As a teen, most of us don’t even care if we’re eating right, or begin to understand the implications of poor eating habits. As we age, however, we do begin to notice the effects of improper exercise, poor eating habits, and how they affect our health. Today, as the baby boomers begin their retirement years, health concerns and questions are on the rise. These aging boomers are more concerned than any previous generations about their good health, their ability to keep their good health, and how their diet affects their health.

The easiest place to affect our health is through our eating habits; in fact it’s the most effective solution to better health, sharing the spotlight with exercise. What about our food intake? What choices do we have to make eating a healthier occurrence?

Fruits and vegetables are a great place to start. There are so many choices in the filed of fruits and vegetables, that being picky isn’t even a consideration here. It does not matter where your location, the time of the year, or the method of preparation, there are fruits and vegetables to suit the most discriminating taste

The choices in fruits and vegetables run the gamut in color preference, leafy versus compact, fresh and raw, or freshly picked and cooked. There are fruits and vegetables high in flavonoids, anti-oxidants, or just plain high in flavor.

What about as a snack? Do fruits and vegetables meet the snack requirement for taste? We already know that they’re good for us, but if we’re going to snack, we want something that tastes really good.

There are fruits and vegetables that fill that bill, quite successfully. What about celery? Celery with pimento or peanut butter is quite delicious. Or, you have the broccoli and cauliflower combination with ranch dip. That’s a snack that any other snack would be hard pressed to surpass. In the fruit section, you have so many snack choices it would require you to spend hours debating which one is best. Apples, oranges, mangos, bananas, peaches and pears, and this just begins the list.

One of a southerner’s favorite snacks would be baked sweet potato. Now, this is normally consumed with large amounts of butter, but doesn’t have to be, in order to be good. The baked sweet potato can simply be peeled and eaten straight from the oven and it’s still delicious.

Back in the fruit section, you still haven’t covered plums, grapes, raisins, watermelons, cantaloupes, or honey dews. My, my, I didn’t realize there were so many.

We haven’t even discussed fruit options that would require us to cook. These are just the fresh and raw options available, most year round. By the time you run the gamut with these ideas, you should be ready to start all over at the beginning.

You should have enough options now for snacking, that healthful snacking can become a standard, not an exception for you. These ideas do not by any means encompass all options; these are just simply the most popular local favorites if you live in the South and in Alabama.

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DISCLAIMER:

This information is not presented by a medical practitioner and is for educational and informational purposes only. The content is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health care provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition. Never disregard professional medical advice or delay in seeking it because of something you have read.
Since natural and/or dietary supplements are not FDA approved they must be accompanied by a two-part disclaimer on the product label: that the statement has not been evaluated by FDA and that the product is not intended to “diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease.”
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One of the things many of us do as we dream of the life of retirement and living in our golden years is to enjoy some adventures and vacations that you may have put off when raising the kids.  When you have those little ones in your life, you don’t want to miss a single summer when you can take them to Disneyworld or to discover America with them so you can make memories with your family.  So if your library of vacation pictures is mostly with Mickey and Goofy or on a huge water slide at Sea World, those are memories worth keeping forever.

But now that the kids are off with families of their own and you are in these years that are just for you. So now its time for the vacation you have been waiting for.  Its time for a vacation that is an adventure but also one in which you wallow in the lap of luxury.  It time for a vacation that you see exotic things but never have a need that some eager servant isn’t there to fulfill. 

And there is no other vacation thrill that meets this dream of the perfect retirement vacation than to take a cruise.   A cruise of the Caribbean can give you the chance to see exotic locations and be just as adventurous as you want to be.  I know when I first thought of being on a boat for 10 days, it seemed like the most boring prospect possible.  But there just isn’t any time to be bored on a Caribbean cruise.

