Thanksgiving and Christmas are my favorite eating days of the year. Thanksgiving dinner is now only a couple of days away in Canada and the Turkeys and Hams have already been bought and are waiting to be eaten. This thanksgiving maybe you can be more careful about your eating and well being and I hope that looking at these tip will keep you feeling better the day after as you get to go on your post Thanksgiving day shopping spree.

1. Decide what you are going to eat each day in the morning before you start. Think about 3 meals and 3 snacks. No one says you can’t have a snack, then dinner a while later and then desert a while after that.

2. Get some exercise right after you get out of bed. This will help you focus on your fitness and make you aware of how your body feels that day.
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Tags: angel food cake, Canada, christmas, Cool Whip, drink water, energy outlet, food, heavy food, leftovers, thanksgiving, thanksgiving day, thanksgiving dinner, Turkey, turkey dinner, United States

Holiday weight gain is almost inevitable! In fact, you would need to be a staunch, self-disciplined, health-conscious individual to be able to avoid the temptations of cookies, candies and alcohol at parties! In fact, the ‘food season’ starts much before Christmas – usually from Thanksgiving Day!

From Thanksgiving Day to New Year, people stuff themselves as much as they can with all of their favorite foods. A bite here, a bite there and then more bites follow!

All this while the individual keeps reminding himself that even if he gains some extra pounds during this time, there is nothing to worry about as he would work very hard after the New Year to lose all that extra weight! Truth to be told, you CAN lose holiday weight within just a few weeks, provided that you make a little effort and are determined to reach your goal!

Continue with your workouts: The first thing you need to keep in mind is that no matter how busy you are, you should continue with your regular workouts! If you haven’t exercised ever, start doing it right now, and continue doing it at least throughout the whole holiday season – up until the New Year, when much of the ‘food craze’ usually dies away and is replaced by a new craze: the craze of weight loss!

If you workout regularly then you would not only be able to lose weight, but also have very little chance of gaining weight either! However, to be on the safe side, I would suggest that you focus on the intense workouts which help you burn a lot of calories within a very short time! On one hand, you would spend very little time on your workout regimen and on the other, these intense exercises would help you burn calories even at rest!

There is no excuse for deferring your workouts or taking a sabbatical from your exercise regimen simply because it is holiday or that you don’t ‘feel’ like working out, or are too busy with shopping and writing and sending out party invitations! Keep in mind that health always comes before everything else, and nothing but your health should always be your number one priority!

Indulge yourself only on the ‘cheat’ day: Just because it is holiday season doesn’t necessarily mean that you would throw all dietary cautions in the wind; but at the same time, you also won’t want to deprive yourself from the fun and enjoyment of this period! What I recommend is that you eat healthy foods for at least six days pf the week and then use the next day as the ‘cheat’ day.

Now how would you choose this ‘cheat’ day? If you have a party to attend to soon, just plan things in such a way that you attend it on your ‘cheat’ day! That way, you would be free to indulge yourself in all the delicacies available to you: candies, cakes, eggnog, you name it!

Keep in mind that one day of indulgence won’t hamper your health or make you excessively overweight, provided that you don’t eat the same bad foods throughout the whole week! Even if you gain weight, it won’t be much and you would easily be able to lose it within a short time!

Tags: christmas, food craze, food season, new years day, thanksgiving

With so many people taking a resolution to lose weight every New Year, one would think that our world is getting healthier. Reality however, is exactly the opposite. Out of the countless number of people who take the weight loss resolution, only a few are able to stick to it throughout the rest of the year!

Come to think of it, taking a weight loss resolution has become more of a fad than anything else, as most people hardly take their resolutions seriously, or even if they do, they are not prepared to make the extra effort it takes to keep those resolutions! If you really want to make your weight loss resolution iron-clad solid, just follow the two easy steps below.

1: Make your resolution realistic: How far you would be successful in weight loss would be determined on the viability of your resolution. Is it realistic? If not, it is unlikely that you would achieve your weight loss goal ever! The very first thing you need to do is to make sure that you make a very realistic resolution.

Examples of unrealistic resolutions are:

“I want a body like Jessica Alba by next Christmas’.

‘I want to lose all weight before the next Thanksgiving day;

As you can see, these goals lack specifics of any kind, so there is no doubt that they are unrealistic. When your weight loss goal lacks specifics of any kind, your mind would wander aimlessly and you would jump from one diet to another with little or no success.

