Staying Fit for the Holidays

Christmas, New Year's, Hanukkah--they're great. We eat delicious food, watch a lot of Netflix and, most of us, are probably playing all the video games as we can. Here's the hitch--when you sit around for that long eating, you're bound to lose energy. How can one get energy back? Well, you could drink a Red Bull or bury yourself in Christmas MnM's. But, let's be real, crashing after is less than fun.

So here I've got a short list of easy ways to get your heart pumping--or at least your butt off the couch. These suggestions are circuit training, so they're a list of different activities you do at one time. Before you start any of it, though, make sure you stretch! I don't care how in shape you are or how little time you may have--it's far better to stretch before a work out for a few minutes than to pull a muscle and be miserable on New Year's because of it. (I don't apologize for the cheesy holiday names I gave these.)

Grow Your Heart 3 Sizes

25 jumping jacks
7 push-ups
15 crunches
8 squats
25 jumping jacks
1 minute wall sit (I know, these are a struggle but they're really awesome for your muscles!)
7 push-ups
15 crunches
8 squats
20 knee highs

Rinse and repeat 3 times!

Melt Away the Snow

80 jumping jacks
20 calf raises
20 knee highs
20 squats
20 crunches
20 sit ups
30 reverse crunches
15 second plank

Repeat two or more times!

Baby It's Cooling Down Outside

10 jumping jacks
10 push-ups
10 squats
10 crunches
10 knee highs

Repeat 9 more times, reducing the number of each action by one each time

Melt Away the Snow is definitely a more difficult one--I honestly prefer the last one the most. It gets my heart pumping but then cools down as it goes. :) One important aspect to remember is to make sure you cool down after--stretch again, drink plenty of water and let your body calm itself down before continuing on. If you don't, you may regret it and experience a good amount of pain after.

Easy Comfort Food

We've covered easy gifts, now let's cover food because, let's be real, who doesn't love junk food?! I know I'm a real big fan.

These are all easy, cheap and require little effort. :) Let's do this!

1. Marshmallow Popcorn Bars

INGREDIENTS:

• 2 bags of popcorn (microwaveable)
• 4 cups mini marshmallows
• Non-stick spray (Pam works perfectly, and I'm sure you have some somewhere!)
• 1/4 cup butter
• 3/4 cup MnM's or some candy coated chocolates similar to those

This recipe is essentially like making rice crispy treats. Pop your popcorn bags, then dump it all in a bowl but pull out all the unpopped kernels. Then take a baking dish and spray your non-stick Pam or whatever in the pan lightly--just to coat it because you're about to have super sticky marsmallow all over. haha

Now, put your marshmallows and butter into a bowl and microwave for 2 minutes. Once they're done, you've got to move fast. Carefully stir the popcorn in with the marshmallow mixture and then add in the MnM's once it's all coated nicely.

Put it in your pan, toss it (not literally) in the fridge and you're done! Once it's cooled down, you can leave it out on a counter or whatever and enjoy. I really love popcorn so I think I'd probably eat the entire pan myself, which you can certainly do!

BONUS: You can also melt some chocolate slowly in a microwave (10 second increments or it will probably burn) and drizzle it over top or mix in pretzels with your popcorn and MnMs.

2. Handmade Jolly Rancher Pops

INGREDIENTS:

• Jolly Rancher candies
• Lollipop sticks

First, you need to preheat your oven to 200 degrees F. Once that's done, using a non-stick pan, stack up a few Jolly Ranches (2-3) and put them in the oven for 7-8 minutes. Basically, until they melt. Once they've melted, quickly add in your lollipop sticks and let them cool. After they've cooled, you can simply pry them off! Bam. The best part is that you can choose whatever flavors you like.

3. Pizza Ring

INGREDIENTS:

• 2 Tubes of Crescent Rolls
• 1/2 cup Tomato Sauce
• 1 cup Mozzarella (shredded is better than slices, in my opinion)
• 1 tablespoon Garlic Powder (totally optional but highly recommended)
• 1 tablespoon Italian Seasoning
• Pepperoni slices

This is a more complicated recipe, but if you're skilled in using an oven and have used crescent rolls before, I can't possibly recommend this more.

First off, preheat your oven to 425 degrees F and open up your crescent rolls. You want to take those out but not as triangles--use the rectangles, as you can see pictured below and place them on a pizza stone or a baking sheet (make sure you spray the sheet with Pam or something so it doesn't stick!). Once you've done that, spoon out the tomato sauce only in the first 3rd of the circle, layer on cheese and add in the pepperoni! The photo has pepperoni only on the right half, but you can do pepperoni on both sides. :)

Once that step is done, fold in the outsides to the inside and bake for 15-18 minutes. Once they're baked, sprinkle the garlic powder and Italian seasoning on top. They'll puff up pretty big and pull apart easily. Super yummy.

Quick and Cheap Holiday Gifts

With the holidays coming in quickly, it's time to buckle down and get our gifts together to give to those we love. That said, it's also the time of year to be short on cash and for those without an income, gift giving becomes even more difficult.

Thankfully for us living in this society, there's Pinterest. Bless Pinterest users for posting gift ideas that cost nothing or hardly anything at all. I have to say, up until a few months ago, I didn't really use it, but I think it's got some of the best ideas for gift giving especially!

1. Sugar Scrub
I feel like sugar scrubs and bath bombs are really popular this year. With the store Lush expanding all over the US, these items are becoming everyone who likes a good bath's favorites.

T sugar scrub is seriously the easiest product to make ever.

INGREDIENTS:

• 1/2 cup oatmeal
• 1/4 cup baby oil
• 1 1/4 cup sugar
• 1/4 cup honey

I've found that you can replace the oil with a bit of extra honey. Simply throw all of that into a bowl, mix and bam, sugar scrub complete.

2. Bath Bomb

These are one of my favorites to make and they can cost a little bit of money, but that little bit can go a long way. Not only that, but you can customize these to look any way you want.

INGREDIENTS (makes 2.5 8oz bath bombs):

• 8 oz of baking soda
• 4 oz of citric acis
• 4 oz of corn starch
• 4 oz of finely grained Epsom salts
• 3/4 teaspoons of water
• 2 teaspoons of essential oil
• Round, plastic, snap together dome molds

These ingredients may look a bit intimidating, but they're really simple to make. Mix the dry ingredients in one bowl, the wet ingredients in another, combine and fill your molds! You'll need to leave them in the molds for a few minutes before carefully removing and setting on a towel or some wax (non-stick) paper.

My favorite part of making these is the customization. If you have a friend that loves all things pink and glittery like me, you can drop some pink food coloring in the mixture and then put some edible glitter in the bottom of the mold before adding it all in. You can also add in scents if you have those or want to go above and beyond or even sprinkles. Definitely my type of craft.

3. Coloring Book
Now, this sounds really silly, I know, but this is another gift that is really popular right now. Adult coloring books. The designs are more intricate and complicated but I know a lot of people that enjoy these and you can certainly print out your own.

I spent less than 30 seconds typing "free adult coloring book download" and found tons of websites right away that have free to print pages. This page was the first to come up and it looks pretty good to me.

So simply print out some pages, make yourself a cover, and then you can either staple it or punch holes on the side and tie it together with string or ribbon. Easy mode activate.

4. Cookie Butter
This is for those that love to eat or have a huge sweet tooth. It's also for those that have a blender or food processor.

INGREDIENTS

• 2 cups cookie crumbs
• 1/2 stick butter
• 1/2 cup sweetened condensed milk
• 1/4 cup evaporated milk

First, you need to take some cookies--any kind will work, and crush them up. If you have a cookie with a filling like an Oreo, make sure you remove the filling. I find a food processor works best for this but you can use a blender or simply put them in a bag and take a hammer to them (I'm not joking--that's how I make a graham cracker crust for cheese cake). Once you have your 2 cups of crumbs, you'll want to melt your butter on a stove top and slowly pour in the two types of milk until they're all combined. Then, using a bit at a time, mix your liquid ingredients in with your crumbs.

Put that in a jar or container of some kind and bam! Cookie butter. You can put it on pretzels, crackers, bread--whatever. It's delicious. :)

Have any other ideas for easy gifts? Comment them or tag us in them on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram! :)