Even without getting off the ship, your cruise operators will be there to provide you with swimming, shuffleboard, deep sea fishing and just about any kind of amusement you can think of.  But since this is your time to kick back and relax now that you are in your retirement years, no worries if you want nothing more than to lay on deck and watch the world go by.  Your cruise servants will just make sure your drink is never empty or just leave you to read Moby Dick or just have the best nap you have ever enjoyed.

Are there any tips you should be aware of before going on your Caribbean cruise?  Well you are going out to sea so if you think sea sickness is likely, see your doctor before leaving and take your meds before getting on board so that kind of discomfort doesn’t ruin a single moment of your fun during the trip.

If there is any real danger to be aware of it is overindulgence.  You will be provided with such a feast of food, drink and party opportunities that if you don’t pace yourself, you could wear yourself out in the first few days out to sea.  So get your rest and watch your consumption.  Be aware that the rich foods that you are enjoying so much might be a bit much for your constitution.   You can get your exercise with that morning turn around the deck or in an invigorating swim in the on board pool. 

To maximize your enjoyment, do some research up front about where you will be stopping so you know what to enjoy and what kind of shopping you want to be sure to do while you are there.   Many of the shore leave opportunities on your Caribbean cruise offer fun and exotic things to discover that you can enjoy in advance with a bit of reading and study about the native lands that are your playgrounds for a few days on your cruise.

You can easily get “hooked” on the excitement and fun of a Caribbean cruise.  You certainly deserve to be pampered and have an adventure now that you have reached that plateau in your life of retirement.  So get out there and have a great time.  And take lots of pictures.  They will give you just as much joy as the ones of you standing there with Mickey and Goofy.

America’s Got Talent - Quick Change Artists

It’s a proven fact that a manufacturer is in business because they make a profit off the items they sell to the consumer. This has been a known fact since the inception of manufactured food.

And up until the last twenty years or so, manufacturer’s weren’t held accountable for their process, or the additives they put into your food. Then we began the health revolution, and suddenly everyone wanted to know what was in their food, and if what healthy for them to consume. In fact, had the consumer been aware of the level of sugar being added to manufactured cereals during the early part of the 20^th century, they might have refused to purchase or eat something so poor in nutrition and high in tooth decay.

As soon as the manufacturer’s began to deal with that situation, along came the claims of “fat free” and “reduced fat” and the manufacturer’s were forced to prove their claims. The FDA ruled that if they were going to claim those facts, they must label so that proof could be established.

But are the labels really true and accurate? Or do the labels simply tell us what we want to hear. Are they accurate about the fat content? Well, let me ask you, when was the last time you took your bottle of ranch dressing and had it analyzed for fat content? Exactly. You the consumer aren’t going to analyze anything. You’re going to believe whatever those label states as fact.

Food labeling and accuracy are regulated by the Food and Drug Administration, but that doesn’t always keep everyone honest, or true to a simple process of determining what the product you’re buying contains. Many times, the product will provide two to three servings per package. The obvious take, on the consumer’s part, when buying a snack cake or candy bar, is that the single package should constitute a single serving. This is not the case many times. The manufacturer in order to appeal to the consumers sense of sight, makes it appear as though the contents of the package would be a single serving, simply by the way the package is sold. In reality, the serving size is ½ the package or a third of the package. This is a deceit times two. Naturally, as you read the calorie content, you don’t stop to check the serving information, because a product sold for a single serve consumer, should naturally be a single serving, right? Wrong.

This is where we must carefully watch our food labels, read between the lines, and check the fine print. Quite often, we only see what we want to see. We don’t notice that we’re being deceived until much later, or sometimes not at all.

To a consumer just concerned with the calorie content because of weight issues, this is not a life threatening situation. For the diabetic patient, the improper reading of the package contents can mean the difference between normal healthy functioning, and a dramatic increase or drop in blood sugar levels. As you can see, the manufacturer’s who are regulated do their very best to benefit themselves, not the consumer.

