolivia, the focus on both love and friendship encourages the celebration of our relationships with families and friends alongside relationships with significant others. Here are some ideas for how to celebrate this Valentine’s Day as your own personal day of love and friendship:  It’s tough to overstate the benefits of being physically active. Regular exercise lowers the risk of heart disease, cancer, diabetes and more. Research suggests that it also helps fight and prevent depression by releasing endorphins (our brains’ stress-fighters). However, working out often feels like a chore, and getting yours kids to participate can be an even bigger challenge. Inspire a positive attitude toward staying active in your family and show them exercise doesn’t have to be a drag!
 Let’s face it: family mealtimes can be a battle.
Everyone knows how important it is to eat our fair share of greens — everyone, that is, except your child who is scrunching her nose at that side of asparagus, hoping her determined distaste can make it disappear into thin air. It’s easy to get frustrated when you’re having a hard time convincing your children to dig in to their healthy and not-quite-favorable helpings. By making the following practices part of your dinnertime routines, you can make your mealtimes — and picky eaters — happier and healthier. |
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