We all know how hard it is to resist the temptations that are all around us during the holidays -we need to stay on the path but still lighten up and enjoy ourselves.

If anyone has any tips, tricks, food finds, advice or questions for staying on plan during the holidays please post here. Thanks!

Put yourself in the hospital for a couple of weeks. You'll lose about 20 pounds on the food there.

Very Funny Ellis

Sorry, didn't think you'd like that one.

Well, what I'm going to do is keep a LOT of OP food in the house. And instead of making my usual high fat recipes, I'm going to look for some yummy "lighter" versions. I won't be completely on-plan when I eat them, but it won't be as bad as it could have been.
Once I even START to eat bad stuff I think, "The **** with it." And go right overboard.

I'm not baking goodies this year to bring to work or friends. Right now I am too weak!

Also, I am cooking a lot of things that I can eat, and am bringing it along to Christmas and Thanksgiving dinner with my family. We won't need that much extra food, but it will be there for me to grab from instead of the high carb family favorites. EVERYTHING on my family's traditional menu is high carb except for the turkey and the deviled eggs.

I'm doing Thanksgiving here, so I can control the menu a bit (we do it pot-luck style.) My Mom said she'd bring raw vwg for the appetizer, so she is in my corner!!!

Thanksgiving is at my grandmas, I live in good ole` Okalhoma, Grandma in texas, so she usually has everything prepared and ready to go for the family. But, I think I'm gonna try to cook up some of my own goodies, that arent so high in fat/carbs....

ellis..always so naughty LOVE IT!!!! I am sick.....

I am going to act like a baby, put a tiny dab on my plate of the new things, and if I do not like them pfffffft.
Then try to eat really really slowly and enjoy the company instead of focusing on stuffing myself.

I don't keep any candy in the house during the holidays. I stick strictly to the three bite rule, and three bites for the event, not per desert!

I always have a high protein snack before I go to any event, just to make sure that I never walk in hungry. I keep ON protein in the car so that I am never hungry, it is easier for me to resist if I am not hungry.

When I travel, I bring a collaspable cooler and always have OP foods with me. I did this 5 years ago and I lost 7 pounds in December.....

I also try to not eat the sweets, only because once I start, it is so hard to stop, and really if I am staying OP I don't crave it and if I have it, the three bites is enough!!!

I try to host one event and always cook completely OP, no one has ever complained or sometimes even knew the difference!!!

Good Luck!!

rb

Got this from an MSN article, some seem do-able -

Challenge yourself to use these easy tricks:

Always eat a healthy dinner before you go to a holiday party.

"Don't go to a party wearing spacious clothes," suggests Josh Fink, MD, owner of Prescriptions For Fitness, a personal training studio in Ridgefield, Connecticut. Wear something slim-fitting, or pull your belt one notch tighter than it should be -- you will be much less likely to overeat.

Bring "safe," healthy foods to potlucks.

At appetizer tables, choose two or three of your favorites, put them on a napkin (try to avoid large plates, which you're likely to want to fill up), and then walk away.

If there are fruits and veggies, load your plate with them first. Then find room for smaller portions of the high-calorie mains.

Watch out for craving binges, says Fink, times when you feel guilty for overeating, then figure you might as well just eat as much as you can while you're at it. Remember: One meal is one meal. One day is one day.

On the nights you decide to have a drink, limit yourself to one or two and don't indulge every night, says Fink. And choose wisely -- a gin and tonic has 155 calories for 7.5 fl oz, while the same size frozen strawberry daiquiri has a whopping 450 calories.

If you are drinking, alternate alcoholic beverages with nonalcoholic, calorie-free ones, like flavored seltzer. Asking for wine spritzers, which are half wine and half seltzer, is a great way to limit the impact of the liquor.

Drink extra water to help flush out the extra sodium you consume during rich meals, says Fink.

No matter how busy you get, make time for a healthy breakfast.
Eating a morning meal will help control cravings later on.

If baked goods are your holiday weakness, consider hosting a cookie party: Everybody brings one batch of his or her favorite cookies, plus the recipe, and shares. This way, you and your family get a variety without having to bake loads. (For bonus points, challenge your guests to bring low-fat or low-calorie cookies.)

Store healthy snacks at the front of your fridge and pantry, and go for them before you treat yourself to the splurge stuff.

Just say "no" to holiday-colored packaged candies and cakes! So what if they're red and green or blue and white -- with all the homemade goodies hanging around, you don't need them.

Streamline your grocery shopping with lists of the ingredients you'll need for a week's worth of quick, easy meals. This way, you won't be limited to last-minute convenience and fast foods during those nights when you're dashing around.

Park as far away from stores and malls as you can, so you're forced to get in those extra minutes of walking.

Online shopping is a great time-saver, but it means you lose out on the mall walking that usually goes with shopping. Make it up by figuring out exactly how much time you saved (say, 15 minutes per gift), and increasing your cardio that much for that week.

On heavy-eating weeks, compensate for the extra food with more weight or resistance training. "It will increase the metabolic rate of the muscle tissue," says Fink. That means your body will be better prepared to handle the extra calories.

Add health-related gifts to your wish list this year -- they could help make for a slimmer, healthier 2004!

If I get any candy for the house it will be ju-jubes, red licorice and Pep chocolates as they are lower in fat...and I will only put them out when guests are over so I don't have them in front of me all the time

Good tips, everyone!
Squeak, those are great! Woof!

This isn't a tip, but I'm actually unable to gorge myself in front of other people. I'm too embarrassed to really chow down. ("Look at that Ellis with all that food! Isn't she fat enough!")
It's the leftovers I have problems with. After everyone's gone, I can easily eat about six helpings of dinner.

I think what I need to do is send as many leftovers home with the guests as I can. And the rest should be bagged for future meals and stuck in the freezer.

Good plan Ellis!

I told DH that since we only have 4-6 people for dinner and that I will have to do everything this year because he will be laid up with his shoulder that we are not doing a giant dinner - too much work and too many leftovers (we used to ge a free 15lb turkey from his work).

I end up overeating since I feel guilty about wasting food and even with sending some with guests we had a huge amount left.
I am not a big turkey fan in the first place so after freezing some it ends up getting ignored and thrown away a year later.

I am scaling the dinner down this year and maybe having a roast beef with potatoes, veggies and yorkshire pudding with trifle for dessert. I am also going to try to make everything on the lighter side so I can stay OP.

Oh, yum, Mauvais! My favourites! (You call yorkshire pudding and trifle "scaling down"?)

Yup! Easier thank cooking a freaking 15lb turkey and I have a low-fat, low sugar recipe for trifle which I will be posting in the Christmas recipe section sometime this week

I also plan on making some special veggies dishes since my dad is mostly vegetarian and only eats meat once in a while.

It is either the roast beef dinner or I may buy a pre-stuffed boneless turkey breast from Loblaw's -again less work and less leftovers!

I also have to plan for a low-carb cocktail party for our annual Christmas Eve open house! So I will be spending the next week or two perusing my cookbooks looking for recipes - which I will of course share with everyone