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DISCLAIMER:

This information is not presented by a medical practitioner and is for educational and informational purposes only. The content is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health care provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition. Never disregard professional medical advice or delay in seeking it because of something you have read.
Since natural and/or dietary supplements are not FDA approved they must be accompanied by a two-part disclaimer on the product label: that the statement has not been evaluated by FDA and that the product is not intended to “diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease.”
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It’s 7:00 am, and you’re late for work. You decide to just simply skip breakfast, and have a snack later, around midmorning. Your kids decide they don’t want breakfast, either.

Lunchtime arrives and you’re just not that hungry. Maybe a quick snack bar, a diet soda, and back to work. Do you ever wonder what your kids are eating for lunch? Have they come to the same conclusion?

Alright, time to prepare dinner, and time is short. You have three places to be in order to get everybody to practice, pickup the cleaning, and then on home. On the way to the cleaners you realize dinner is going to be a lite one if you fix what you have at home. Where to stop? How about pizza and soda? Or maybe the kids would like burgers and fries. While you try to decide what to provide for dinner, the kids have finished practice and they’re starving. The gym has a food dispenser for snacks and sodas, and so they load up on candy bars and coke.

It’s 6:45 pm and you’ve made the last stop on the child pickup train. Everybody’s loaded up and ready to go home. You’ve decided to stop for pizza, already called your order in, and it’s ready when you stop by.

Have you ever stopped to ponder why you eat the way you do? Where did those habits develop from? Do we learn these habits as we grow up? That’s exactly where we learn them. Then we just improve upon them as we age. As the demands of really hectic lives intrude upon our mealtime, we simply skip meals, compact meals, or choose the quickest alternative.

These food habits are not lost on our children either. They take note of our food habits, just like they do our hygiene habits, our work habits, and our exercise habits. They will generally follow right along behind us parents. What is it we say to them, “good habits are just as easy as bad”?

What we should absorb as we travel along life’s daily path is a way to incorporate healthy habits into our lifestyle. There is generally just as much room for healthy as there is unhealthy, it just so happens that unhealthy holds more appeal.

Unhealthy receives more advertising dollars than healthy, and is often more visible. But that doesn’t mean it’s any easier, more convenient, or cheaper. Habits, generally take about two weeks to make the switch from conscious action to unconscious habit. Two weeks is not long, it’s not long at all for decisions that will affect you for the rest of your life. It’s also not long for the potential reward that comes from setting an example your children can follow, and you can be proud for them to follow. You teach them daily about the good habits you want them to develop, and then you demonstrate a bad one in your food choices. C’mon, mom and dad, let’s practice what we preach.

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DISCLAIMER:

This information is not presented by a medical practitioner and is for educational and informational purposes only. The content is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health care provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition. Never disregard professional medical advice or delay in seeking it because of something you have read.
Since natural and/or dietary supplements are not FDA approved they must be accompanied by a two-part disclaimer on the product label: that the statement has not been evaluated by FDA and that the product is not intended to “diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease.”
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The foods of the food pyramid are necessary for our optimal health. But in what quantities and which ones are the best? These are questions that must be tailored to our individual needs. And the answers will benefit our unique needs. Healthy for me, is not the same as healthy for you. Everyone’s nutritional needs are different, and everyone’s level of calorie consumption is different

We can examine some of the better foods, and offer advice as to what particular formulas make us the healthiest on average. The average person needs an hour of physical exercise, six to eleven servings of grains, two to four servings of fruit, three to five servings of vegetables, two to three servings of meat, two to three servings of milk, and enough water to make it all work.

This could be the formula for an eighty year old man, or a fifteen year old girl. The recommended daily calorie intake is just as vague and generalized as the daily food intake pyramid. Can you see how this might not work for either one? When a guideline published is this general, it is up to the individual to determine what food regimen will keep them at their healthiest, provide the caloric intake necessary, but not excessive.

