Planning – to me this is one of the KEY components of weight loss/weight maintenance and overall healthy living.
Planning saves you money and calories. Oh, and it makes your life a whole lot easier – less stressful, more organized and is more likely to included a balanced meal. But newsflash – this doesn’t happen on its own – it all starts With-U:
1. Figure out what you like to eat – ask your family.
2. Create a menu plan – using healthy cooking books or some of the following sites online for low-cal/healthy menus:
http://www.cookinglight.com/
http://lowcaloriecooking.about.com/
http://www.recipezaar.com/recipes/low-calorie
3. Create a shopping list for the week or even an entire month.
4. Look for items on sale and stock up in anticipation of the monthly menu.
5. Don’t deviate from the menu and buy “extra snacks” or “just in case”! You know what I’m talking about.
Then start saving and losing! These small changes in your routine will start to make healthy living a no-brainer. And BIG BONUS, Strippers – you won’t feel bloated because you’ve eaten junk because you didn’t have a plan.
Check out these articles on the effectiveness of making small behavior modifications:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/14567154?dopt=Abstract
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15672889?dopt=Abstract
And this amazing “Good Morning America” piece on a Texas mom who planned every meal for a year!
http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/Parenting/mom-plans-meals-entire-year/story?id=9618348
Wow! I love your blog--such good information! In my job for a cooking software company I study blogs and one of the happy parts of this assignment is finding great sites like yours. I am so glad I found this! I agree with your suggestion about menu planning . Since I work for the company, I FINALLY decided to try their product (duh!) and it’s saved me so much money and time already! Without sounding like an infomercial, I wanted to tell you about their cookbook software that’s made menu planning and grocery budgeting so easy. FINALLY I can find what I need, when I need it, without having to scour through boatloads of recipes and books! (I’ve included the link in case you are interested.) Lastly, thanks so much for a great blog—I love how reader-friendly your site is!
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