I’ve been asked to offer my input for a new “top bloggers” list being compiled by a pretty high-profile publication. The list will be of the best “undiscovered” parenting bloggers out there – the mom (and dad) bloggers who are absolutely terrific writers, but who just haven’t gotten much exposure or readership yet.

I’d love to have input from my own readers on this. In the comments below, please share your own picks for the best up and coming bloggers on the scene. I will be personally checking out each and every suggestion y’all make, and I have no doubt that some of your recommendations will make it onto the list that I turn in to this publication for possible inclusion on their upcoming “best of” list. Making it into this list would be a really huge boost for a blogger, so if someone you read regularly should be on it, let me know!

If you were to ask the people who know me best – my husband, kids, sister, brother, close friends – what my worst health habit is, they would all tell you the same thing; I am utterly and totally addicted to a particular brand of diet soda. While I will drink pretty much anything with caffeine and aspartame in a pinch, there’s this one particular brand of soda (hint: rhymes with GIANT SEPSY) that’s my favorite. In fact, I spend so much money on this type of diet soda on an annual basis that I really try not to think about it, because if I added it up, the total dollar amount would be too depressing.

I know that I have a caffeine addiction (although strangely, I’ve never been a coffee drinker), but I really think I am equally attached to the aspartame in these drinks, because real, non-diet soda does nothing for me.  I know that I should be drinking less GIANT SEPSY and more water (my doctor actually told me exactly that at my last checkup), I’ve been making a real effort to change my ways, and over the past six months or so, I’ve successfully cut back on my bad habit to some degree – maybe by 30 percent. But that means I still manage to consume at least 3 cans or bottles of diet soda every day. (Emphasis on “at least”) It seems there’s always some excuse for me to reach for another icy cold and temptingly fizzy caffeinated can or bottle, and to avoid drinking the water I know I should be drinking instead.

Everyone in my family hates that I have this yukky, expensive, unhealthy habit.  And weirdly, neither Jon nor the kids drinks soda much at all.  All of them strongly prefer water over anything else, or in the case of J and Jon, the occasional glass of iced green tea. And then there’s me, with my GIANT SEPSY can permanently glued to my hand. Thirteen year old E in particular lectures me on a regular basis about how I am slowly turning my bones to rubber by drinking so much diet soda, and I know he’s right. There’s plenty of research to indicate that drinking all those diet sodas year after year after year is bad for me in about 6,000 different ways.  I also know that drinking all of that carmelized, chemical-laden fluid every day prevents me from drinking enough water, which is something my body seriously needs more of.

But now, to the great rejoicing of those who live with me, the good folks at Brita have offered me a little inducement – a healthy hydration CHALLENGE , if you will – to take my diet soda taper to the next level, by switching out most (or maybe even ALL) of the bad stuff I’ve been guzzling with abandon for far too long with something a lot better for me – Brita-filtered water.

Our new Brita filtered water pitcher

Here’s how it works. Brita has kindly provided our family with a super-cool, fridge-sized pitcher that has their filtration system built in so that we can keep fresh, cold water at hand for me (and the rest of our family) at all times. The pitcher that Brita sent us is purply-pink. How did they know that pink is my favorite color?

Additionally, Brita sent me one of their BPA-free water bottles to use as part of their hydration challenge, and the bottle also has its own, built-in Brita filter.  My spiffy new, lime green Brita bottle is approximately the same size and shape as a bottle of my favorite brand of bone-rubberizing moneysuck  diet soda, so I can carry it around all day and pretend that I am drinking something bad for me when in fact, I am actually drinking something really good for me.

I’ve even been bringing my new Brita bottle to work with me this week. Over there to your left, you see my spiffy water bottle with built-in filter sitting out on my desk, quietly lording its superiority over other drinks that just happened to be in the general vicinity.

In the past few days, since I started keeping cold, filtered water in the fridge for the first time, plus carrying around a bottle of cold, filtered water wherever I go, I am finding it MUCH easier to say no to another diet soda and instead just drink more fresh, clean water.

Now that I am drinking filtered water, I think that I might have been avoiding our tap water without even realizing it because the water coming out of the pipes in a 101 year old house just doesn’t taste that great. It’s not that I was complaining about the taste of Casa Hickju’s tap water before Brita hooked me up with their pitcher and water bottle, but in the past few days of running our water through filters before drinking it, I now know that better tasting water definitely encourages me to drink a whole lot more of it.  It really does make a big difference.

But wait! There’s more!

Not only did Brita set ME up with a new filtered water pitcher and bottle, they want to set YOU up with a gift basket with both of these same products as well, plus a replacement Brita filter. Each week for the next three weeks, I will be giving away one of these Brita baskets here on Mamapundit, starting today.

And here’s how to win:

In the comments below, tell me what your worst health habit is – something you really want to change (like my diet soda habit is for me) – and also what your plans are to make that change happen.  Or, if you would rather, you can inspire the rest of us by sharing how you DID manage to change some really bad habit that was detrimental to your health. And of course, you could also chime in to offer friendly support or helpful ideas to other commenters who are opening up about their health habit challenges.

Whatever you write, each comment left below this blog post counts as an entry in this week’s Brita basket giveaway.  Comment as often as you like until October 1, 2011 at midnight, EST, when entries for this week’s Brita gift basket giveaway will close. Then I will choose the winner at random from all the comment-entries, and I will announce the winner here on the blog. (NOTE: I reserve the right to delete any comments that are unkind or pointlessly negative for whatever reason. This is supposed to be fun, not un-fun.)

If you don’t happen to win this week, I will have another Brita basket giveaway happening here at Mamapundit next Friday, and then again on the Friday after that. (NOTE: the Brita giveaways are only open to U.S. residents. Sorry about that, you furriners! We’ll do a global goodie giveaway sometime soon.)

I’m really looking forward to reading your stories. (Are any of you excessively attached to diet soda, as I am?)

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This post was sponsored by Brita. Please support the brands and companies that are kind enough to support my blog.

Ah, fall! It’s the time of year when a girl’s fancy turns to going full-on redhead once again. It’s been a while, but the change in weather calls for a change in haircolor, dontcha think?

Tonight, my old pal Loreal & I will be working together in attempt to impart my newly lengthy locks with a sort of Joan-from-Mad-Men-meets-Lucille-Ball kind of gingery vibe. And I have high hopes that no one who sees me and my freshly reddened hair at my office tomorrow will secretly be thinking “Krusty the Klown.”