According to the guides published by the USDA, calorie needs vary from one age group to another, one gender to another. So how do you determine what your individual needs are? You can setup a journal for recording your daily caloric intake for about a month. Make a note of your weight each day. If you don’t gain any weight during the course of that month, you’re eating your recommended calorie level in order to maintain your weight. Now, take that calorie information, check with a nutritionist about the recommended daily allowances of vitamins and minerals that you need. Take both pieces of information, calorie intake and nutritional requirements, use the food pyramid and comprise a combination of foods that will help you achieve these recommended daily intakes, and still be enjoyable food. You now have an individualized healthy eating plan.

Once the importance of a particular food plan is understood by us, it is a simple as learning our multiplication tables. We simply memorize the benefit, and incorporate it into our daily intake as needed. As you take the time to incorporate a healthy food plan, don’t’ forget the necessity of exercise in our daily lives. In order to keep our bodies healthy and functioning off of healthy food, we need to keep it fit. This comes through proper amounts of exercise

What those foods might be, are entirely dependent upon the unique guideline you have just established. This guide will not work for Cousin Bob, or Aunt Tilley, but it is the unique blueprint for you. It is at this point in the process that we seem to lack the direction to finish what the government started. Maybe we need to incorporate these techniques into a class taught at school. Maybe this would give our young people the direction and tools they need in order to begin such a process, make it a lifetime habit, and pass it along to their children. Whatever the formula, your food intake and level of calorie content, will affect your general overall health everyday. Overeating can bring on obesity, under eating can bring about anemia; you need to find that one right guide for you, and plan, plan, plan.

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DISCLAIMER:

This information is not presented by a medical practitioner and is for educational and informational purposes only. The content is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health care provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition. Never disregard professional medical advice or delay in seeking it because of something you have read.
Since natural and/or dietary supplements are not FDA approved they must be accompanied by a two-part disclaimer on the product label: that the statement has not been evaluated by FDA and that the product is not intended to “diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease.”
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We face a lot of hard moments in life.  As you have raised your family, dealt with business issues and tried to be an upstanding citizen in your path from youth to retirement, you have many moments you are proud of.  But anyone who has successfully come to their senior years also has a few relationships and moments that they are not proud of as well.

One of the hardest to things to admit is that you ever were wrong.  But the chances are that by this stage in your life, you can look back and think of times when you did treat people badly, where you were in the wrong and were not honest or ethical or moral in some aspect of life.  But in the middle of a struggle, when we do behave in a shameful way, it’s easy to just get past it, bury it in your mind and let the passage of time wipe away that memory. 

But your senior years are about more than just trips to casinos and sleeping until noon.  It is also about reviewing the life you lived and cerebrating the joys and successes you have had.   But to be honest with yourself, you cannot rejoice in the good without remembering those times when you were the one doing wrong and the people you hurt and the damage that was caused by your mistakes.

This is hard to think about but as a mature senior adult, now is the time to decide if you are going to make that situation right or not.  Facing your senior years is about putting your affairs in order so you can live out the balance of your days with a peaceful mind and a happy heart.  And you are not going to be able to go to your grave knowing you did all you can to be the quality person you set out to be until you do what you can to fix the things you broke as well.

In many cases, all that you have to do to resolve a mistake you made or to fix a broken relationship is to be prepared to say the two hardest words there are in the English language.  And those words are – I’m sorry.  

It would be a shame that would border on a Shakespearian tragedy if you look back at your life and identify those broken relationships that were caused by your pride, your impetuous activity or your greed.  Some of those relationships may be very important to you and to leave them broken as you move into your retirement years is more than just a shame, it’s unimaginable.  So how do you go about saying your sorry and saying “I’m sorry” to someone with whom relationship ended a long time ago?

Perhaps the easiest way to accomplish this very hard part of setting your affairs in order is to work through someone who can help make it happen.  Suppose that in your young adult years, something happened in the family finances and you said something or did something to hurt your brother which caused that relationship to die.  Now, decades from that event, that little financial squabble seems small and far away.  But the hurt of that broken relationship is painful to you every time you think of it.

