Drink More Water!
Let’s talk about W A T E R! We hear “Drink more water!” all the time, but WHY is it so important? Well, every cell in our bodies (all 100ish trillion of them!) requires water to function properly. Even very mild dehydration can result in:
- impaired mood
- an increase in the frequency of headaches
- muscle fatigue (which makes exercise difficult)
- chronic fatigue/exhaustion
- constipation
- lack of concentration
- BRAIN FOG
Besides preventing all of the above, water is also incredibly important for you kidneys to be able to flush toxins out of your system. We don't want toxins hanging around! Many of the symptoms we experience daily can be avoided by simply drinking more water.
We should drink around EIGHT 8oz glasses of WATER a day. Sports drinks do not count. Coconut water doesn’t count (though it is good for you). Juicing doesn’t count. Water that has been turned into tea or lemonade or coffee does NOT count. It needs to be filtered, pure water. If you’re like I was 2 years ago, that sounds daunting! I didn’t even LIKE water, so how was I supposed to drink that much every single day?!
If you don’t yet enjoy drinking water and are accustomed to drinking sodas or other flavored beverages all day, one thing you can do is add a drop or 2 of essential oil in your glass of water for flavor. When you use oils to flavor your water, you reap the health benefits of the water AND the oils. It’s a win, win! Some of my favorite oils to add are Young Living’s:
- Lemon Vitality
- Peppermint Vitality
- Orange Vitality
- Tangerine Vitality
- Grapefruit Vitality
We use a Berkey Water Filtration system in our home, and I keep a glass water bottle with me at all times and a mason jar beside the system so that I can easily drink water throughout the day. When you decide to become intentional about upping your water intake, I suggest keeping track of your consumption either in a journal or in an app like iDrated or Waterlogged. Before long, you’ll find yourself craving water! It’s amazing what happens when we give our body what it NEEDS instead of just what we think we WANT.
**When I speak of consumption of essential oils, I am only referring to the Young Living Vitality line of EOs. Please do not ingest oils off the shelf at your local health food store (or Whole Foods/Wal-Mart/Bed Bath & Beyond). Do your research!**
Essential Oils First Aid Kit + printables
Have you ever had a kid wake up sick in the middle of the night only to discover that you don't have what you need to help them and thus find yourself speeding to the corner CVS at 3am? I know that happened to us before we started using our oils. Now, we always have what we need ready to go, and there's no more groggy trips to the pharmacy - just groggy trips downstairs. Ha!
We have a First Aid Kit for the kids that has the oil blends that we use most often with them. I included instruction cards on where/how to apply them so that when we hand the kit to sitters and grandparents they know exactly what to do. No more stressing about correct dosages of OTC meds! The kids can roll the oils on themselves, and caretakers can rest easy knowing they can't screw it up. We're empowering our kids to take their health into their own hands, and that is amazing.
I've made this whole kit into printables so that you can create one of your own for your family! Winter is coming with all of its yuckiness, so go ahead and get a head start and put your kit together. You'll be so glad you have it!
The download includes Usage Cards, Recipes, and bottle labels.