the primary objective of this study was to assess for a relationship between sedentary and physical activity patterns to certain aspects of the family food environment with child body mass index (bmi) in children ages 3 to 5. a secondary aim was to assess for relationships between parental obesity and family socioeconomic status to parental perceptions of childhood weight with child bmi. a nonprobability, exploratory, and descriptive cross-sectional study design was used. a total of 85 children ages 3 to 5 (44 boys, 41 girls) and their primary caregivers participated in the study. at risk for becoming overweight was determined using the bmi-for-age and sex-specific 85th to 94th percentile from cdc growth charts. overweight was determined using the bmi-for-age and sex-specific 95th percentile and greater from cdc growth charts. the primary caregivers completed a self-administered survey assessing sociodemographic information, parental height and weight, frequency of organized sports, physical activity patterns, sedentary activities, and certain aspects of the family food environment. height and weight measurement data revealed that 18.8% (16/85) of the child participants had a bmi in the “at risk for becoming overweight” range, while 9.4% (8/85) o f the child participants had a bmi in the overweight range. in summary, television viewing on usual weekdays in early childhood is significantly related to child bmi. the results from this study also suggested that failure to recognize that a child may be overweight is an issue that needs to be investigated further to understand how a parent’s description of childhood overweight differs from perception of excess weight in his/her own child. more qualitative research in regard to parental perception of childhood weights and sedentary behaviour is recommended. study area : hinton, alberta.