Hi everyone.  No matter what time of year it is it’s always a great time to get out of the house and get moving.    Some stuff you can do outdoors all year long like bicycle riding, roller skating, getting on your scooter or skate board; playing basketball, throwing a Frisbee, kicking a soccer ball around and so much more.  Even on a rainy or snowy day, you can still keep moving … invite some friends over, put on some music and dance.  Or play the Wii Fit game on your TV.  I LOVE that; it’s my favorite of all the Wii games.  The point is, as my dad says, “you gotta keep  movin’ and groovin’” (he’s so corny).

Anyway, it’s really important that during and after all your activities you remember to keep hydrated. That means that you not forget to drink lots of fluids, especially water.  My mom doesn’t even let me drink anything else most of the time, and even if she does she makes me drink water first. 

Just like most kids can stay in the water for hours with blue lips and tell our parents that we’re not cold, we can go hours or like forever without being thirsty.  That’s why at my summer camp all our counselors stop every hour and make sure we drink from our water bottles.  And when I horseback ride all year long, my mom leaves a water bottle and tells my trainer I must drink during the lesson.  I didn’t really understand why water was so important until my mom explained it to me.   It’s really simple. 

Did you know that about 70% of your body is water?  That’s amazing, right?  But, what’s even more amazing is that the other 30% of your body is all your body parts——eyes, ears, nose, skin, tongue, gums, teeth, hair, nails, brain, heart, kidneys, lungs, intestines, stomach, neck, throat … and I can’t even list them all——as well as all the functions of our bodies, like thinking, breathing, sleeping, talking, walking, blood flowing, and a gazillion other things that go on inside our bodies.  Anyway, that’s a real lot of stuff going on but even when you add it all together, it’s still less than the amount of water we have in our bodies.  Know why?  Because all of our body parts and all of the functions of our bodies need that water to function properly.  It’s like a whole bunch of elephants and zebras and other animals all drinking out of the same watering hole.   If all those animals are drinking out of the same pool of water, the pool would dry up if it wasn’t always refilled with rain water.  That’s like our bodies.  If all the organs of the body, and if all the functions of our bodies, use that 70% of water all day long, when the pool of water gets too low, our bodies try to hang on to the little water that is left for as long as possible.  And, don’t forget, not only do our bodies use that water just to work properly and keep us alive, but then when we do activities, whether we sweat or not, our bodies are losing even more water.  (Did you know we lose water even when we are sleeping?)  Eventually, when we run out of water, we get what’s called dehydrated—we get really tired and lazy, and our lips get really dry, and sometimes you can get dizzy, and it’s very unhealthy.  That’s why it’s important to remember to drink all day long, so that the pools of water in our bodies don’t get too low.  Or, try to picture in your mind a swimming pool … you always want to keep a swimming pool full of water, right?

So get in the habit of drinking your water.  It’s good for you inside, it’s good for you outside (your skin and your hair) and besides … it will make your parents happy!

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