It was you that caused that relationship to fail. You know that when you look in the mirror but your pride keeps you from calling your brother and just saying “I’m sorry.  Let’s be family again.”  But that’s what you want.

So perhaps another family member can be of assistance.  Another sibling may be able to mend this family rift and be happy to see that relationship restored.  If you can call that sister who still loves you and still loves your brother, she may be able to help soften the hurt feelings and be the mediator between two hurt brothers who desperately to be reconciled.

You can bet that your sister would be thrilled to be the one to bring you two together.  This is just one example of a way to reach out and say the hardest words ever to fix a mistake you made in life.  It’s a way to reach out to that person you hurt and just say – I’m sorry.

You don’t need to buy a costume for Halloween when you can make one yourself. What is even better is the fact that you don’t have to be a tailor or seamstress to sew it together. You just have to be creative and use whatever you have in your closet or get a few of these items from the thrift shop.

Using your imagination and putting different items together is much better than tossing a sheet over your head and saying you’re a ghost.  Since Halloween doesn’t always have to be scary, think of other characters you can play like perhaps a clown, tin man, a pirate or a gorilla.

For a clown outfit, you should start by looking for a  colorful pair of sweats pants. If you don’t have any, see if there is some other baggy clothing lying around. Since clowns have big buttons on their coveralls, use colorful mesh dish scrubbers which can be found in your kitchen or the grocery.

For your hair, get a wig because it will take more than a day to get off the color on your hair. Get some white makeup for your face and then find a pair of goofy shoes to complete the outfit.

We all know tin man from the wizard of Oz. To dress up just like him, you will see cardboard which will be most of your costume. To make yourself look like him, you can spray the cardboard with silver spray paint or attach aluminum foil all around it.

For your hat, see if there is an old funnel in the garage. You will need black shoes for your feet and silver eye shadow for your face. Another option will be to make your own make up using silver face makeup with cold cream and food coloring. Don’t forget to put black eyeliner to draw lines from the corners of your mouth to your chin.

Making a pirate costume is probably the simplest of them all. For this you will need a pair of black or brown hospital scrubs. You then cut the top portion as well as the sleeves to create a vest. To make it look good, sketch and skill and crossbones onto white felt then paste this on the back of vest.

Now put on a white shirt and just wear a pair of jeans. Since not all pirates have wear a hat, you can wear a bandana instead just like some of the characters in Pirates of the Caribbean.

Lastly, to be a gorilla, you will need a lot of black fur and then sew this up to your top and bottom. Since the mask is hard to make, it is best to just get the costume from the store.

Once you have finished planning what you are going to wear, it is time now to look at what accessories there are available. If there are none, then you have to buy it at a thrift shop or consignment store.

Making your costume for Halloween will surely save you a lot of money since most costumes cost more than $20 a set. The best pat is that you don’t have to feel guilty when you decide to throw it away since you can probably make a new one the following year.

The perfect and scariest Halloween costume would not be enough without the mask. Since the face is first thing that people gaze on to when he or she meets somebody, a Halloween mask worn during a party would definitely determine how scary can you get.

Today, there are so many Halloween masks being sold in various bookshops and specialty stores out there. You can choose from your favorite characters from horror, thriller, or sci-fi movies. You can even find masks which as truly Halloween inspired such as ghosts, ghouls, and monsters.

In most specialty stores, the most popular Halloween masks include gaping wraith mask, glow in dark hockey mask, meateater mask, Batman the dark knight Joker mask, deep sea mask, devil’s rejects Captain Spaulding mask, whispers hooded mask, Harry Potter dementor mask, elegant devil mask, leatherface deluxe mask, Batman the dark knight grumpy clown mask, that’s not funny clown mask, got your goat mask, red skull mask beanie, white skull mask beanie, skull mask blue beanie and so much more. If you are into departed celebrities, you can even find some which are created in their memory.

