We all realize that it’s that time of year again – the beginning of the Holiday Season! We’re planning for Thanksgiving the day after tomorrow. Then, it’s a mad dash of shopping, cooking, eating, drinking, parties, family get togethers, religious events, perhaps traveling, and lots of joy (and possibly sadness depending on our circumstances) until after New Year’s Day. In other words we’ll be incredibly busy and have little time for ourselves, and, even worse, our daily routines will be disrupted for months! Despite this, the Holidays are a good thing. We just have to plan. This is not a time for thoughts such as “I’m not going to gain weight!”, or, “It’s impossible so I won’t even try!”, or, “I’ll wait until after the New Year!”, or “I’ll skip all those parties!”, or, whatever. The truth is we’ll all party and eat and drink – some of us will maintain our weight but most of us will gain at least a few pounds despite our best intentions. By planning, however, we can minimize the damage and enter the New Year healthier by doing a few simple things. We must be honest with ourselves because we know what’s going to happen otherwise. The first thing we must do is try to get at least and extra 30 cumulative minutes of physical activity each and every day. This can be simply walking while shopping or visiting. Next, since we are planning to snack and drink more, we should cut back on our regular meals and try to keep the accumulation of goodies in our homes and work spaces to a minimum by taking inventory and throwing them out daily if necessary. We all know what to do – we just have to do it. Thirdly, we should keep some type of record or diary of what we consume and where we’re going to go so we know what we’ve done and what we’ll probably soon do. This sounds too easy and it is, but, we’ll only do it if we begin now.