10 Tips to Stay on Track with Your Health and Fitness over the Holidays.

Typically the holiday season is the time of year where we all fall off of our health and fitness routines and more than likely over indulge in everything. Did you know the typical person gains around 7-10 pounds from Thanksgiving to New years?! Yikes! This year I want to do everything to have a Happy and Healthy Holiday season, without gaining. Enjoying your holiday season is okay, and actually I encourage you to enjoy it! Life is far too short to not enjoy it. Just enjoy in moderation of course. As most of you know, I have become an avid 21 day fixer, and now portion control is just a regular part of my life. So, here are some tips I have come up with for enjoying the holidays AND staying on track at the same time.  

1. SCHEDULE your workouts each day. Preferably in the morning. When I say schedule them, I mean physically write them in your planner or put them in your calendar. When you do this, it's like making an important appointment you can't miss. Your workout is an important appointment that you should do everything in your power not to miss. Successful people are not people who do miraculous things everyday. Successful people are the people who do easy things everyday to benefit their lives. They take small steps in the right direction consistently everyday. Working out for 30 minutes is so easy to do. BUT, it is also SO EASY NOT TO DO. Schedule it, and get it done! No excuses!  

2. Set aside a specific time each week to make a weekly menu, grocery list and get your grocery shopping done. I do this every Sunday. Then I prep as much as I can on Sunday to make my work week go smoothly.  

3. Portion out HEALTHY snacks that are easy to grab. The snack baggies are my absolute favorite way to do this. I usually spend Sunday chopping veggies and fruits, boiling some hard boiled eggs, and throwing them all into snack baggies in what I call my healthy snack drawer in my fridge. This has helped me to stay on track more than I can even begin to tell you. It also makes packing my sons lunch so simple, and he eats healthy too! No one wants to cut up some celery when they are hungry for a snack. They want to grab something easy and convenient. Usually people will opt for the junk because of the convenience. Fix your fridge/cupboards so that the easiest things to grab are HEALTHY.

4. When going to a party, wait 30 minutes before having seconds. It takes a while for us to realize we are full. If we wait 30 minutes before dishing up again, we will more than likely realize we are not hungry for seconds.

5. DRINK WATER. You should be drinking half of your body weight in ounces of water. For example, if you weigh 200 pounds, you should be drinking a minimum of 100 ounces of water a day!  
6. Be the person who BRINGS a healthy dish to the party. There are so many amazing recipes on Pinterest for the holidays that include HEALTHY food. Find one, and bring it! Everyone will appreciate a healthy recipe, and if they don't oh well, that means you will have a healthy recipe left over to eat at home! ;)

7. Tell your friends and family about your GOALS to be healthy over the holidays. This will hold you accountable.

8. If you are going to indulge in drinks or food one day, PLAN out your meals the next day. There are days when I indulge in far too many drinks, and don't make the best food decisions. Where I really spiral downwards is not the day I indulge. It is usually the day AFTER I indulge, AKA the hangover day. I am lazy, and don't want to cook or make healthy food, I usually don't even want to get out of bed. I also crave junk when I am hungover. Best way to prevent this is to actually make your meals for the next day and have them prepped and in the fridge. This will leave you with ZERO excuses to  it eat healthy the next day. Don't let a cheat day turn into a cheat weekend, or a cheat week!  

9. DO NOT SKIP MEALS. If you know you are going to indulge, one of the biggest mistakes people will make is to skip meals so they feel they can justify eating more later on. DO NOT DO THIS.  

10. FILL up on veggies before anything else. If you are at a holiday party, make sure more than half of your plate is veggies before filing up on all of the other stuff.



XOXO

Melissa