Hi H.,
I give my kids water only at meals, mostly so that they don't drink too much and not eat, and because drinking with a meal is not really good for digestion, as it dilutes digestive juices. When we eat out, servers are always stunned when my four-year old asks for water with lemon. Anyways, I sometimes offer fresh juice with snacks, and they each have a cool water bottle to carry around with them all day, that either has water or herbal tea or barley tea. The juice is not all that good for them, either - it's just sugar. Better to eat the whole fruit. And I suspect that juice-drinking toddlers become soda-drinking people, so it's better to instill good habits now. Which is another reason to avoid "flavoring" the water for him - you're giving him chemicals and bad habits that way. If he's accustomed to having juice and milk or anything sweet as beverages regularly, it will take some effort to make the change. But it's a lot easier to change a two-year old's habits than a ten-year old's, or forty-year year old's. Good luck.
Sharie G - I'll have to side with Donna H on this one. When you eat fresh fruit, you get fiber, and most importantly, live enzymes, which are not found in pasteurized juices, or anything cooked. I am a juice advocate - when I push the fruits and veggies through my juicer and drink immediately, yes, it's very good for anyone to drink. The only thing Juicy Juice has over Pepsi is a lesser amount of chemicals - but they're in the juice, too, mostly in the form of pesticides!!!! And I'm not just a health nut here - you can call up your local health department and ask to speak with a registered dietician, who will tell you that juice is no good, and that they are rallying to get it off of WIC.
Okay Sharie-
I'm sorry I misunderstood you. When you wrote "Juice is VERY good for EVERYONE in moderation and as long as it is 100% juice like Juicy Juice brand," I thought you were saying that Juicy Juice is good for people. Juicy Juice, like every other bottle of juice on supermarket shelves, is pasteurized, thus lacking the nutritional value found in fresh whole fruits or freshly made juice. I must have missed the part about fresh fruit juice. And I should have been clearer about the soda thing. No, I do not believe that ALL children who drink juice WILL drink soda. What I meant when I said "I suspect" is that all the talk about having to sweeten water or even milk in order to get kids to drink it speaks volumes about the preferences these kids are forming, so that later in life, for many of these kids, the drinks will still need to be sweet. I did not intend that as a blanket statement, but simply as a comment. Indeed, my own children could turn into soda-drinking people, despite my best efforts to deter the development of tastes for such things. I worry very much about the next generation, specifically my children, having to struggle to break bad habits, as I watch family members and friends (and myself) struggle with their health and behaviors responsible for the problems today. It's fantastic that your daughter doesn't opt for Sprite. And you are right - everyone has their own opinions about things. My opinion is that it's a good idea to understand facts.
Yes, Sharie - well put! I couldn't have said it better.