Tips for helping to keep your family cold and flu free #lysolcoldandflu

With fall and winter quickly approaching, keeping our children healthy and minimizing the impact of cold and flu season is top of mind. Germs can spread easily when kids are in school sharing lunches and school supplies, playing with friends, and participating in extracurricular activities. It’s important to keep your kids healthy so they can stay active, alert and not miss any school. The experts at Lysol recommend getting a flu shot, washing your hands with soap and water and scrub thoroughly for 20 seconds, and routinely clean and disinfect surfaces to help stop the spread of germs. Lysol Spray and Lysol Wipes kill 99.9% of bacteria and viruses on hard non porous surfaces.

So Lysol has asked a few us mom bloggers to give our motherly advice on  staying cold and flue free this season!  These are One Momma Saving Money's Tips for helping to keep your family cold and flu free:

1. Head to the pediatrician and have your little one checked out; are they up to date on their shots?  Our doctor has use do yearly visits around the kid's birthdays!  Also make sure to schedule your flu shots!   Some places even offer the nasal spray so your child does not need a shot anymore!  Moms and Dads should get the flu shot too!!!
2. Take your vitamins!!!   Every morning make sure your little ones have their multi-vitamins!  Now that vitamins are in a gummy form they are more enjoyable and fun to take.  Kids will be asking to take their vitamins each day!  Mine sure do! Vitamins are import for the entire family, so set an example and take yours too!
3. Make sure they are getting enough sleep, a child with not enough sleep can become run down more easily! Heck if they get off the bus and seem a little tired a nap every now and then is not so bad too!
4. Eat Right!   Remember the good old saying, an apple a day keeps the doctor away!!! So bust out the fruit and veggies!  Hit the orchards and pick some apples, sent healthy foods and snacks to school.
5. Start the morning right.  Breakfast, we all have heard it before, but breakfast is the most important meal of the day!  Not eating breakfast can make you run down too, or at least for me. 
6.  Teach your child the proper way to cough and sneeze… into the inside of your elbow and NOT your hands!  Germs spread fast!  If at all possible have sanitizer with you in purse, backpacks, etc.   I also carry tissues in my purse and they are must for the backpacks!
7. If you help wipe a nose, touch a dirty tissue, etc.  Make sure you are washing your hands too!!!If out in public, avoid touching doors and highly touched areas.  If you have to open a lot of doors and no sanitizer handy, make sure you do not touch your face!!! 
8. Make sure you wipe down the house if someone else is sick!  A quick Lysol wipe on the door knobs, light switches and common places is best!
9.  Following suit, make sure your kids know the benefits to washing their hands.  The less likely they are to spread germs and stay healthy!   make it fun by having them sing their ABC's while washing hands!
10.  Dress the kids properly!   Send them off with a jacket, umbrella, hat, gloves, etc.  My daughter always has a hoodie in the bottom of her back pack just in case! Always watch the forecast as temps change and you don’t want your little one in the wrong attire!

Please note I am not a doctor, dietitian, health professional or claim to be... just a mom sharing what I do to try and stay healthy!

Help protect your family from the germs that cause the flu this season. Here is a nice little rebate to encourage too: Receive $5.00 by mail when you purchase 1 LYSOL® product and a flu shot. Offer is valid and receipt(s) must be dated between 10/1/11 – 2/29/12.

About Lysol
We do more not just because we can, but because we must. Health matters. To all of us. That's why we've started the Lysol Mission for Health. With new mom programs, healthy habits initiatives in schools and disaster relief efforts, we are dedicated to doing more for health. Our mission is fueled by passion and backed by our expertise in killing germs. So when you use Lysol at home, you'll know you're a part of something bigger.

More info on Lysol: http://www.lysol.com/mission-for-health

“I wrote this blog post while participating in the SocialMoms and Lysol blogging program, for a gift card worth $40. For more information on how you can participate, click here.”