Food is a big and wonderful part of holiday tradition.... From Thanksgiving to New Years, we stuff our faces with Aunt Linda's famous pumpkin pie to Grandma's N.Y. style cheese cake. (Actually, it all starts with Junior's Halloween candy.)

Learning to deal with mass quantities of fattening food doesn't have to be painful. Instead, get to root of Holiday munchies:

1. Take stress away. Stress causes many of us to overeat. This year, cut out a few of more stressful holiday events. It is OK to say, "No."

For instance, traveling during holidays can cause extra stress that you don't need. Put your foot down this year and tell your relatives that you're not going to travel.

Or maybe your stress is caused by having a gazillion people over to your house for dinner. This year consider having a quiet dinner or suggest that it's someone else's turn to play host.

Spending too much on gifts can also be an unneeded stress. Try telling relatives you'd like to cut down on gift giving this year... just tell plain truth - money is tight and you can't afford it. Instead, suggest a lower cost alternative... like trading homemade gifts or putting a limit on gift cost.

Whatever source of your stress, nail it down and remove it. And throw guilt out window. You will feel relieved and happy with control that you exert over situation. It's your choice to take control... don't leave room for excuses.

2. Focus on holiday activities, not holiday food. Go ice skating, caroling, or read a favorite holiday book. Don't be afraid to start your own traditions. Instead of focusing on baking and cooking traditions make a new tradition surrounding an activity like decorating your own door wreath.

3. Replace some of your high calorie holiday foods with low calorie or healthier options. Replace cookies with fruit, replace rich candies with nuts, replace an apple pie with ambrosia.

The pictures are frightening. Porous, fragile bones. Broken hips and hunched backs. A lack of calcium may result in bone thinning disease osteoporosis, which affects older American men and women. Osteoporosis is a condition of gradually weakening brittle bones. As bones lose calcium and other minerals, they become more fragile and porous. Osteoporosis is cause of more than 1.5 million bone fractures each year. These fractures often lead to permanent changes in lifestyle. Calcium is a key ingredient in maintaining good bone health and slowing bone loss later in life.

Calcium is most abundant mineral in body. It plays two important roles. First, it is an essential part of bone structure. Second, bone calcium serves as a reservoir that releases calcium to body fluids when there is a drop in blood calcium concentration. Calcium in body fluids plays several important roles including maintaining normal blood pressure and nerve transmission.

The establishment of recommended intakes for calcium is difficult because absorption varies not only with age, but also with a person's vitamin D status, calcium content of diet, and calcium binders in foods. In general, calcium recommendations are high for young people and for those over age 51 because calcium absorption declines with age.