Vitamins, Slowing Down and Active (not) Kids: Friday Tips, Tricks and Inspiration

Happy winter Friday, fit friends!  Here are your tips, tricks and inspiration:

We all know that savoring our food leads to more satisfaction in eating and helps calm those cravings. It's also true that our brains need time to receive the message that we have had enough. The biggest benefit to slowing down though, is the social one. When we are savoring our meal, we have time for conversation, time to really hear our dinner partners and read between the lines. Even when dining alone, savoring that meal allows us time to think through our day (just past or just starting) and feed our souls as well as our bodies.  In that tack, let's start with these 5 tips to eat slowly from Fooducate. To these I would add two tips from Weight Watchers: Put your fork down between each bite -- it's harder than it sounds -- and/or take a small sip of water between bites.

This week's trick focuses on another way we may be tricking ourselves. As I've long suspected, yet another study seems to show that taking vitamins just isn't a good use of your money! We need to get as much nutrition as possible from our food, folks! If that isn't enough, this scary article from the New York Times demonstrates that some people have suffered real harm from dietary supplements. Please be both wise and cautious in your use of supplements.

Do you think your kids are active? I think mine are! Yet this new study highlighted in Obesity Panacea shows many are not as active as we think. My kids hate it when I read things like this because I start enforcing our hour-a-day-rule for exercise to earn screen time. I think teens and pre-teens are at the greatest risk because their school day is sitting-based. Hopefully this little bit of inspiration will get our kids moving and us, as well. I have started watching my own screen time since reading this study.

That's it for this week's news. If you are facing a weekend of inclement weather as we are, think of ways to get the whole family out for some fun and activity. Maybe a visit to a local skating rink or bowling alley will add some fun to your weekend! Have a great one!