NAPSI: This year, along with the holiday presents you buy and wrap with bows, give another gift to your nearest and dearest. Give the gift of health.

By making healthy food choices and adding physical activity to daily routines, you may reap benefits like having more energy and using more calories. You may also help to make a brighter future for yourself and the people you love.

To help, the Weight-control Information Network (WIN), an information service of the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, part of the National Institutes of Health, offers these tips for a healthy holiday season:

Control portions
• Eat a healthy snack before going to holiday parties. This may help you to feel full and prevent you from making unhealthy food choices.

• Make half your plate fruits and vegetables.

• Split dessert with a friend or family member.

• Pack a small cooler of fresh fruit, sliced raw vegetables and fat-free or low-fat yogurt if your holiday plans include road trips.

Keep moving
• Get at least 150 minutes each week of moderately intense physical activity. Divide these minutes up over the week as your schedule allows. Remember, some physical activity is better than none.

• Keep track of your progress with a physical activity journal or log. Record date, time and activity. Set goals and reward yourself.

• Get moving indoors with a walk around a shopping mall or through a museum, for days with bad weather.

You can find more tips and ideas in the booklets “Just Enough for You: About Food Portions” and “Walking . . . A Step in the Right Direction.” For further information, visit www.win.niddk.nih.gov/publications.

North American Precis Syndicate Inc.