Finally, Sunshine! Are Your Kids Ready for It?

By Amy De La Hunt on Mon, 05/24/2010 - 10:47am

On Saturday we headed out to play in the bubble jets at Tower Grove Park. In our eagerness to get out and enjoy the sunshine, I completely forgot to pack sunscreen. During the summer I keep tubes and bottles of it everywhere – the car, my purse, the swim bag – but with the rainy spring, I was slow wrapping my head around the usual summertime routines. Luckily the boys didn't burn, but I sure did.

Turns out that more than two-thirds of youngsters are like mine were Saturday, playing in the sun without being adequately protected.

If only I'd read this helpful info from the folks at St. John's Mercy Health Care earlier! It lays out how to get the beneficial effects of sunshine exposure without the downsides of sunburn or increased skin cancer risk.

Now my sunscreen is distributed in all the usual places, and this morning the 3-year-old and his grandparents had a successful strawberry-picking mission fully protected from the sun.

By Amy De La Hunt, Health Blogger for SmartParenting

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by Amy De La Hunt

Amy De La Hunt is a journalist and editor who lives in the St. Louis metro area and works across the country as a writer, copy editor, project manager and editorial consultant on everything from fiction books to monthly magazines to blog posts. When she's not chauffeuring her teenage sons to activities, Amy is an enthusiastic amateur cook, landscaper, Latin dancer and traveler. Follow Amy on Instagram @amy_in_words

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