We try really hard to stay away from high fructose corn syrup around here, although, man, that stuff is in everything! Even bread. I think there are two or three brands that don't have it.

Olivia used to drink a lot of diet soda. I'd buy a couple of 2 litre bottles every week for her, in addition to drink mixes like Crystal Light. Sometimes I'd make diet Kool-Aid, using Splenda instead of sugar. One week, I added up how much of my grocery money was going towards diet drinks and was apalled - it was easily $10 or $15 a week.

And then I started looking into artificial sweeteners and how they're made and got a little freaked out about it (as is my wont) and decided enough was enough. They've been linked to various syndromes and diseases and I'm not willing to mess around with that. No more fake sugars. They worry me too much. And they're expensive.

I got Olivia used to drinking water. I started out by cutting the Crystal Light (or, more commonly, the generic store brand) drinks in half, making them with twice the water than was called for. Then, making them with 3x. Until finally, the water was barely flavoured. Then I switched to straight lemon juice, out of the bottle. She wasn't crazy about it unless it was really diluted. And now, she's fine with plain old water. And I'm not shelling out money I can't afford for drinks that get sucked back like there's no tomorrow.

I think a lot of times, parents are convinced their kids won't like water, won't drink water, but I think it's fairly easy to get them used to it. I know the babies (babies - they're 3.5 and 21 months old) will drink water over just about anything. I'll sometimes put a splash of apple juice into their water cups, but that's rare. And I've even managed to wean a teen-ager off of diet soda and diet drink mixes. No mean feat, really.

We still get diet soda when we're having a party and if we go out to eat, Olivia will order one and that's fine. She thinks of it as a treat now and, like anything that's not really good for you, that's how I want her to think of it.