February Health Challenge – Eat a heart-healthy Diet!

Let’s strive to eat four to five servings each of fruits and vegetables per day. We can do this!

Happy February, friends! We’re back to encourage you with a new monthly attainable health challenge. We hope that everyone was able to attain the first health goal we shared in mid-January of drinking 11 glasses of water a day. If you missed that post and want to read all the health benefits as to why we should, you can find it HERE. No need to aim for perfection. Instead, consistency is key to attaining any goal and moving closer towards a healthy mind, body and spirit.

With a main focus in February being Valentine’s Day, we feel there’s another great reason why we should think about our own heart; this month is American Heart Month! And what better month than to have an attainable goal towards taking care of our heart. There are many ways to keep our heart in great shape. But to make it attainable, let’s focus our attention on at least one way to fully embrace this attainable health challenge in February by eating what the American Heart Association recommends for adults to eat four to five servings each of fruits and vegetables daily. If you’re already doing so, you ROCK! Why not visit this LINK and pick out you’re own challenge for American Heart Month. This site is packed full of information on heart health and is an awesome way to further educate ourselves, so definitely take a peek at it.

Here is a great chart from the American Heart Association to help us with serving sizes:

Eating a heart-healthy diet can sound daunting but if we focus on just loading up on fresh fruits and vegetables throughout the month of February, we feel that’s an important step in the right direction! Did you know that fruit and vegetable juices can be part of a healthy diet?One serving of 100% juice can fulfill one of your daily servings. Just watch for added sugar and choose 100% juice. Another idea is to consider the Mediterranean diet which focuses on eating a diet that’s rich in fresh fruit and vegetables as well as whole grains, nuts, fish and seafood instead of red and processed meats. You may also be familiar with the DASH diet (Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension). It is similar to the Mediterranean diet in that you fill up on fruits, vegetables, whole grains, lean protein and low-fat dairy. Follow this LINK for 27 days of delicious DASH Diet recipes. Both diets are a great way we can improve our overall health.

Thankfully, we can keep our heart healthy no matter how old we are, by striving to make changes in our everyday habits. Let February be a reminder to give our heart a little TLC this month and know that we’ll be right there alongside you doing the same thing.

Love your heart and it will love you back!

Mimi Jackie

Originally Published on https://www.gigiconnection.com/

Gigi Connection Grandparenting

With decades of friendship between us, we aim to empower and encourage women of all ages as we share, from our hearts, topics relating to health, beauty, fashion, reading, cooking, faith in God, travel and the joys of aging gracefully as we live life with our friends, family and adoring grandchildren.

Our greatest hope is that with almost 200 collective years of marriage wisdom, 20 grandchildren between us (newborn-12 years of age) and friendships lasting since 1989, our blog encourages you in some way in your friendships, your relationships, your faith, your self and in this wonderful journey called grandparenting.