13 tips to stay healthy and stress free this holiday season

I just got done reading my 437th "Healthy Holidays" article and I want to scream! Not only was that a tremendous waste of time but I didn't learn a darn thing. NOT ONE THING! "Why?" you ask innocently, and I'll tell you: because they weren't about "Healthy" at all. They were about skinny! 

Every single post was about how to avoid eating extra cookies and appetizers. Fitting in gym time around holiday events. Hiding your weight loss shake in a reusable plastic cup so no one will try to give you a calorie laden drink at a party. Excuses to use when treats are brought in to work. Blah blah blah...

Are you kidding me?

I'm pretty upset about this. It feels to me that the majority of people believe that healthy and skinny are the same thing. Well, they are not! You can be overweight and healthy, but you can also be skinny and unhealthy. These are not exclusive! Furthermore, a few cookies over the holidays are not going to kill you. 

Certain other practices though, are very unhealthy! Like spreading germs and running yourself ragged. That is what we are talking about avoiding in this post....

How to have a healthy, stress free holiday season

I lost 25 lbs. in 2015 and kept it off so I am no stranger to the little tricks you can use to keep on an eating plan or fit in a gym visit, but it's the holidays here folks! This is once a year and what a year we've had! Relax and enjoy yourself. 

Have a cookie or two. Drink some eggnog or have an appetizer. Toast with some champagne.We all know not to go crazy, but live a little. 

Come January everyone will be at the gym and it'll be like a big party, so you'll be right back to the grind in no time. Live a little, but do your best to take care of yourself too. Taking care of yourself is not about watching what you eat as much as it is about everything else you do during your day to stay healthy. 

Here are my 13 favorite stay healthy tips for this holiday season:

How to store dried herbs

If you're anything like me you've spent the better part of the summer growing, harvesting and drying your own herbs. Growing your own herbs is a very cost effective way to stock your spice cabinet or herbal apothecary and drying them is simple enough that anyone can do it! 

Now that you took the time to dehydrate all those fresh herbs, how do you store herbs so that they last the longest and are the most potent? 

How to store dried herbs properly

There are 5 things that cause herbs to deteriorate:

• Air
• Heat
• Sunlight
• Moisture
• Time

To minimize the deterioration cause by the first 4 on the list, store your dried herbs in an airtight container in a cool, dark place. I like to store my dried herbs in glass and I use canning jars. I love that they come in all different sizes since some herbs I use a lot of and others I only use sparingly. 

I store them in a cabinet down in my family room where it stays pretty cool year round. 

Unfortunately because kitchens tend to get hot when cooking/baking they are probably the worst place to store dried herbs, especially if you keep dried herbs on the counter or in an herb display rack. If you can't store your herbs in a cabinet, try the tinted Ball jars to help keep light out.

The easiest solar herb drying method ever!

I've always wanted to make a solar dehydrator. I've looked at solar dehydrator plans and kits but never really wanted to invest the money for a kit, or the time to build one myself. However, I love the idea of being able to dehydrate herbs without using electric. Plus, I dehydrate a lot of herbs in the summer and can always use extra space!

This past weekend I found a super simple solar method of drying herbs and I just have to tell you about it! Over the years I have used various methods of drying herbs including air drying by hanging, oven drying, microwave drying and my current favorite...using my dehydrator. 

That is until now, because I have discovered that the easiest way to dry herbs is to simply leave them in your car! Yep, that's really all there is to it and I stumbled upon this quite by accident.

Cheapest solar drying method ever!

Last weekend we went to the Renaissance Festival down in Pittsburgh. The parking lot was a huge field and all along the outer edges were Red Clover plants. The basic rule of foraging is to not take too many and ask permission. 

There really wasn't anyone around to ask, but this was a field they were slowly destroying by parking cars on it so I figured the unparked areas were fair game.

We were going into the festival and I was afraid if it was dark when I came out I would forget to grab a few, so I picked 1 perfect Red Clover blossom and placed it on my dashboard as a reminder. We locked up the truck and went into the festival for the next several hours.

You can prevent forest fires. Really!

If you've been anywhere near a computer, TV or newspaper lately you've heard about the devastating fires sweeping across the nation. Right now, at this very moment, there are thousands of acres of wilderness burning to the ground due to wildfires across 7 or more different states. There is a 300 acre fire in Oregon. Over 82,000 people have been evacuated and historical landmarks have been destroyed in the Blue Cut fire currently raging in California. There are at least a dozen other forest fires of various sizes racing across the land and consuming every thing in their paths....as we speak!

While some of these are caused by nature, like lightning strikes, more of them are caused by the carelessness or accidents of humans. We live on a clearing right in the middle of the woods – so as you can imagine, any kind of wildfire would be completely devastating to us! I can't even imagine looking out the window and seeing the woods glowing orange with fire. Or feeling the heat as it races towards me. *shudders* That's the stuff nightmares are made of!

I believe that knowledge gives us power and it is so important to understand the safety and prevention of wildfires. They are damaging not only to the forest but can also be damaging to any homes and structures around them as well. You can't tell me it doesn't break your heart to think of all the frightened animals in the woods as a fire approaches! I know it kills me and I would hate to be the reason anyone or anything suffers through such a devastating event! After all, it really isn’t all that difficult to take steps to ensure that you are doing what it takes to prevent a wildfire.

We have to be SMART and take preventative action any time we are going to be outside! And while we all know that matches, burning cigarettes, and abandoned campfires are all potential threats for wildfire – there are MANY lesser known causes. Ones that you might be participating in and not even realize it.

Common ways YOU could unintentionally start a wildfire:

•  Metal chains hanging from a moving vehicle
•  Parking over tall, dry grass 
•  Unattended debris burning
•  Equipment fires such as from lawnmowers, ATVs, power equipment
•  Smoking
•  Unattended campfires
•  Fireworks
•  Carelessly discarding fireplace or BBQ ashes

Do you remember the Smokey Bear commercials? I remember the them from when I was a kid. He stared out at me from the television and while pointing straight at me stated "Only YOU can prevent forest fires!" What a message that sent to a younger me! Even though I was a suburbs kid and only saw the inside of a forest once a year, I still learned caution from those ads. Well, those and the free coloring books that were handed out by fire trucks at parades. I loved those books. 

Many year later when I moved into the woods myself, I found myself being overly cautious with my own fire pit. Well, overly cautious in the eyes of my husband that is! He never understood why I would sit out until the fire was cold instead of just heading in to bed. Or check on it every 5 minutes till I finally gave up on waiting and dragged the hose out to drench it. I just had to make sure it was out or I wouldn't be able to sleep. Maybe that's why he bought me that burn cage a couple years back? Hmmm, now it all makes sense. 

Any-whoo, coinciding with Smokey Bear’s 72nd birthday, the Ad Council, the U.S. Forest Service and the National Association of State Foresters (NASF), have launched a new series of public service advertisements (PSAs) created to help prevent wildfires nationwide by increasing awareness about less commonly known fire starts:

10 Ways to attract bees to your garden

I'm sure that by now you've heard of the bee 'crisis', if not I'll sum it up for you real quick: bees are being killed off at an alarming rate by big AGs use of pesticides. Unfortunately we need bees to pollinate flowers so plants can produce food so we can eat and do that important thing called LIVE. 

While there isn't too much we can do on a large scale, there are several things we can do to attract these natural pollinators to our own gardens. The better pollination we have going on in the garden, the better chance we have of a great harvest. 

Maybe I'm just lazy, but I have no plans of spending days in the garden hand pollinating my zucchinis! I need bees to do this for me....so I attract them to my garden.