If you’re anything like me, your August is all about enjoying the hottest days of summer: time outside, preferable near the water, eating al fresco with family or friends, and soaking up all of the lazy days of heat and kids playing. There’s a lot of rose and cheese platters and napping in the shade. I wanted to enjoy all of that but still get to September feeling healthy and energized, so I’ve found two quick tips that are all over the wellness world right now, and you can painlessly integrate them into your summer routine without taking time away from that new watermelon-shaped pool float your daughter talked you into buying at Target.

Add a Variety of Plant Food for Gut Health:

Have you read Fiber Fueled by Dr. Will Bulsiewicz? Dr. B is a successful gastroenterologist who believes that gut health is absolutely essential to helping our bodies fight disease, maintain a health weight, and feel good. He’s made it his mission to approach this issue through scientific studies and has concluded that plant diversity in diet is the most important factor in determining gut health and overall health. 

I’m reading his book right now and it’s fascinating, so I highly recommend reading the whole thing, but it also inspired me to make a quick health challenge for August that I wanted to share with you. I’m trying to feed myself and my family eight different fruits and vegetables every day. This is fun to do in the summer when the produce is so abundant and fresh, and it keeps me feeling like we’re doing something right even when the kids are lobbying for popsicles again. It sounds like a lot, but it’s actually been pretty easy incorporate it, as long as I keep it in mind when I’m buying groceries. I’ve been tossing a few veggies on the kids lunch plates, serving cut up watermelon with strawberries and blueberries for breakfast or snack time, and trying to toss different veggies into a salad every night with dinner. We don’t hit the goal every day, but it’s something to aim for and has been inspiring me to try some new summer dishes and combinations. 

Incorporate a Few Minutes of Rebounding Into Your Workout:

Rebounding, or jumping rope has been getting a lot of press these days. Exercise gurus like Tracey Anderson, Lauren Roxburgh and Amanda Kloots are all about incorporating it into your workout routine, as it’s touted to be more effective at burning calories and building aerobic endurance than running, can help flush your lymphatic system and strengthen your immune system. You only need to do it for about ten to fifteen minutes to see results, you can do it at home, and you can do it with just a simple jump rope (or buy a fancy rebounder like this one, if that’s your jam).

I tend to slack off on exercise in August, so I’m trying to add this in a few times a week to keep my fitness up without having to commit to something that takes a long time and I know I won’t follow through on. I’m still loving the Amanda Kloots online workouts, and she has some short videos that are dedicated just to jumping rope, or some longer ones that incorporate a mix of jumping and strength training. 

So, that’s what I’ll be trying this month! If you’d like to read up more on Fiber Fueled or Dr. B, you can visit his website and blog here, listen to him on this podcast here, or check out his book here.

For more resources about rebounding, you can check out this article with Amanda Kloots, this blog with Lauren Roxburgh or this PopSugar video here.