July is National Park and Recreation Month and the National Recreation and Park Association encourages you and your family to “GET WILD” about parks and recreation and take advantage of everything your local park has to offer. Since 1985, America has celebrated July as the nation’s official Park and Recreation Month. In 2009, the U.S. House of Representatives officially mandated July as “Park and Recreation Month”.

Our small town of Cleveland, Mississippi has several parks and they are all beautifully maintained by our park commission and offer everyone a safe place to play and exercise.  We have two parks we prefer to use as a family (Fireman’s Park and Bear Pen Park), and both have excellent playground equipment for the little ones, gazebos and picnic tables for picnics, a wading pool, fitness trails, baseball and softball fields, tennis courts, soccer fields, basketball courts, and one even has a beautiful duck pond where we like to feed the ducks and turtles.   We have made so many wonderful family memories at these parks.   One of my favorites is watching my son play t-ball for the first time.

Because of the heat, we have to take advantage of our outdoor time during the early morning and late evening hours during the summer, but that won’t stop us from visiting our local parks.  My son loves the playground and just can’t get enough each time we go.  As a family, we have committed ourselves to getting more exercise this summer, and our parks offer so many activities to achieve our goal.

Not only are parks just a great place to play, but local parks help take a stand against the increasing obesity epidemic by encouraging kids to play outside and participate in recreation activities.  Studies have shown that parks help boost the economy and contribute to the value of surrounding residential properties. In addition, they help make the local community a safer place to raise a family.

This month, visit the NRPA website where you can find a calendar of local events happening across the country, the official toolkit, opportunity to take the Get Wild pledge, and information on the Get Wild Geocaching Contest, which  includes instructions on how to participate in the real-world, outdoor treasure hunting game using GPS-enabled devices. Explore local park and recreation areas in your community and share your geocaching photos on Facebook to be automatically entered to win one of 5 Magellan GC eXplorist GPS Devices in NRPA’s Get Wild Geocaching Contest .  You can also “like” the NPRA Facebook site to get updates.

So, head outdoors to your nearest local park and “GET WILD” about playing!

I wrote this review while participating in a blog tour by Mom Central Consulting on behalf of National Recreation and Park Association and received a promotional item to thank me for taking the time to participate.