Home Hacks for Weight Loss

While fad diets come and go, your home is here to stay. Make a few small changes to help support healthy lifestyle habits. Try these tips.

Reorganize your kitchen. According to a study at the Cornell Food and Brand lab, having a cluttered kitchen results in stress and can lead to more stress eating. Remove unnecessary items, like junk mail and appliances you never use from your counters and table.

Make healthy foods easy to spot. Rearrange your refrigerator and cabinets to display nutritional items at eye level. When you take produce home, wash it immediately before placing it in the fridge. Wash, dry and precut your salad greens for healthy lunches and side salads. Peel and slice oranges. Store carrots in one side of a double container and a serving side of hummus in the other, making these easy grab-and-go snacks.

Hide the unhealthy options. Try not to buy junk food or processed food, but if you do, place it on higher shelves or behind closed cabinets so it's not in your line of sight and is harder to reach.

Place hand weights in sitting areas. Results from the Health Professionals Follow-up Study indicate weight training plays an important role in helping people maintain smaller waistlines. Continue to fit aerobic activities into your schedule. When you sit down at home to rest your legs, consider picking up light weights to exercise your upper body.

Multitasking while you eat or eating meals in front of the television can result in mindless distraction, making you more likely to overeat. Families who eat dinner at the table have lower overall body mass indexes than families who eat in front of the TV, according to the Cornell Food and Brand lab. For better portion control, consider these small changes the next time you sit down to a meal.

• Set the scene. Low lighting can lead to a calm environment and help prevent you from scarfing down your food.
• Consider your dinnerware. Contrasting colors between your plate and the food you are eating can help you better manage portions. According to the Cornell Food and Brand Lab, people serve themselves smaller portions when the food contrasts with the color of the plate. The contrast makes you think your plate is more full. If new color dinnerware isn't an option, a similar effect can be obtained by using a smaller plate.

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