Halloween is a holiday that many of us tend to overlook when planning for their weight loss goals. Temptations are everywhere on Halloween, and hunger can easily send you rummaging through the candy dish. Lots of us end up with excess candy lying around the house either because we bought too much for trick-or-treaters or our own children have scored lots of yummy loot that tempts us for days or weeks to follow.

Thus, you may think that  the best way to avoid eating too much, is to simply eat enough to avoid raging hunger altogether. If you’re not hungry, you’re much less likely to binge on Halloween treats, laden with diet destroying sugars and excess calories.

To some, this is true but to most, it is not so.

Art of Appreciation Gift Baskets Boo! To You Halloween Candy and Snacks Care Package Box

Start thinking now about what you can do to stay on track over Halloween, and have your plan ready before all the ghosts and goblins show up at your door. Here are a few strategies that might help curb candy overload:

- Purchase candy to hand out to trick-or-treaters that you don’t like; this way you can give it out freely and won’t be tempted to keep any at home to snack on later.

- Choose healthy snacks to give out. Some options might include small packages of raisins, apples, granola bars, or other nutritious treats. Sure, kids might not be as happy with these choices, but you’ll feel good knowing you provided them with a better option than sugary, high-calorie candy!

- Give away excess treats. If you end up with lots of extra candy after the trick-or-treaters leave, get it out of the house quickly! Donate it to co-workers, give it to neighbors, or even throw it away – but don’t let it stay in the house, as you’ll be more likely to snack on it.

YummyEarth Organic Lollipops, Assorted Flavors, 30-Ounce Container

- Set limits on candy consumption – for you and your kids. There’s no reason NOT to indulge in a sweet treat or two around Halloween; that’s part of the fun of the holiday! However, you can help your children establish healthy habits themselves by focusing on eating Halloween treats in moderation. Consider letting kids have 2-3 pieces of candy the first night, and then limit them to 1 piece per day after that. Then, practice what you preach and do the same! This will teach your children how to enjoy candy and sweets without overdoing it.

- Finally, get out there and move! Don’t drive your kids around to trick-or-treat; walk! This will help all of you burn more calories through the night in order to better enjoy a few pieces of candy. You might even use a tool like the food journal on MyFitnessPal.com to help you figure out how many calories you need to burn through walking in order to indulge in a few of your favorite Halloween treats.

Here are tips on how to choose  healthy snacks around Halloween, and stay headed in the right direction towards your weight loss goals.

Healthy Snack Ideas

• Air popped popcorn. For seasoning, you can spray a small amount of butter-flavored nonstick spray, and then add seasoned salt and some herbs of choice. Sprinkling some nutritional yeast on the popcorn, gives it a boost in nutrition, as well as a cheesy flavor.
• Chopped fruit is a handy snack that eliminates the craving for sweets. Keep some chopped melons, apples, berries, and pears in the refrigerator. People tend to eat what is readily available, and it’s easy to grab a handful of fruit to satisfy a sweet tooth.
• Nuts mixed with a healthy cereal is a salty, crunch snack that provides a good amount of energy. Almonds and unflavored, puffed wheat cereal is a good mix. Just put the ingredients in baggies to have on hand.
• Sugar free gum is another good way to avoid eating too much Halloween candy. Chewing a stick of gum tends to dissipate cravings. It helps to always have some available to help you avoid temptation.

For more tips, you may want to check out : 9 Simple Halloween Healthy Ways to Maintain Your Weight Loss

Welch’s Fruit Snacks, Mixed Fruit, Fat Free Snacks, (80-0.9oz. Pouches Per Box)

Ingredients:

1 serving of sandwich and lean meat.

Use an assortment of Halloween cookie cutters, white and wheat bread, and the two types of sandwich spreads below to make a plate of spooky sandwich bites. I like to use leftover BBQ chicken breasts for the chicken spread.

