Oh water… can’t live with it, can’t live without.

If any of you are like me, you choose flavored beverages over water anytime of the day. I must admit, Diet coke is my guilty pleasure and it gets in the way of my 8 cups of water a day, leaving me dehydrated and feeling sluggish. I know, I know… Diet Coke is horrible to drink and I shouldn’t be drinking it. I am working on it people… ok, maybe not as much as I should. I guess this post is more for me than it is for you guys!

Water works in so many different ways throughout our body. Just look at how water affects our body

There are so many benefits to drinking water besides the obvious of staying hydrated! Drinking at least 8 cups of water a day aids in weight loss, moisturizes skin to make it look younger, relieves headaches, fuels to brain to function better, aids in energy to exercise longer, prevents cramping and sprains, and helps fight against the flu.

So with this in mind, how can we get more water in throughout the day?

Here are 7 great tips to get in more water:

1.)  Buy a fun water bottle and NEVER let it leave your side

1. Rule: Only fill up with water

2.)   Drink one glass of water prior to every meal

3.)  Spice up your water with a slice of lemon or lime.

1. My friend taught me to slice up cucumbers and throw them into a pitcher full of water the night before. The water soaks up the flavor of the cucumbers to give a nice taste. You can do this is all sorts of fruits!

4.)  Straws… They work wonders

1. Who would have known that straws help in drinking water? I find myself drinking so much more when I drink from a straw.

5.)  Drink and Drive… water that is

1. Ok, this is the only time on my blog that I will ever encourage you to drink and drive. Keep your car cup holder full with your fun water bottle and make it a priority to drink your water while on the road.

6.)  Add your vitamins

1. Kill two birds with one stone by getting in your vitamins and water at the same time.  There are several different vitamin supplements made to be mixed with water

7.)  Filter your water

1. I don’t know where you live, but Arizona has the worst tasting water in the world. Brita Filters have saved my life ever since I moved out here. They aren’t too expensive either. Speaking of filtered water… Starbucks has the best water ever! From what I hear it’s triple filtered

Find what works for you. Hopefully some of these tips will help you cross the finish line of 8 cups by the end of the day.

Cheers and drink up!

Question: How do you fit in your 8 cups of water a day?

Now you can enjoy all the jelly, jams, and fruit spreads that you want without all the added sugar and calories. I recently discovered Walden Farms Calorie Free Fruit Spreads while shopping at Sprouts.

These fruit spreads are made with concentrated fruit extracts, splenda, and natural flavors, but no calorie, fat, carbs, gluten or sugars of any kind. I know there is controversy with splenda, but at least it’s not aspartame! Where do you stand with splenda?

There was a variety of fruit spreads to choose from, including strawberry, raspberry, blueberry and apricot, and orange, but when I saw Apple Butter, I just couldn’t resist. Obviously since it was a fruit spread it didn’t have the rich creamy taste of REAL apple butter, but it did had a great cinnamon apple flavor.

The best part was that you can use this one ingredient to spice up any meal! Here were a few recipes I used with my Walden Farms apple butter:

- Spread on toast  or a biscuit with small amount of butter

- Mixed with low fat yogurt, a small amount of honey, and Fiber One Cereal

- Combine with oatmeal, almond milk, raisins, and chopped up apples and a little bit of cinnamon

- Mixed in with frozen yogurt

- Swirl it into some fat free cottage cheese, raisins, sprinkled with Grapenuts Cereal

- Mixed with fat free cool whip and spread on a rice cake… tasted just like apple pie for only 50 calories!

Here is a pic of one of the many yummy recipes I made durning my afternoon snack