How to survive the Holidays

Whether its Easter or Christmas or vacations or Memorial day or Summer cookouts…a common question I get is how to survive the event/holiday WITHOUT totally derailing from current health and fitness progress.

And in my opinion there’s no cookie cutter answer.

Its what works for YOU but as chatted with some of my current challengers I decided it was probably best to aggregate everything into one place.

So here are my top tips:

1. PICK YOUR SPLURGE:

The common every day “snag the convenience store” type of things get – SKIPPED. The oreos, hershey bars, jelly beans (come on – starburst jelly beans are out year round!!) – and YES even the Reese cup eggs because let’s be real…they’re pretty much the same as a reese cup and not that special anymore as you can get hearts at valentines day and trees at Christmas, etc…

Now – Grandma’s special cookies or pie or delicious mashed potatoes that you don’t have or don’t make yourself…that’s a different story!

Things that you ONLY get at a certain time of year are when I deem – necessary splurges!

2. Drink your SHAKEOLOGY before you head out to a big family meal/gathering

This way you don’t arrive STARVING and inhale everything in sight – half of which you probably didn’t/won’t care for anyways. Allow yourself to arrive and simply spend time with the company there. After all – isn’t that why you’re there?

3. Take a dish you know you’ll ENJOY and meets YOUR health goals…and NO I’m not talking about raw celery sticks.

You can make some pretty darn amazing appetizers and side dishes and main dishes that are as delicious tasting as they are for you!

Here are some of my favorites:

Buffalo Chicken Dip

Homemade Applesauce

Roasted Root Veggies

Southwest Quinoa Salad

Black and White no bakes

Black and white shakeology no bakes_long and wide.jpg

Peanutty Peanut bars

When it comes to actual Easter Sunday, we will be practicing BALANCE.

My mother in law makes THE BEST Monkey Bread (and no, there’s not a healthy lick to it) and we will balance that out with some scrambled eggs with veggies.

4. Enjoy the day – but don’t make it a weekend/week/month of it

Enjoying all your family favorites during Easter brunch or Christmas morning breakfast is a-okay…but you have to cut the sugar cycle.

I won’t pretend like cutting the sugar cycle is easy – but sugar is one of those foods that the more you eat the more you want and even when you crash or get a headache from the influx of sugar your body is trying to process, your mind will often leave you with the feeling that you want/need MORE.