What happens when you are asked to go on a shopping spree without a list of items you are going to buy? You wander aimlessly and waste money on buying useless stuff. The exact thing would happen if you don’t make your weight loss resolution specific and realistic. Examples of good weight loss resolutions are:

“I want to lose 20 pounds by next year”

“I want my weight to be reduced by 30 pounds at the end of 2009″

Okay these look like ‘baby resolutions’, but I really suggest that you make ‘little’ resolutions like these so that your mind thinks it is ‘easy’ to lose weight. Keep in mind that if you intimidate your mind with a formidable resolution, chances are that you would soon lose the motivation to lose weight!

It is possible that you will outgrow your weight loss resolution and lose more weight than what you promised yourself, but the opposite may also happen! Either way, you WILL lose some weight, that is for sure!

2. Get plenty of support: I would be honest with you: I don’t know anyone who has been able to reach their weight loss goals all by themselves without any kind of external support or guidance! Very often your family would support you, but that is just not enough! You also need to secure the support of your peers – people who are in the same boat as you, struggling to lose weight!

You can find such people at weight loss forums. Most of them are free to join, so make sure you sign up with at least one of them and get involved! Remember that you will also find several experts in these forums who are more than eager to offer free help and advice to wannabe weight loss aspirants!

It is also important that you surround yourself with positive-minded people at all times. Positivity begets positivity and encourages you to lose weight, while negative people would only frustrate and discourage you!

Tags: christmas, Jessica Alba, new years day, thanksgiving

I have a sweet tooth. Actually a sweet tooth may be an understatement as I love sugary things especially pop and chocolate and no matter what anyone says there is, to me anyway, a correlation between the amount of sugar that I eat and how much I quest for it afterwards.

During this time of year there are sugary treats everywhere, You sample a turtle, you eat a couple chocolates, someone offers some eggnog. Next thing you know you are feeling a little sick but you will have a little lowere resistance to the chocolates.

Sugar Addiction is real

Science direct and the Journal for Nutrition are just two example studies that show that sugar addiction exists and I beleive that most people that eat a lot of sugar really do believe it to be true. Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: christmas, food, sugary products, thanksgiving

Thanksgiving and Christmas are my favorite eating days of the year. Christmas dinner is now only a couple of days away and the Turkeys and Hams have already been bought and are waiting to be eaten. Every year I get up early on Christmas morning and eat and drink my way through the day and end up feeling boated and a little off by the end of the day.

I have thought about how best to get through the day and have the following tips. Remember that so much about Christmas is about lounging around and visiting with family and friends and this year if you plan to be moving a bit you may feel a lot better for it as you sit down to eat that big delicious meal. I have tried to put all of these ideas in order so that it is a bit easier to follow.

1. Decide what you are going to eat during the day is morning. Think about 3 meals and 3 snacks. No one says you can’t have a snack, then dinner a while later and then desert a while after that.

2. Get some exercise right after you get out of bed. Well we may have a little bit of a problem with this as the two little ones are going to want to eat presents right away and they will dictate the first hour or so. But after that if you can get the blood flowing is would be great. This will help you focus on your fitness and make you aware of how your body feels that day.

3. Drink lots of water throughout Christmas day starting in the morning. We all know how important it is to drink water and to stay hydrated. Also the Water will keep your body from feeling hungry throughout the day and let you feel a little fuller.

4. Eat a small breakfast to set up a slow eating day. Maybe some All Bran or something else filling would be good. I like to load up on the fruit if I know that I am going to have a busy day out and about as I know I will not get a chance to eat fruit later and it makes your breakfast a lot more interesting, colorful, and better.

5. Again you should have a fairly small lunch. but make sure that it is a complete meal and not a meal of candy and chocolate. This is where the morning planning will have helped as you may be out of the house and you do not want to resort to fast food.

6. Try to have some kind of snack a couple hours before dinner and then a walk. This is your first real chance to make a difference in your eating for the day that may normally be bad. Try making something interesting and out of season. I love fruit salad so you could always make a fruit salad and have it over low fat frozen yogurt. The great reason for this is that the Turkey and the rest of the food smell great I am always feeling so hungry all afternoon just smelling the food that the dinner itself is pure gluttony, this can be avoided by not starving yourself through the afternoon.

7. Eat everything at dinner but only small portions of each food. I am not sure about you but we have a large Christmas celebration with about 15 people and have ham, turkey, two kinds of potatoes, six vegetables and a couple of kinds of buns or bread. It is not the amount of food that matters but the trying of all of the foods at the table. Remember you can have leftovers for days in small servings as well.

