Summer is the biggest "exercising yo yo" time of the year for me because the nice weather makes it more appealing to exercise outside on a regular basis, but vacations and fattening weekend getaways make for frequent interruptions. It's been a goal of mine recently to master the idea of keeping up some kind of fitness effort when I'm on the road, so naturally this article about easy ways to keep active while traveling caught my eye. And although the tips are all pretty basic, that's okay. The idea of staying active while traveling is also pretty basic. We just need to actually do this stuff! Pick out the ideas that work for you and then make a point to do them, and pull your family in to the effort too, so you're not in it by yourself.

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One of the best parts about summer is all the fresh fruit that comes into season -- not only does it taste so much better when it didn't have to get shipped across the world but freshly ripened fruit is also full of much more in the way of nutrients, enzymes, and other health benefits. And although pretty much all fruits are good for you in one way or another, here are a few you'll want to make sure you incorporate as much as possible into your summer diet:

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It's nearly impossible to be a healthy individual if the family you live with relies on unhealthy habits and lives an unhealthy lifestyle. It's unrealistic to expect yourself to eat nutritious, balanced meals when everyone around you is having pizza and KFC every night! One of the single best things you can do to help ensure your health and fitness success and give your efforts a much-needed jumpstart is to embrace your family and draw them into living healthier with you.

Of course lecturing and making steamed broccoli for dinner every night probably isn't going to do the trick-- you're going to have to get back to basics and make it a "from the ground up" kind of effort. Here are some tips to get you and yours all started on a healthier lifestyle, together:

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Summertime is both one of the easiest times to get in shape, thanks to motivational beach bikini's and outdoor-friendly weather, and one of the hardest, thanks to summer barbecues full of fattening buffet meals and sugary homemade desserts. So how can a person reap the benefits of warm weather, outdoor sports, and skimpy clothes without the downside of fattening foods and too much partying? One solution is to throw a barbecue or two yourself and make all the favorites (like coleslaw, potato salad, and baked beans) but make them healthier by leaving out the unnecessary fats and sugar. Nobody will even notice the difference, seriously!

Barbecue favorites, the healthy (and tasty!) way:

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Stress is a part of life, but it seems like lately with the economy in the state it's in (and gas prices skyrocketing to record high after record high), it's getting to be more than just a part of life -- for some of us, stress has downright taken over our lives.

Stress is bad, there's no doubt about that. Sure, in the case of meeting a bear in the woods, stress might help you run faster (or are you supposed stand still?) but in a civilized society, stress doesn't do much more than make us sick. Chronic mental illnesses like depression and anxiety are often directly linked to stress, as are physical conditions like high blood pressure, heart attack, stroke, insomnia, and obesity, to name just a few from an ever growing list.

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Unhealthy habits, we all have 'em. Eating too much, exercising too little, spending too much, saving too little, the list goes on. When it comes to your health and meeting goals for weight loss and fitness, some of the biggest obstacles standing in your way could be some the things you do everyday without even thinking: your unhealthy habits.

Habits aren't easily broken, but many of the methods for getting rid of them are the same across the board, regardless of what your specific vices are. Here are the most proven and effective methods for breaking unwanted habits:

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It's free, it takes no skill or education, and it's one of the #1 things we can all do to improve our health, yet we never seem to get enough of it. Sleep! Despite all those other qualities, sleep, for millions of Americans, is also one of the most elusive things due to time constraints, stress, and any other number of things that keep us from the getting the deep restful repose we all so desperately want and need.

Making the commitment to make sleep a priority is only the first step -- after that, beating all the sneaky obstacles (like finding the time and "getting in the mood" for sleep) becomes a necessity. Follow these tips to beat whatever sleep problems you are facing and get the best sleep possible, and hence, the best results from your healthy lifestyle and fitness efforts!

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Last week, the Jumpstart Your Fitness post was about how we all take advantage of our feet, using and abusing them and neglecting to take very good care of them until they start screaming out in pain or discomfort. Well unfortunately the same can be said for the way we treat our joints. Knees, hips, ankles ... they all do their jobs on a daily basis, usually quietly and without complaint, but also without a second thought or moment of consideration from the people to whom they belong. Men and women are quick to work on health routines for strengthening muscles and protecting skin, but what about strengthening and protecting your joints? Nothing slows (or halts altogether) a workout routine faster than knee pain, hip pain, shoulder pain, etc.

