Does your husband spend lots of time working in the garden? Let's hope so -- not only is it good for him, it's good for your relationship. And I'm not just talking about the fact that the you two are less likely to get into a big fight when he's willingly helping out in the yard -- gardening can actually improve your sex life. As in, physically.

Recent studies show that gardening greatly reduces a man's chance of impotence, meaning it can do wonders for his performance in the bedroom. If gardening is typically your job around the house? Exercise in general will have the same effects, so get your guy moving.

And considering gardening burns around 272 calories an hour, the fact that it's helping your hubby get rid of his beer belly can't hurt either.

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Martha recently posted about whether or not parents should be notified if their children are overweight. A recent user question on Momtourage shows that some doctors are doing just that. ... and I think it's a good thing. The parent asking the question is wondering if they should even be concerned that their child is overweight because they feel that their child is active and happy.

Some children are clearly, unmistakably overweight. But for other kids, it isn't always easy to tell. After all, kids go through growth spurts and they grow at different rates. But if a medical professional expresses that your child is indeed overweight, it's time to take action.

As parents, there are many things you can do to help your child live a healthy lifestyle and maintain an appropriate weight.

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If you've got a crabgrass problem like I do this year, weeding can be exercise. In fact, it can be a high-impact aerobic activity, if you do it at my house.

Weeding can be done for flexibilty and endurance, and we are now told by some researchers that low-key fitness, like weeding and strolling, is the answer to a long, healthy life.

So, in the spirit of weeding like a fiend, I write this Fitku:

Stretching, pulling weeds
Beautiful garden, exercise
Squatting, bending, done!

Do you buy it? Can weeding be exercise? I know my sore thighs and ankles tell that story the next day....

Growing your own produce is an economical way to feed your family healthfully. As an added perk, pulling all of the weeds helps to burn a few calories each day.

If you haven't gotten around to planting a garden this summer, you're not too late. There are plenty of veggies that can still thrive even into the fall. Perhaps even into the winter, depending on the weather conditions where you live. Divine Caroline has a list of edible goodies that can be planted now and enjoyed in the coming months:

• Long-maturing crops such as carrots, cabbage, and potatoes can be planted now for regions with October frost dates, or in August for regions with November frost dates.
• Medium-maturing crops like broccoli, Swiss chard, and kale take about two months to mature. You can plant them now or hold off a bit longer for fall growth.
• Fast-maturing crops such as spinach, arugula, and leaf lettuce mature in about a month and can be planted as late as September. Plant some now and then plan to plant again for a second crop in the fall.

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From time to time I'll share our family's experience as a half-shareholder in a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) garden down the road.

Just as Bethany loves the veggies pouring in from her family's CSA share, so do we. This is our family's first experience with owning a CSA share and we absolutely love it! It's headed up by a wonderful woman with an immense knowledge of organic gardening -- beyond locally-produced veggies, my thumb is becoming greener.

The plan we purchased requires ten hours of work in the garden. So a couple nights ago I took the kids over for an hour of weeding. I worked up a nice sweat weeding between two endless rows of tomato plants. I showed my son what okra, sweet potato and green pepper plants look like. He ran the perimeter of the two-acre garden and I didn't need to worry about traffic.

At the end of the weeding session, our CSA host had a special surprise. The sugar snap peas were ready to harvest and we were able to pick and take home the biggest, juiciest sugar snaps I've ever tasted. They were like candy off the vine. Here's a gallery of photos of our evening at a CSA -- hope your vegetable garden is yielding plenty this summer!

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Seven years ago, I found myself unemployed for a while. I tried to trim costs wherever I could -- disconnecting my cable TV, terminating my cell phone service, and doing everything I could to lower my grocery bill. When you're trying to cut costs that $0.79 box of mac n' cheese starts to look awfully good. Unfortunately, my low cost grocery shopping had a price I didn't want to pay -- I gained weight and plenty of it.

With today's grocery costs, everyone has to think of their budget when shopping whether you're in a temporary financial hardship like I was, or at the top of your financial game. Luckily, you can stay within your budget and still feed your family a nutritious meal. Some tips:

• Eat locally and in season. When you visit farmer's markets, you cut out the middle man and cut out some of the cost.
  
• Get a green thumb. Planting your own garden is by far the most cost effective method for fresh produce -- plus you'll get the added perk of physical activity.

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Feeling stressed? One of the best ways to manage stress may be waiting for you just outside your back door.

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My mom is one of those hard-to-buy-for types. She and my dad are, thankfully, in a position where if they need or want anything, they can go out and get it. But when birthdays and holidays like Mother's Day roll around, it leaves my siblings and me with very few options. This year, I think I'll try to give my mom something in keeping with her healthy lifestyle. If you're thinking along the healthy lines for Mother's Day gifts too, here are some ideas to consider:

• A day at the spa. Moms rarely take time for themselves. Give your mom a gift certificate for the spa and help her relax.
• Skin care. Whether you give a face mask, moisturizer, hand lotion, or cleanser, skin care gifts are always appreciated.

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Spring is here and that means flowers, nature in bloom everywhere, and as I just recently learned while working on an article for AOL Body (11 Reasons to Love Spring): the potential for improved health. While doing research for the article, I had the opportunity to discover a new reason to love spring, which is -- at the risking of sounding touchy-feely -- the healing powers of gardening.

