The holidays can be so crazy! It’s easy to let your health habits slip. Here are my top 3 tips for helping make your holidays healthier. Enjoy!
1 – Surround Yourself with Healthy Food
- Put out a fresh fruit bowl with at least two kinds of fruit in it. Keep this in a well-light, easy-to-access place on a prominent counter in the kitchen or on the dining room table.
- Keep a fresh vegetable platter ready for snacks, appetizers, and as a side dish. Use a variety of veggies and have dip handy. You can make a platter with several different kinds of vegetables and then when that gets empty, alternate it with a plate full of your family’s favorite vegetable. For example, I’ll load up a pretty platter with baby carrots, cherry tomatoes, sweet peppers, celery, broccoli, and cauliflower. We’ll eat off of it for about 3 days. Then I’ll set out just baby carrots and dip for a day or two. Then I’ll put out just cucumbers for a day. Then I’ll go back to the full platter for a while.
- Keep high protein snacks available at all times. We keep boiled eggs, yogurt, and nuts on hand pretty much all the time. We also frequently make a tuna and pickle salad and eat it with crackers.
2 – Meal Plan and Prep
- Meal planning and preparing saves time, money, and frustration … and it helps you come to the dinner table feeling more calm and confident than if you had to scramble.
- Plan your planning and prep time so it happens. I plan and prep most often on Saturday so I start the new week ready to roll.
- Meal planning and prep can help you surround yourself with healthy food, supporting you and your family in eating much better than if you were deciding what to eat on the fly.
3 – Own Your Desires for How You Want Your Holidays to Go and PLAN WELL
Health is more than what you eat and drink. It involves exercise and sleep, yes, but other things contribute to your health too. Stress levels affect your health, fun time with uplifting friends and family members affect your health, and making and reaching goals affects your health as well.
- Think about what you truly love about the holidays, what you want to do during the holiday season, what you’d rather pass on this year, and how you want to feel throughout the season. I want to feel energized, healthy, happy, and overall wonderful! I don’t care to carol or send Christmas cards or go to every possible get together or do lot of Christmas baking. I love reading with my family around the fireplace. I love giving friends small gifts. I love to gather Christmas gifts a little at a time and have everything gathered by mid-December.
- PLAN, PLAN, PLAN. I plan evenings at home to read together, when I will make gifts, and when I will deliver gifts.
- DON’T forget to plan in getting enough sleep, exercising, meal planning, and meal prep or so you can physically feel your best.
To your healthy, happy holidays!