9 healthy tips for family weight loss

1. Plan meals – Take the time to plan and prepare healthy meals for the whole family. This will result in less eating out and less fast-food calories and sodium.
   
2. Watch what you buy – Food that you bring home from the grocery store determines what the family will end up eating. Before you head out to the supermarket, spend a few minutes taking an inventory of your refrigerator, freezer, and pantry, making a list of needed items as well as menu items for the week. Jot down items and ingredients that you will need for your meals and recipes.
   
3. Eating on the go/Smart snacking strategies – Think fast but good. Snacking properly contributes to weight loss and not weight gain. By ordering food to go and eating at home, sticking to the "light menu," and special-ordering, you can drastically reduce both calorie and salt intake.
   
4. Condiments make a difference – Use a wide variety of condiments to add extra flavors to your meals. Leaving off the mayo can save you 9 grams of fat and 100 calories per teaspoon. You can substitute mayo for a wide variety of flavorful mustards, like French's Honey Mustard, which are generally fat free, low fat, and low carb.
   
5. Set a good example of eating and exercise – Set the tone at meal time. Make sure you sit down and eat together as a family to show you believe that nutrition and exercise are important not only for kids but for adults as well.
   
6. Plan Family fitness outings – Plan a couple of family fitness outings for the week, like a picnic, a nature walk, a bike ride, or a trip to the community swimming pool.
   
7. Create an after-school plan – The four-hour danger zone (after school until dinnertime) is when kids typically consume a third of their daily calories and are least active. With less time in front of the TV, kids will have more free time on their hands. Help kids create a schedule for the hours after school and check to see how closely it is followed.
   
8. Eat home more often – People are less likely to overeat when eating at home, so make eating at home a priority. If prepared, home-cooked meals are hassle-free and available there will be less temptation to eat out.
   
9. Resist the temptation to "Super-size it" – More food for less money isn't really such a great deal, especially with the added extra calories.
   

Choose grilled chicken sandwiches and hold the mayo – Grilled chicken offers a lot less fat and fewer calories than beef of deep-fried fish. Simply leaving off the mayo or substituting French's Mustard can reduce daily consumption of fat and calories.

It sounds too easy to work, but it does! Daily, small, simple, and permanent changes to your family's diet will reduce fat consumption and obesity in children and adults. Simple choices like holding the mayo and substituting one of several flavours of mustard, like French's Spicy Brown Mustard, can reduce fat by 9 grams and 100 calories per tablespoon. One hundred unburned calories per meal, per day calories can quickly add up to pounds around the waist.

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