So follow these guidelines for having healthier joints, starting today:

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Swimsuit season is fast approaching! It's just around the corner so now is the time to uncover that beautiful beach body you've been keeping under wraps all winter. Is yours hidden beneath an extra layer of winter flab? Have a great exercise plan in mind but having a hard time getting motivated because of stress, pain, anxiety or even depression? Relaxation is one of your body's best healing mechanisms, but it's not always easy to do. Natural techniques like breathing exercises, muscle relaxation, and guided imagery can help, plus you don't need any special equipment or training to reap the benefits.

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Finding a way to thwart death and live forever is the stuff of movies and legends -- how many characters have gone in search of the fountain of youth? That's all just fiction and fun, of course, but in real life there are real things you can do to help not only get the most years out of your life as possible but also the most quality years out of your life. A good start to a solid fitness plan is implementing healthy (i.e. life-extending) habits. So try these on for size:

• Get enough sleep, but not too much! Studies show that people who sleep too much (generally 8+ hours per night) have shorter life expectancies, but then again so do those who don't get enough sleep (less than 6 hours). It seems there's a magical number of just enough sleep, which for most people lands somewhere between 6 and 8 hours.

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When you're stuck in a rut sometimes all you need to do to get back on track is to switch things up and try something new. I've tried a lot of different ways to workout, like with a stability ball, resistance bands, free-weights/dumbbells, a stepper, etc, but here's something I have yet to try: a workout using a foam roller.

Foam rollers can help with strength, balance, and even stress relief. Foam rollers themselves are very similar to the foam "noodles" kids use in swimming pools, but they're thicker and shorter. The primary benefit of adding foam rollers to your workout is an increase in calories burned and better core strengthening due to the balance challenges added to traditional moves like squats, arm exercises, and even massages. Try some of these foam roller moves from Alive.com and see if you don't feel muscles working that you didn't know you had!

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Now that spring is officially here and Easter has come and gone it's the perfect time to embrace some clean and healthy habits to coincide with the fresh new season -- and to get you on track to have an awesomely fit summer (bikini panic anyone?).

Some people swear by detoxing and doing regular "detox diets" in order to flush toxins out of their bodies, but even if you're not ready to commit to something that serious you can still get some of the benefits just by incorporating certain foods into your diet and boosting your body's own natural detox system: the liver.

The top 10 detox foods(click thumbnails to view gallery)

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God created appetites as a way to make sure we wouldn't forget to eat and starve to death, but somehow over the years it's turned into almost the opposite -- instead of helping us live our appetites are contributing to one of the biggest killers of our generation: obesity.

Although many work to retrain appetites and are successful, many people (me included) fight it on a pretty much daily basis -- I'm not so much training myself not to be hungry for certain things as I'm training myself to recognize when that hunger is legitimate and when it's not.

But sometimes it gets the better of me.

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Frustrated because it seems like no matter how hard you try to eat right and exercise the needle on the scale just won't budge? Or maybe you were making progress until suddenly it stopped, and now you don't know why or how to get it moving again?

Ugh, that's the pits. The good news is that it could be a simple situation of you inadvertently sabotaging yourself. Do you ever grocery shop when you're hungry? Take a lot of "taste tests" when cooking? You might be surprised at some of the ways calories and pounds can sneak into your life -- right past you and your diet plan.

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We're lucky today to have access to all kinds of food from all kinds of places around the world, but it can still be hard to eat right because it's amazingly easy to end up eating the same things all the time. If you're stuck in a dieting rut then it might help to shake things up a bit and try some of these healthy staples from across the globe:

Cabbage, from Ireland
Here in the States cabbage isn't all that popular as a main player in dinner, but in Ireland it's a basic staple that originated hundreds of years ago. Most people just think "smelly" when then think of cabbage when in fact they should be thinking "cancer and disease fighting goodness." Cabbage, as well as its cousins broccoli, cauliflower, turnips, and brussel sprouts, is known to be a beneficial fighter against stroke, all kinds of cancers, cognitive decline and diabetes.

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