How to Raise Healthy Eaters

When it comes to learning, some people think more is caught than taught. This might be the case especially when it comes to healthy eating habits. Try the following ideas to help you raise healthy eaters.

#1 – Be a good role model. You can teach children to love healthy foods by eating them yourself. Children, especially young ones, will do as their parents do. Let them see you eating fresh fruits and vegetables rather than junk food.

#2 – Keep negative opinions about food to yourself. Even if you don’t care for a particular food, don’t make negative comments about it within earshot of your children. This will enable them to form their own opinions about it.

#3 – Let your children pitch in. Some children don’t like the idea of eating something if they don’t know what’s in it. By having them help you prepare the meal, so they can see everything that’s in it, they may be more willing to eat anything you place on their plate.

#4 – Keep junk food out of the house. If you don’t have cookies, candy, and chips in your house your children won’t ask for them. You can offer healthy snacks such as fresh fruits, vegetable sticks, hard-boiled eggs, yogurt, cheese, or peanut butter.

#5 – Allow your children to play with their food. If you think your child will be more likely to eat fruit if it’s made into a funny face, what will it hurt if they make them? Your goal is to get children to eat healthy food and sometimes whatever works is fine.

#6 – Offer new food several times before giving up. It may take as many as twelve times for your child to be comfortable with a food, so it might take more than one or two tries for them to make up their mind about them.

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The Healing Powers of Indian Head Massage

Indian Head Massage has its roots in Ayurveda, which is an ancient form of medicine. It began as a cosmetic practice, wherein women would massage oils into each other’s scalps and hair. Now, it has come to involve more than just the head – Indian Head Massage focuses on the upper back, arms, neck, face, and shoulders as well. The recipient sits upright, so this form of massage can be done just about anywhere. The use of oils is optional, but some practitioners feel that the various herbal aromas in the oils are an important component to the massage’s healing effects.

Because it targets key pressure points in the upper body, Indian Head Massage tends to bring immediate relief to such complaints as stress, emotional distress, and muscle tension. It is said to enhance mental clarity and improve memory. This massage is especially conducive to an office setting, not only because of its portable nature but because it targets those areas of the body most often affected by sitting at a desk or computer for long periods: upper back, neck, shoulders, and eyes (often strained by computer screens).

Here are some of the ways that Indian Head Massage may benefit your health.

1. Headaches

Chronic headaches can be a difficult burden to bear. Indian Head Massage is reputed to relieve chronic headaches, probably by increasing the circulation in and around the head and relaxing muscles. Practitioners believe the massage restores harmony to the three higher “chakras,” or centers of vital energy, thus relieving pain caused by chakra disharmony.

A note on a particular kind of chronic headache, the migraine – some practitioners warn that migraine sufferers may actually bring on an attack by undergoing Indian Head Massage. Others believe that migraines are helped by this massage.

2. Increased circulation

Blood delivers nutrients and oxygen to the entire body, and takes away toxins, bacteria, and other impurities. The blood contains germ-fighting white blood cells and oxygen-rich red blood cells. Therefore, increasing the blood flow to any part of the body is likely to improve the health and vitality of the targeted area.

Increased circulation in the brain can have many positive effects, such as improved memory and decreased depression. The eyes, sinuses, and ears can all benefit from increased blood flow, thus enhancing sight and relieving eye strain, alleviating sinus congestion, and reducing tinnitus.

3. Promotes restful sleep

Some practitioners claim that a restful night’s sleep is the greatest and most immediate benefit of Indian Head Massage. It relieves stress and relaxes muscles, and combined with relaxing herbal essences it can be a safe alternative treatment for insomnia.

4. Lymphatic drainage

The lymphatic system can get congested due to accumulated toxins, stress, poor posture, tension, illness, etc. Indian Head Massage manually promotes drainage of the lymphatic system, thus enhancing immunity and providing relief from other toxin-induced ills, such as acne.

A bonus to Indian Head Massage is that it is a beauty treatment as well. Scalp health is greatly improved by the stimulation and the increase in circulation, thus promoting hair growth and health. And if the practitioner uses oils, they can act as a conditioner for the hair.

How to Add Humidity to Your Dry Home without Using Energy

In the winter, the air gets very dry and cold, and forced-air heat can make the air inside our homes uncomfortably dry. That kind of desert-like air can be hard on our bodies, drying skin and mucus membranes, making us more susceptible to colds and other respiratory ailments. Super-dry air can also damage the structure of your home, causing cracks in drywall and gaps in floor joints (dryness causes wood to shrink). And the static electricity is just plain annoying.

Increasing the humidity in your home makes it feel warmer (remember how much hotter the summer weather seemed when it was humid?). A house that feels warmer means you won’t be as inclined to turn up the thermostat, thus saving on energy costs.
So how can you humidify your home without purchasing a humidifier? There are economical ways to increase your home’s humidity. Here are some ideas and tips for moisturizing your house.

1. Re-think how you do the laundry

-Vent your dryer inside
For under $10, you can purchase a simple kit from your local hardware store that will enable you to vent your dryer inside. The moist, hot air from the clothes-drying process will get put back into your home, and the kit catches the lint in a water-filled plastic cup.

-Hang your laundry indoors
Wet clothes dry quickly in the warm, dry air of a heated home. And the moisture that evaporates out of them will be put into the air, humidifying your home. You can use drying racks made for the indoors, or hang clothes from your shower curtain rod. You’ll save electricity by skipping the dryer, too.

2. Turn down the heat

While it’s tempting to crank up the thermostat, consider putting on an extra layer or a thick sweater instead. The more you use artificial heat, the drier the air will become.

3. Water

When you are cooking, leave boiling pots uncovered when possible to allow the steam to diffuse throughout the kitchen. Also, leaving an open pot of water in each room will increase humidity simply by evaporation.

4. Open the bathroom door

When you finish your shower (or during your shower if you don’t mind the lack of privacy or the chill), open the bathroom door and don’t run the bathroom fan. After drying off, hang your wet towel up in another room to dry.

5. Vaporizers

Far cheaper and easier to maintain than a humidifier, the same vaporizer you use when you or a family member has a cold can be used to humidify your home. You may already have one on hand.

6. Water those plants

Use a spray bottle to mist your houseplants, and keep them watered (they will need it in the dry air). Be sure you have a dish under each plant, so the water that runs out can be left to evaporate.

These are all relatively small things you can do, but they can have a big impact on your health and your finances.

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