8. Go for another walk if the weather is good. The worst thing to me is that after having a great Christmas dinner there is no energy outlet so you end up just sitting and almost falling asleep from the tryptophan in the turkey and then you don’t want to get up at all. Why not instead take a little walk around the neighborhood?

9. Dessert. If at all possible try to make a dessert yourself as then you can be sure how good or bad it is for you. My wife is always the designated dessert person for family get togethers as she makes stuff that is not quite as bad for you but always different and always really great tasting. One of the favorites these days is angel food cake with strawberries and Cool Whip

10. Try to keep things interesting for the evening. Having an interactive game to play or have the kids putting on a play is great. What you want to do after dinner and dessert is keep away from the regular habit of snacking even though you are full.

Christmas is a day that people always associate with a lot of food and what I have in mind is not to have you starve yourself on Christmas in the name of dieting but instead just make sure that you have a great day of moderation and eat some healthy snacks to keep yourself from eating too much heavy food and to feel a bit better about yourself the next day.

Tags: angel food cake, christmas, christmas day, Cool Whip, energy outlet, food, food smell great, heavy food, thanksgiving, Turkey

As you are probably aware the average person in the US gains 10 to 20 pounds between Thanksgiving and New Years day. Are you used to this yourself? Well this year you can avoid this weight gain by following the 10 simple rules

1. Plan what you are going to eat everyday Wake up in the morning and see what plans you have for your day. Will you be going out for lunch or dinner? Are you going to have a crazy morning and may be near donuts? The best way to avoid the binging at restaurants is to pack in breakfast and lunch into the office in the morning.

2. Drink lots of water 30 minutes to an hour before your meals. Why fill up on sugar and heavy foods when you can trick your body into eating less by filling up a little before you eat your meals.

3. Moderate alcohol I find that there are a few alcohol based parties this time of year and I try to do my best to decide before hand what I should eat and drink at these events. Remember there are a lot of calories in beer, wine and mixed drinks. I trick my self by drinking a glass of water between each alcoholic drink. One of the problems that I find that I have is that I will drink too much to fast at a party and am loaded early. I started using this trick years ago and find that I can have a great night visiting with people and have a bit of a buzz without betting loaded and being hung over the next day.

4. Don’t let the office potluck build your pot belly. Office potlucks are fantastic for trying new food and again for socializing but they can be dangerous. How much three layer dip and homemade cookies, cakes, and KFX can you eat at one standing event? Think about what you want to eat by browsing the potluck buffet before you start filling your plate.

5. Start a new exercise schedule. Why wait until new years day to start a new exercise schedule when you can do it now instead and relieve all of those New Years Resolution pressures?

6. Watch the high calorie foods at dinners. How about that gravy? Eating fatty dressings? Sugary candies? What are you going to eat instead? How about eating small servings of those treat like foods instead of acting like a cow at a trough.

7. Host your own party where you serve nothing but low cal and low fat foods to try to set a trend for everyone and their parties.

8. Write down what you eat ever day. There is a certain amount of accountability that goes along with writing down what you are eating. After you write it down you can figure out the calories with a simple calorie counter and in just a few days or a couple of weeks you will have a good idea how much you are eating compared to how much you should be eating.

9. Watch your serving sizes. If anything you should reduce your food serving sizes so that you can eat a little more variety of food. If you really look at all of that great food you get to sample during the holiday season you will soon realize that you want to try it all not make a meal out of every food.

10. Finally the most important thing. Socialize…a lot. There was a report a little while ago that found that people have a lot less friends now than they did 20 years ago. The opportunity is there this holiday season to meet more people, start lasting friendships and relationships and one thing that I have always found is relationships with others in the long term make you a lot healthier.

These tips should help you out this holiday season to stop you from gaining a lot or even a little weight. Remember as you do these things that one of the positive effects that it will have is that you will being more in control of yourself and healthier going into the new year.

I also wrote a post about how to deal with eating and exercise on Thanksgiving itself. Check out the 10 tips for Thanksgiving day Eating and exercise

Tags: food, food serving, new years day, thanksgiving, United States

Here are 10 foods that will increase your metabolism and help you lose weight. This great article from Sheri Strykowski is sure to have you nodding your head in agreement but there are a few that will probably be new to you as well. I have made comments in bold just to highlight some of my own opinions

Stoke your metabolic fire and burn calories faster with diet-friendly foods and beverages. Post this list on your fridge next to the photo of you in your “skinny jeans” and make a copy to bring with you the next time you shop for groceries.

