Sticking to your healthy eating plan when your fridge is filled with vegetables and there’s no temptation in sight can be much easier than sitting two feet away from a buffet table loaded with gingerbread cookies and eggnog every night for a week. Once the holidays come around, you’ve got food filled parties and get-togethers to attend every night so it’s important to have a strategy to avoid binging until January rolls around. Stay Full Having a healthy breakfast that morning and filling up on fruit and veggies before you head to your next Christmas party will reduce your cravings for all the cakes and cookies you’ll be faced with. Once you do decide to grab a plateful from the buffet table, load it with the leaner meats, vegetables, and whole wheat crackers. If you still need a sweet fix after that, limit yourself to just one then position yourself further away from that table. Drink Smart Alcoholic drinks can be loaded with hidden calories so be aware that what you’re dri ...

With any good healthy eating plan, snacking can throw a wrench into your best efforts. You can have the healthiest meals planned out, but when you can’t make it from lunch to dinner and have to grab something to tide you over, be sure you aren’t eating something that will sabotage you. Satisfy Your Cravings Always have a snack alternative for every craving. When you want a salty bag of chips, eat a handful of nuts instead. For that sweet tooth, grab an apple or banana rather than a pack of candy. Substituting a healthy choice for your hot, cold, crunchy, and creamy cravings will keep you feeling full and satisfied without out all the guilt. Eat Smaller Meals If you feel like you have to snack quite a few times a day and just can’t wait for your main meals, split your three large meals up into six smaller ones. This will keep you feeling full all day while giving your body time to properly digest a smaller amount of food. Eating this way may also encourage you to plan out healthi ...

Teaching your kids the importance of healthy eating while they’re young will not only ensure they’re getting the proper nutrition they need to grow, it will help establish good habits for when they’re older and start making their own food choices. By sticking to healthy eating rules, your children will become accustomed to making better choices and will hopefully carry these lessons with them through life. Involve Them When Deciding Meals By giving your kids a choice of which vegetable to have with dinner or what type of healthy snack to have between lunch and dinner, they will feel more invested in what they’re eating and less like they’re being forced to eat something they don’t want. If they really hate one type of vegetable, give them the option of something they prefer and you’ll have far fewer battles at dinner time every night. Make Healthy Food Fun By cutting food into interesting shapes or making pictures out of the food on their plate, eating becomes a game tha ...

Too often people eat to make themselves feel better rather than to satisfy their hunger. When you eat for this reason, the foods you crave are usually those loaded with sugar or fat rather than healthy fruits and veggies. In order to develop healthy eating habits, the reliance on comfort foods needs to be reduced or eliminated completely. Reflect On Why You Eat Before reaching for a candy bar when you’re in line at the grocery store, ask yourself if you really need some chocolate and why. If you’ve had a stressful day at work or you’ve been under emotional strain, put the candy back and try to find a healthier way to make yourself feel better. Replacing exercise with eating will not only maximize any weight loss goals, it will increase your endorphins and give you a huge self esteem boost. Healthy Eating For Dessert A delicious dessert at the end of a hard day can be the highlight of the evening for a lot of people. Rather than eating a piece of cake or bowl of ice cream, have  ...

Weight loss isn’t the only reason to lead a healthier lifestyle. By building healthy eating habits, you’ll be lowering your risk of heart disease and diabetes while making your body feel stronger and more alert. Many people have a naturally high metabolism and don’t need to watch their weight, but this doesn’t mean they should live off chips, cookies, and chocolate milk every day. Heart Health Thin people can be at risk for heart disease as well. Just because you don’t have a spare tire around your midsection doesn’t mean you shouldn’t worry about health issues such as diabetes and high cholesterol. Especially if you don’t get any exercise, healthy eating is something that should be kept in mind for people of all shapes, weights, and sizes. Brain Food Healthy eating habits aren’t just good for your body, they’re good for your brain as well. Eating properly will help you to be more alert while giving you increased mental and physical energy. Not only will you  ...

You don’t need to spend a lot of money to stick to a healthy diet. While you may decide to buy those expensive organic crackers or keep your fridge stocked with pricey imported vegetables, but it isn’t necessary to spend that much on healthy eating. In fact, some of the healthiest meals can be the cheapest if you take the time to put together the right recipes and meal plans. Convenience Foods Pre-packaged snack foods and ready made meals are often more expensive than making your own meals and are usually loaded with extra sugars, fats, and preservatives. Preparing veggies and low fat dip as a snack is not only one of the healthiest things to munch on, it’s incredibly inexpensive. Instead of grabbing a breakfast burrito from your local drive-thru, making one at home will cost a fraction of the price and you can cut back on the oils you use while packing it full with more veggies. Fruits and Veggies Sometimes our favourite produce isn’t in season and trying to get that basket  ...