But, if you are the type who gives so much emphasis on creativity, uniqueness, and resourcefulness, then you should try making your own mask. The following are just some of your options in making your very own Halloween mask:

1. Improvised latex Halloween masks. Many people would agree that latex or hard plastic masks could be quite uncomfortable once worn. And why not? These are made from synthetic plastic materials and can even be harmful when not used properly. So if are not into wearing latex masks sold in specialty shops, you can create your very own latex inspired mask.

Here, you’ll be needing poster board or light weight cardboard, elastic or tongue depressor, and various embellishments to make the mask stand out. The instructions are quite simple, you need to cut the board with the shape of your face, cut it out, punch holes in each side of the mask and decorate it using various embellishments such as poster paints, feathers, glitter, and everything you wish to put in. The  good thing about this is you can make your mask as scary and as ghoulish as you want it to be.

2. Simple paper and cloth masks. This is quite popular and easy to do because all you will be needing is a used cloth which can come from a used pillowcase or shirts, permanent markers, a pair of scissors, and lots of duck tape. Doing a paper and face mask is easy because all you have to do is lay the cloth flat and cut a hole in the center of the cloth. Afterwards, you need to take a piece of paper and draw the mask that you like. Then, turn the cloth inside out and lay the mask face down.

Using the duct tape, tape the sides of the mask down to the cloth and cut the eye holes. Let the duct tape grip the cloth and paper well then you can now decorate your Halloween mask using markers and other crafts and embellishments that you want to include.

3. Your very own printed mask. If you are not the type who is into work stuff such as cutting, pasting, and drawing, you can still make your very own Halloween mask through the use of computer. Today, there are so many sites, which offer Halloween mask patterns, which are ready for printing.

You can choose from a wide array of styles and characters depending on what or who would you want to portray. If you are knowledgeable on various computer programs and software such as Photoshop, you can design your very own mask and print it out.

Hanging fake spider webs and creating your own lanterns is one way to decorate your house during Halloween. If you want to make something bigger or more life like, why not add a mummy?

To make one, you don’t have to buy a mannequin or an inflatable. You will need though a lot of newspaper since this will help make up the entire body.

When all the parts are ready, hold everything together using some tape then begin wrapping the mummy using bandages. The best ones to use are those used in the hospital. Since this is too expensive, you will have to substitute this with toilet paper instead. It is best to use the plain kind since people will probably laugh if they noticed that it has a flowery design.

Now that your mummy is ready, put this where there is a lot of traffic like beside the front door to your house or in the dining room.

If you want to scare people, put this in places where they don’t expect like the bathtub or the closet. If people ask where the toilet is, just give them the directions. The same goes if people come in and want to hang their coat then just wait until you hear a loud scream.

Another way of making a mummy will require adult size clothes for a large mummy and child size clothes for a small one. When you have it, lay these on the floor and start stuffing it using newspaper. If you notice, the end result will make your mummy look like a scarecrow.

For the hands of the mummy, get a pair of gloves then attach this to the arm then wrap this up using toilet paper or gauze. If you can spare an old white bed sheet which you can cut into strips, even better.

As for the head, try inflating a balloon or a gallon sized milk jug then put this near the collar of the shirt. Continue wrapping until you are also able to cover the mummy’s face. If you want to put some eyes, use black construction paper then glue this on the face.

While most mummies lie still, you can make your mummy different by letting it sit upright on a chair. One suggestion will be put the chair beside the table where the candies are.

Your life sized mummy will look great wherever you decide to put it. If the tissue, gauze or strips should come off just patch it up as fast as you can.

Although most mummies are color white, you can give it an aged appearance by using some spray paint. The two ideal colors to use for this are translucent beige and brown which you can easily buy from the craft store.

When Halloween is all over, take one last look at the mummy and then take it apart. Some of the stuff you use can be recycled for next year while the rest has to be thrown in the trash.

Now that you know how to make a life sized mummy, you can also use the toilet paper and gauze to create your own Halloween costume. If the two are identical, some people will think that they are talking to you when actually they are talking to a dummy.