Just remember: Calories count, portion control rules and there’s no substitute for a well-balanced diet and regular exercise. So get moving!

Here are the top picks culled from some of the latest research:

1. Water! A new study seems to indicate that drinking water actually speeds up weight loss. Researchers in Germany found that subjects of the study increased their metabolic rates (the rate at which calories are burned) by 30 percent after drinking approximately 17 ounces of water. Water is also a natural appetite suppressant that banishes bloat as it flushes out sodium and toxins. Drinking enough water will also help keep you from mistaking thirst for hunger. So drink up! Make sure that you are starting your day with a big big glass of water and drink throughout the day not just all at one time.

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Tags: calorie bank, Canada, cancer, chemical found, chemical properties, christmas, energy, food, freelance journalist, Germany, head, heart disease, Laval University in Canada, Lerner, National Safety Council, Penn State University, Scripps Clinic, Sheri Strykowski, State University of Rio de Janeiro, steel cut, thanksgiving, The Chicago Tribune, Turkey, vitamin a

I would like to start this post just by saying that I know that there are many horrors of alcohol abuse and that there are many reasons why drinking alcohol may lead to an early exit but at the same time I just bottled my fourth batch of home made beer, Barons Beer actually, and thought that it would be fun to come up with a great big list of why beer is good for you.

Cancer preventer – A compound found only in hops, which are used to make beer, have been discovered to prevent cancer. Of course we all know that hops are an ingredient in beer and therefore Xanthohumol has high hopes of making beer a new anti cancer drug. Xanthohumol flavinoids have been tested and its use is hoped to be a preventative treatment against prostate and colon cancer and even may be a form of hormone therapy for women.

Getting your vitamins – A friend of mine used to say there is a pork chop in every glass of beer but recent studies show that there is vitamin B6 in beer increases the level of vitamin B6 in a beer drinkers blood which has been shown to decrease the level of homocysteine which increase the chances of heart disease.
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Tags: alcohol abuse, Austria, Austria's Innsbruck Medical University, BBC, beer, cancer, colon cancer, Fitness Nutrition, heart disease, hormone therapy, inflammation, Karolinska Institute, kidney stones, National Institute of Radiological Sciences, Neuropsychopharmacology, relaxation, Stefan Brene, thanksgiving, the American Journal of Epidemiology, the International Journal, Tokyo University of Science Blood, United States

Today it was my Thanksgiving dinner. Here in Canada we have Thanksgiving in October, I know our southern neighbors have Thanksgiving in November we just get to see the football scores from work that day.

Two things that I noticed at dinner today, we had the big spread with lots of people and even more food. We of course have a couple of drinks before dinner, graze for a while rest for a while and then have pie. This is probably the worst way to eat as the meal takes a few hours and is thousands of calories.
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Tags: Canada, food, thanksgiving, Thanksgiving in Canada

I found this great interview at EMax Health read and rearead this interview as you shop and start getting ready for the holidays. Don’t just go out and say “I’m not on Weight Watchers this week” as it is easy to have everthing in small quantities instead of feeling sick from eating to much of everything.

A Q&A with Head of Training for Weight Watchers, Palma Posillico, Provides Tips on Healthy Holiday Weight Management

Each year millions of people look forward to sitting down at the table with loved ones for a special holiday meal. Woven into the nostalgia of the holidays are those favorite dishes that evoke memories of childhood and family togetherness, but also bring along the guilt and weight of extra calories and excessive portions. Palma Posillico, head of training for Weight Watchers International, establishes the guidelines and curriculum that Weight Watchers meeting room Leaders use. Therefore, she is ultimately responsible for guiding millions of Weight Watchers members – through those Leaders – on their weight loss journey. In the Q&A below, Posillico offers suggestions on how to enjoy the holidays while maintaining a healthy weight.

How much weight does someone typically gain at the holidays?

Although it is commonly believed that the typical person gains about five pounds during the holidays, the good news is, this does not appear to be true. The most reliable study to-date suggests that the average weight gain in the period from Thanksgiving to New Year’s is just less than one pound, although those already overweight tend to gain more.
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Tags: food, food courts, head, head of training, new years day, Palma Posillico, thanksgiving, Weight Watchers International