Let’s Move Pittsburgh Healthy Lifestyle Tips, Recipes and Resources for Your Family
5 Outdoor Activities for the Whole Family
With so much technology, it can be hard to pull ourselves away from indoor attractions like computers, TVs and video games. As a result, we miss out on the exciting and beautiful world of nature that is right outside our door. Spending time in nature alone and with our families has positive outcomes for everyone.
1. Go Apple or Berry Picking
At pick-your-own fruit farms throughout Southwestern Pennsylvania, you and your family can find fresh healthy produce while enjoying some outdoor exercise. Check out VisitPittsburgh's U-Pick Farms directory to find a farm near you.
2. Plant a Vegetable Garden
Backyard veggie gardens make for a great family activity that brings little ones an enriched understanding of the plant-to-plate journey — and they'll be more excited to eat vegetables they've helped to grow. Get started with Phipps' own Homegrown resources, including How to Build a Raised Bed Vegetable Garden and our guide to Square Foot Gardening.
3. Take a Hike or Nature Walk
Nothing connects children to nature like a walk through a wild space — and the Pittsburgh area has plenty of extraordinary parks and green spaces to choose from. Start your journey by checking out the resources of Pittsburgh Parks Conservancy and the Children & Nature Network.
4. Take a Bike Ride
Biking is good for you, good for the planet and good for family bonding! Visit BikePGH for helpful information on biking in Pittsburgh.
5. Try Outdoor Yoga
Calming and strengthening to the body and mind, yoga can be practiced no matter your age or level of skill. Let's Move Pittsburgh and YMCA of Greater Pittsburgh offer special outdoor Family Yoga classes on the front lawn of Phipps; watch our website for upcoming dates.
From the Let's Move Pittsburgh Blog
Fresh herbs and spices are a great way to improve taste without contributing excess sodium or calories to your meal.
Rosemary is a very hardy plant and is easy to grow on a windowsill making it a very popular cooking herb that anyone can grow at home.
Making healthy choices while dining out calls for tough decision making, but we have some tips to ensure you have a nutritious meal.
Fiber is an essential nutrient, and it is important that we eat enough each day for it to work at its full potential.
About Let's Move Pittsburgh
Let's Move Pittsburgh — modeled after Former First Lady Michelle Obama's national Let's Move! campaign to raise awareness about the benefits of healthy foods, increased exercise and decreased screen time — is a program of Phipps and a collaborative effort to improve the health of children in southwestern Pennsylvania. Engaging communities with an interest in and a capacity for making a difference, Let's Move Pittsburgh ultimately seeks to better understand childhood health issues, and then tackle them with a unified approach that anyone can follow to meet a common goal.
Let's Move Pittsburgh Is Sponsored in Part By
Visit the UPMC MyHealth Matters Blog for More Health Tips
Select photos © Kristi Hoffman, Paul g. Wiegman
