ALLURE MEDICAL - all•u Magazine all·u Magazine Fall 2017 | Page 28

JUMP START More Cheer, Less Pounds! Everybody loves to celebrate the holidays, but nobody likes to put on pounds while they’re celebrating. Good news: sharing holiday cheer with friends and family doesn’t mean you have to fear stepping on the scale! There are plenty of ways you can avoid holiday weight gain. 1. 2. 3. 4. 28 FALL 2017 EXERCISE YOUR CREATIVITY If you’d like to have a holiday-themed gathering that’s not about food, host a craft evening to give you and your guests a chance to have fun making DIY gifts. Chances are that people have artistic talents they’d love to share with others— maybe someone knits or does scrapbooking or could show the group how to make wire jewelry. You can spend quality time together without having to focus on eating and drinking. Besides, it’s far more satisfying and far less stressful to exercise your creativity than battle for parking spaces at the mall! MAKE TASTIER AND BETTER-FOR-YOU COOKIES & CAKES When you do your holiday baking, swap out refined sugars for less- processed versions. You can substitute natural sweeteners like sucanat, coconut or palm sugar 1:1 for white sugar. For cakes, quick breads, and other batter-based goods, look for recipes that use maple syrup—it also offers more nutrition and flavor than white sugar does. (Doughs are stiffer, so you need to use granulated rather than liquid sweeteners with doughs.) You can use sucanat or maple syrup to make hot chocolate, too! WORK OUT WITH FRIENDS Find a fun indoor activity that you can do all winter long. Is there a spin class you’ve been meaning to join? A dance studio that keeps catching your eye? Make a commitment to attend a class or two a week to keep your healthy holiday vibe going. Has a friend talked about doing yoga? You could pay for her classes, too, when you sign up for yours. Give yourself and your friend the gift of healthy, happy holidays! Check out Nicole Stapp, Allure's board- certified nurse practitioner, to the right for some great work out tips. COOLSCULPT THOSE STUBBORN AREAS Do you have those problem areas that you can’t seem to get rid of? We’ve got a little something that can freeze that muffin top, banana roll and bulging back fat away. Unlike other methods of reducing fat, CoolSculpting ® techniques don’t involve surgery, needles, or anesthesia— you can just relax as the technology painlessly freezes your fat away. There’s no downtime and because CoolSculpting is non-invasive and relies on your body’s natural metabolic processes to dissolve fat cells, it only takes about a month to start seeing results. Most people see the full effects 2-3 months after treatment. Translation: you’ll be beach-ready by swimsuit season!