holidays | pg.2

I love a party. No matter my advancing age, a birthday is cause for celebration. Though I officially celebrate Christmas, count me in for Winter Solstice, Kwanzaa or Chinese New Year or, heck, pretty much anything that involves food and merriment.

Don’t get me wrong, Christmas is a great time of year. But as I’m recovering from the glut of presents, the copious amounts of cookies and sweets I’ve consumed, and the amount of credit card debt I’ve racked up buying gifts and decorations, I always resolve that I’ll offset my good fortune in the coming year by finding a few good causes to contribute to not just at the holidays, but throughout the year — when they need it the most.

By The FIRM Master Instructor Kelsie Daniels

The holiday season is once again upon us. And because I am one of those people who fully enjoys holiday dining, I have to prepare myself for the usual question that comes as I am stuffing my face: “How do you stay in shape?” One of the people who always asks me this question is my dear Aunt Jo. She asks it every year and then follows with how she wants to start working out and eating right.

The holidays make you think about minutes in a whole different way. It’s a time when you eat more, drink more, spend more money and sleep less. You feel time-crunched. You do your last-minute shopping. And as fast as you create the holidays, they disappear.

I’ve mentioned before my family tradition of sharing what we’re thankful for before we begin eating our Thanksgiving feast.

While this year has been a challenging one for so many people I know (and certainly my family hasn’t been immune to this) I think that there is still plenty for us to be thankful for, particularly when it comes to food and our food sources. This year, I’m looking more broadly than my little family. Here’s what I think we all can be thankful for:

In our house, as in many, we have a Thanksgiving tradition where we go around the table and each person shares what he or she is most thankful for. It’s a nice, introspective pause before we all dig in to an enormous feast that took days to prepare, and my only regret is that it’s something that we only do once a year.

A friend of mine received a Christmas card from her niece that contained this recount. I share it with you…

A family, traveling to visit relatives for the holidays, stopped at a restaurant for a bite. The parents were tired, their two kids cranky. Food and warmth and a break from the winter roads beckoned. They were shown to a table and given a booster seat for the toddler and a high chair for the baby. Mom and Dad ordered coffee and food and they settled in to wait.

‘Tis the giving season, and just in time for the holidays, we have 25 great gifts for you, and they’re free! However, they’re not just any ordinary gifts — we’re presenting the opportunity to do something special this year by offering the gift of giving to you.

This is probably the absolute worst time of year to do so, but two weeks ago I started a diet. The good news is, it’s working. And the plan I’m on couldn’t be easier.

When we’re stressed we overeat. We have a hard time sleeping. These reactionary ways of dealing with stress are usually automatic — and they put even more stress on your body in the long run. But you can take a proactive approach to stress management this holiday. Try one or more of these five steps I’ve seen help my clients the most: