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Low Carb, Low Fat, More protein, Eat all the fat you want….. These are the many things we hear as we are bombarded with the latest and NOT always the greatest diet and eating tips when trying to find the Silver Bullet for permanent weight loss.

Well I thought that we would talk about common sense proven tips that will ensure that along with a solid fitness program, will help support your fitness and health goals for life.

Eating Tip 1

Eat Slow- If you read about the French Paradox, which discusses why the French eat a lot of fatty foods, but are a leaner society than that of the United States. They take their meals very seriously and it is one of the most important times of the day. You will get multiple benefits from this tip. Eating Slow will help your body absorb the food at the right level allowing you to fill up much quicker as it will not provide a tendency for you to OVEREAT!!!
The other awesome benefit is that you can spend more time with your family so that you can share the important things in life with each other!!!

Eating Tip 2

Eat 5-6 times per day. Do not allow your blood sugar levels to drop, in between meals. By eating more often and eating the right types of foods that are on the low end of the glycemic index, you can keep your blood sugar levels more even throughout the day, and ensure that you are not getting those mid-afternoon yawns and also help keep the excess weight off. Remember that when you spike your blood sugar by eating simple sugars and refined carbohydrates, this will potentially cause your body to store fat!!!

Eating Tip 3

Eat Your Breakfast… I was bad at this many years ago, but I learned to fuel up early in the day. Eating a good solid breakfast to start your day helps supply you with the fuel you need to get started, especially if you are incorporating a early morning fitness program in to your day. You need the fuel to get your engine going in the morning. Do not starve your body early, because you may have the tendency to binge eat later, because your body gets into the craving mode. Feed your body early!!

Eating Tip 4

Slow down as the sun goes down. What do I mean by this? Well just as important as it is to eat a great breakfast to start the day, it is also as equally important to reduce your food consumption as the day goes on. So plan to eat a good solid breakfast, a good lunch, and reduce your meal portions at dinner time. Remember as you get closer to bedtime your body starts to wind down and you will not have the same opportunity at night to burn those consumed meal calories as you did earlier in the day.
So eat more early and back down as you reach sun down.

Eating Tip 5

Give yourself 3 hours!!! Yes 3 hours before going to bed. Do not consume anymore calories. As I mentioned before, your body starts to slow down as the day goes on and gets ready for sleep. You do not want to consume a lot of calories right before you go to bed, because you will end of potentially storing those calories as FAT!!!

Your body sometimes give you a false sense of being hungry as you bedtime nears. You get those 9pm cravings… And a lot of people end up hitting the Refrigerator and over-consuming right before bed time…
Not good for managing your weight and body fat %. If you just can’t resist the munchies, then what I do is eat a few high good fat nuts. Like unsalted Almonds skin-on (good for fiber) or a couple spoonfuls of no sugar added all natural peanut butter. Eating a good quality fat food will satisfy your craving and will keep you from binging on something with lots of bad carbohydrates or simple sugars, like ice cream, cake or cookies.

Eating Tip 6

Stay focused on eating green in every meal. Always incorporate a good high quality low glycemic index dark green vegetable with each meal. I suggest things like spinach or romaine lettuce in your lunch time salads. Eating broccoli, asparagus, or steamed spinach as your vegetable at dinner time. All of these dark green vegetables supply your body with great vitamins and nutrients as well as being great sources of fiber and are naturally low on the glycemic index scale and will keep your blood sugar levels from spiking after eating. So think Dark green at meal time and challenge yourself to keep it as part of each and every eating event.

Eating Tip 7

Blend your foods.. Blending your foods means making sure that if you are eating a food item that does contain carbohydrates make sure that you incorporate a good low fat protein along with it. Eating a low carb tortilla wrap where the first ingredient is whole wheat flour that is unrefined. Add lean chicken breast as part of your filling in the wrap, maybe with some thinly shredded romaine lettuce and other veggies.

Eating Tip 8

Use splenda as your sweetener of choice, when looking for a simple sugar replacement. I have tried many sugar subs over the years an no other product has the taste of sugar like splenda does. Not equal and surely not sweet and low. Splenda is outstanding for sprinkling on low glycemic fresh fruit like blueberries, raspberries and strawberries, and I also use it to sweeten my drink of choice. Caffeine Free Green Tea that I infuse with cinnamon stick and whole cloves. What a refreshing cold beverage that keeps the caffeine out of your diet, provides you a great antioxidant and does not spike your blood sugar levels by using the no calorie sweetner in splenda.

So I hope you enjoy my GREAT 8!!!

These eating tips will help keep you on the right track, when it comes to living a healthy lifestyle.. All of these tips are the tools that I live by every day….

Stay tuned next month for more healthy eating tips @ Body Perfect Fit!!!

Robert Adams, Coach for Weight Loss, Certified Personal Trainer with NESTA, Fitness Enthusiast, and Executive Chef, will provide you one-on-one DAILY SUPPORT, as you pursue your life long dream of permanent weight loss and getting back to a healthy lifestyle. There is NO silver bullet, NO quick fix, NO magic pill, NO tricks,
NO unrealistic claims, just a sound and proven method that will provide you a weight loss program that Works!!

Your weight loss coach will help you each and every step of the way providing you support, motivation, and will teach you the secrets that all slim people know, so that you can lose weight in a healthy way and allow you to maintain your weight and get back to your Body Perfect Fitness and Health for life.

http://www.Body-Perfect-Fitness.com Body Perfect Fitness- Your Customized Online Fitness Training Resource- The most comprehensive Online Fitness and Health Resource, dedicated to helping improve everyone’s overall Body Perfect Fitness and Health

Asphalt paved driveways are extremely popular and the most cost effective to install over most other driveway options. Hiring the right asphalt paving contractor however can sometimes be a challenge. If the paving contractor installs the asphalt driveway correctly the driveway should last 25-30 years with only minor maintenance.

Unlike concrete, an asphalt paved driveway is both strong and flexible and is ideal for colder temperature zones where constant freezing and thawing occur.

Asphalt paving, also known as Hot Mix Asphalt paving, consists of an aggregate of stone and sand mixed with liquid asphalt cement. The aggregate is carefully mixed and heated prior to being mixed with liquid asphalt. The mixture needs to be delivered to the job site hot else your newly paved driveway will not cure properly.

In order to ensure a quality paved driveway it is critical that the paving contractor first properly prepare the driveway for the Hot Mix Asphalt. Preparation includes removing topsoil or clay type soil and replacing it with a sub-base layer of crushed stone and gravel.

A typical asphalt paving job consists of the application of two layers of Hot Mix Asphalt over the sub-base layer. In some cases a paving contractor may suggest a full-depth asphalt application. This type of application is best if very heavy vehicles will be regularly parked on the driveway. With a full-depth asphalt application the entire driveway, including the gravel sub-base layer, is constructed using liquid asphalt cement. By additionally binding the sub-base gravel layer with the liquid asphalt cement a much stronger paved driveway is created.

When hiring any contractor you should plan on getting 3-4 quotes to get the best comparison of workmanship and price. Talk with friends and family members, as well as search the yellow pages or the internet to find local paving contractors in your area.

With any contractor you hire, make sure they are insured and bonded to protect you from any liability as well as to protect you from any sub-par performance on the contractor’s behalf.

Lead times for paving a driveway can be up to several weeks, so plan appropriately when talking with your prospective paving contractors.

In order to obtain accurate quotes from the asphalt driveway paving contractors it is best to have a sketch of the home and the desired driveway footprint. You should also walk the site with the paving contractor and have him or you stake or paint lines where the paved driveway is to lay.

When talking to the prospective paving contractors make sure the subject of installing proper slopes and drainage is discussed. Otherwise you may wind up with water pooling on the finished driveway, or even worse, draining into your garage or home.

It is also critical that during the installation of all the various layers to the driveway that they are each compacted prior to the installation of the next layer of material. Quoted depths should be after compaction, not before.

Also, if there are any municipal pipes that need to be raised to the finished height of the driveway, find out if the paving contractors’ quotes include performing this task.

In addition, confirm that the contractor will remove and reinstall any type of gate or door to the new finished level of the paved driveway.

With these few basic tips you are on your way to hiring the right paving contractor for your driveway.

For more help on how to hire an Asphalt Driveway Paving Contractor, see HomeAdditionPlus.com’s Asphalt Driveway Paving Bid sheet. The Asphalt Driveway Paving Bid Sheet will help ensure that your hire the right contractor so that your driveway is paved correctly and you get the finished driveway you are looking for. In addition, it will help to ensure that installation of your driveway will be accomplished on time and on budget.

Over the past 20+ years Mark Donovan has been involved with building homes and additions to homes. His projects have included: building a vacation home, building additions and garages on to existing homes, and finishing unfinished homes. For more home improvement information visit www.homeadditionplus.com and www.homeaddition.blogspot.com

The wedding service in the Greek Orthodox faith is an ancient
and beautiful ceremony, which has been celebrated in its current
form for centuries. The wedding ceremony is full of symbolism
and is a great experience if you have never attended one before,
because it is likely to be quite different from other weddings
you have attended in Western Europe. The service is also rather
unique because the bride and groom do not make vows to each
other - their presence together in the church is taken to mean
that they are serious about getting married. There are no
wedding rehearsals and the ceremony usually has a very relaxed
atmosphere - guests take photos whenever they want to and often
chat quietly among themselves throughout the ceremony.

The Beginning of the Wedding

In most cases the wedding guests will wait with the groom
outside the church until the bride arrives (a few sneaky wedding
pros will go into the church early to secure a good seat). In
the Summer, when most weddings take place, it is not unusual for
ceremonies to be arranged back to back, so the guests attending
a marriage will often stand around with those who have just
attended the previous wedding are ready to leave. Wedding dress
commentators among the crowd will get to consider and discuss at
least two brides and maybe even a third as they leave the church
- bargain! Meanwhile, the groom waits for the bride at the
entrance to the church, often holding her floral bouquet. He
hands it to her as they meet and they then go inside together
followed by the guests. There is no separation of the guests
into guests of the bride and guests of the groom - everyone sits
together and in the case of small churches, many people prefer
to stand in a spot where they can get a good view of the
proceedings.

Service of Betrothal

The wedding ceremony itself is in two parts: the Service of
Betrothal and the Ceremony of the Sacrament of Marriage. The
exchanging of rings is the focus of the Service of Betrothal.
The priest blesses the rings by holding them in his right hand
and making the sign of the cross over the heads of the bride and
groom. The rings are then placed on the third fingers of their
right hands. The Koumbaro, the couple’s religious
sponsor, then swaps the rings over between the bride and groom’s
fingers, three times. A number of rituals in the ceremony are
repeated three times and this symbolises the Holy Trinity: God
the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

Ceremony of the Sacrament of Marriage

This Ceremony consists of several key parts. First, several
prayers are said and then as they come to an end, the priest
joins the right hands of the bride and groom. Their hands remain
joined until the end of the wedding ceremony, which symbolises
the couple’s union.

The Crowning

The bride and groom are crowned with thin crowns, or
stefana, which are joined by a white ribbon and have been
blessed by the priest. The crowns symbolise the glory and honour
that is being bestowed on them by God, and the the ribbon
symbolises their unity. The Koumbaro then exchanges the
crowns between the heads of the couple, three times.

The Common Cup

The crowning is followed by a reading of the Gospel, which
tells of the marriage of Cana at Galilee. It was at this wedding
that Jesus performed his first miracle, changing water into
wine, which was then given to the married couple. Wine is given
to the couple and they each drink from it three times.

The Ceremonial Walk

The priest the leads the couple, who are still wearing their
stefana, three times around the altar on their first steps as a
married couple. The Koumbaro follows close behind the
couple holding the stefana place. At this point the
couple (and anyone standing nearby) is usually showered with
rice, which was earlier handed out to the wedding guests. The
priest will often make use of the bible he is holding to give
himself some protection!

The Removal of the Crowns

When the Ceremonial Walk has ended, the priest blesses the
couple, the crowns are removed and he then separates their
previously joined hands with the bible, reminding them that only
God can break the union which they have just entered into.

Wedding traditions

Unfortunately, a lot of the information available on Greek
Orthodox wedding traditions is a little outdated and contains
generalisations that give the impression that certain traditions
are followed by everyone who gets married. Some of these
traditions are set out below.

- The baking of bread and cakes containing coins.

- Rolling a baby on the marital bed to encourage fertility.

- The throwing of money onto the marital bed.

- The pinning of money onto the bride (and sometimes also the
groom) at the wedding reception.

Although these rituals are seen as traditional, fewer and fewer
young people marrying today are following them, because they are
seen as old-fashioned. Many people do not wish to put their
guests through the ordeal of other people being able to see how
much money they pin on the bride, for example. Although money is
still a very common, as well as practical, wedding present it is
often given to the couple before the wedding day or to a third
person at the wedding reception, for safe-keeping. Greeks living
in the more remote parts of Greece and abroad, who will
naturally feel more strongly about doing things the traditional
way, are more likely to follow these traditions than those
living in Athens, for example. Like weddings in many places,
Greek weddings are changing. At the time of writing, there is a
growing fashion to go and get married on an island and I
recently heard someone say that he was looking into getting
married in a ski resort. He was wisely advised by a friend: “You
had better first ask the priest if he wants to perform a
marriage up a mountain”!