"Watching something grow and even smelling flowers can have an impact on someone's health," says Mary Beth Miller, a horticultural therapist with Gardening for Good. A horticultural what? No, not a therapist for plants, but someone who helps her (human) patients address mental or physical health problems through gardening and connecting with nature.

What are the health benefits? The Horticultural Therapy Institute says this unique brand of therapy:

My grandma always had a compost pile. We grandkids never knew exactly why she went to all the work of gathering a bunch of trash and dumping it in a bin in her backyard. She had her reasons, though, and while we didn't grasp them way back when, we understand her intentions now.

Successful gardening -- my grandma loved gardening -- starts with feeding with soil. The best way to nourish the soil comes from an unlikely but nutrient-rich source -- the home and yard.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) reports that food scraps and yard trimmings account for about 25 percent of all the waste generated in the United States. Composting cuts down on this percentage. Just reuse and recycle the garbage you create right at home and you'll benefit the planet. And your garden too.

Here's how you can get started.

• Start in the Spring.
  
  

• Find some scraps and find a place to put them. Make a big pile in an out-of-the-way outdoor spot or buy bins to contain your compost and protect it from the elements.
  
  

• Grab a pitchfork or shovel so you can turn your pile and incorporate oxygen.
  
  

• Gather fruit and vegetable scraps, coffee grounds, tea bags, eggshells, shredded white paper, newspaper (nothing shiny, just newsprint), torn-up toilet paper, paper towel tubes, and plant and yard trimmings.
  
  

• Do not use meat, oil, and dairy products. They won't break down properly, will smell badly, and will attract pests. Avoid weeds too. They will only produce more weeds.
  
  

• Go heavier on "brown" materials -- leaves, straw, wood -- than the "green" items from your kitchen.
  
  

• Compost should be kept as moist as a wrung-out sponge.
  
  

• Compost is finished when it smells good, looks good, and feels like dark, rich, crumbly earth. Your original ingredients should be unrecognizable. If you do nothing but add scraps to your pile, it may take up to one year before you realize your final product. If you actively work your pile -- turning it, monitoring your green/brown ratio, checking on moisture -- then it could take as little as one month.
  
  

• When ready, sprinkle your compost on the soil surface. Then start planting.
  
  

• If your compost begins to stink, bury your kitchen scraps in the material from the yard.

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Whether your job involves heavy lifting or a great deal of typing, the possibility always exists that you may injure yourself. Granted, a sudden injury is more likely to come as a result of lifting a 50-pound box than it is typing an annual report, but injury can also develop over the long term from repetitive strain.

Repetitive Strain Injuries (RSIs) most frequently occur in the wrists, hands, shoulders, and elbows. Fortunately, you can protect yourself against RSIs by performing functional exercise or recreation activities as little as one time per week.

In a study of about 60,000 full-time workers, researchers found that those who enjoyed physical activities -- tennis, dancing, gardening, working out, basketball, etc. -- in their time off had almost 20 percent fewer RSIs than less active workers.

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When it comes to growing and eating healthy vegetables, the Alaska State Fair isn't messing around. There are vegetable growing contests at pretty much every state fair around the country, but those in Alaska have an edge. The summer months in Alaska mean hyper-extended daylight hours, which means ginormously overgrown veggies -- like this 73.4 pound cabbage grown by Brenna Dinkel. In fact, cabbages do so well up in Alaska they have their own category at the fair. I really do love cabbage, but there's no way around the fact that it stinks when you cook it -- that must be one smelly neighborhood the days after the fair is over and everybody's having cabbage (lots of it!) for dinner!

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Doesn't sound so simple, does it? But this list of tips from Frugalist Magazine (via Dr. Mercola) is designed to not only make your life happier and healthier, but it is organized so that it is one less complication you'll have in your life.

Different sections on work, around the house, finances, goals and beliefs, romance, socializing and health and diet offer well-rounded suggestions on how to improve your life.

How about dancing? Saying thank you? Vounteering? Paying in cash? Planting a garden? Rearranging your house? Always being on time? Simple. Easy. But do we do them?

Frugalist's list is a nice reminder that it really is small changes that make all the difference in our happiness.

Here at That's Fit, our Daily Fit Tip is all about small steps you can take to make your life healthier. Today, why not trying to burn some calories. You don't need some hour-long sweat session that burns 600 calories or anything ... but how about 100? Burning 100 calories is easier than you think. It's as easy as dancing with your honey for half and hour, going to the park with your kids or gardening for 20 minutes. If you could devote time every day to burning 100 calories, you would be burning an extra 700 calories a week which is sure to pay off after a while.

For me, burning an extra 100 calories is as easy as taking a walk at lunch instead of sitting at my desk. It's refreshing and energizing after hours of toiling away at the computer.

How do you burn 100 calories?

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Being healthy is about so much more than just eating more fruits and vegetables and working out (although those are very important!), it's also about having a healthy outlook on life and having healthy relationships. It's that whole "well-rounded and balanced" idea we can't seem to get away from, because everything really does work together. So in tune with the season of getting your garden started this spring, check out this inspirational (and also a little cheesy) analogy on why you should plant squash, lettuce, peas, and turnips in your garden this year (squash gossip, let us love one another...)

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