Roasted Chicken Spread:

2 roasted chicken breasts, skinless and boneless, cut into small pieces
3 tablespoons light mayonnaise
1/4 cup light cream cheese (fat-free cream cheese can be substituted)

Cheddar Cheese Spread:

8 ounces reduced fat sharp cheddar cheese, shredded or grated
8 ounces light or nonfat cream cheese
9 slices special recipe white or whole wheat or cracked wheat bread

Method

• Decide which spread you would like to make. Cut the bread slices into interesting shapes such as pumpkins, witch hats, and cats using cookie cutters. Press cookie cutter onto 1 slice of bread at a time. If bread doesn’t cut all the way, use a plastic knife to cut around the cookie cutter. Make sure you make two of every shape (to make a sandwich).
• For chicken spread, add the chicken pieces, mayonnaise, and cream cheese to a food processor. Pulse the food processor until ingredients are blended well and are spreadable.
• For cheese spread, add grated cheese and cream cheese to food processor. Pulse the food processor until ingredients are blended well and are spreadable.
• Spread some of the chicken or cheddar cheese spread on one of the bread shapes. Cover with the second piece of bread in the same shape. Repeat with other bread shapes.

One spread recipe makes about 12 mini sandwiches.

Per 3 roasted chicken spread mini sandwiches: 259 calories, 21 g protein, 31 g carbohydrate, 3.5 g fat, 3 g fiber, 474 mg sodium.

Per 3 cheese spread mini sandwiches: 356 calories, 29 g protein, 33 g carbohydrate, 12 g fat, 3.5 g fiber, 870 mg sodium.

Do you hate yourself when you look into the mirror and found an overweight, fat over 40-years old lady staring back at you? Don’t you wish that the person in the mirror is not you?!

Everyone has their ‘problem spots’. We all have areas on our body that we love and areas on our body that we’re not so in love with. If you have trouble with your hips and thighs you may wonder what can be done to lose weight in hips and thighs.  You may know that it’s not possible to ‘spot reduce’. What that means is that you can’t just lose weight in one or two areas of your body, you have to lose weight everywhere.  For that reason you’ll have to focus on overall body weight reduction to get the lower body you’ve always dreamed of.

Even though you can’t spot reduce, you will still lose more weight in some areas than in others for the simple reason that you have more fat in some areas than others.  Your body will burn fat first, then muscle, so as long as you still have excess fat deposits and you cut your daily calorie intake you will lose weight. So if you want to lose weight in hips and thighs but you don’t need to lose weight in your abdomen or butt, all you need to do is eat fewer calories and the excess weight will come off.

Try this:

Another thing that can help the appearance of your lower body, namely hips and thighs, is exercise. A lot of women wrongly think that if they do too many exercises it will just make their bottom half look  bigger because they’ll ‘bulk up’. In reality women just aren’t made that way. In order to get really big you’d have to workout on a full time basis, eat only 100% nutritious foods (no cheating) and more than likely take a drug or two. It’s just not going to happen.

If you target all your major, and not so major, muscle groups what will happen is that you’ll look smaller. When your muscles are toned you will look smaller since your body will be ‘cinched in’.  Think of your muscles kind of like a girdle. Building your muscles will allow you to hold everything in more, naturally, and that will give you an all over appearance of being smaller which will make it look like you’ve lost more weight than you really have.

To get the best results you should watch what you eat, make sure you drink plenty of water everyday to stay hydrated and to keep your body clear of toxins, and do some muscle building exercises.

One great and easy to do exercise for hips and thighs would be lunges. You don’t need any special equipment and it’s easy to learn how to do them. All you have to do is take a big step forward, bend the forward knee so you go as close to the floor as possible (and still be able to get back up!) then straighten up. Do the same thing with the other leg. Walk across the floor doing this and I’ll bet you’ll find that you’ve gotten a great lower body workout, though you may have a little trouble walking tomorrow!

It’s easy to lose weight in hips and thighs, just eat right and exercise. And, oh yeah, you’ll also lose weight everywhere else too!

If you are interested, you may want to get this:Crunch: Belly Butt and Thighs Bootcamp