The Home workout Guru. Who needs a gym pass?

I'm going to prove you can lose fat, and get fit and healthy without stepping foot into a gym. Follow me as I reshape my body using minimal equipment for home work outs, and easy recipes. I will review workout DVDs and post my own workout creations so you can follow along.

[homeworkoutguru-blog]

K.I.S.S.

I've always been one to over think and over complicate fitness. That has put me into an "all or nothing" state of mind. It's been a lot of nothing over the past year and I feel my body composition turning mushy. Somehow I doubt I'm alone on this, all or nothing is a burnout waiting to happen. Keep it simple stupid. That's my new motto, home workouts, healthy food, no excuses and moderation. I'll be posting pictures, workouts, recipes, and more so you can follow along and get fit without driving to the gym or buying a gym pass if you don't want to. You will see I'm an average woman of 30 years old, and I think most levels of fitness (if you are very beginner, you may need to modify, and if you have any questions email me [email protected]). I am NOT a certified personal trainer, so my advice is just based on years of experience working with personal trainers, research, and personal successes and failures. Please talk to your doctor before beginning any fitness program, and stop if you are having any joint pain or anything that isn't just discomfort from working out. I am not liable for any injuries, pain, damages etc. sustained from following my workouts or advice.

[homeworkoutguru-blog]

Wow, what a whirlwind. So I got divorced and moved to Baltimore MD...I'm now 29 and living with my 23 year old boyfriend, my dog, and a bunch of reptiles. I have definitely neglected my diet/fitness, and I know I've gained weight/fat. It's really important to me to look good for my 30th birthday, and I've got 4 months to turn things around. My boyfriend has bad eating habits, and doesn't exercise, but that's no excuse for me to not do my thing. Back in action... My first goals are: Log food Drink at least 2 liters of water/day Do 45-60 min cardio/day Weights 2-3 days per week Per make meals Wake up by 7:30a, bed by 11:30p Post here daily

[homeworkoutguru-blog]

I didn't forget about you

I had a little hiatus over Christmas/New Years from the "regimen", but that's all over and I've been back to kicking ass (specifically, my own).

My current plan includes

personal training 3x per week (in case there was any question about where all my money goes)

30-40 minutes of cardio on days I work out with my trainer either after or before

3 days per week  40-70 minutes of cardio. Usually I end up running or on my bike trainer at home.

1000-1200 clean calories per day - yes that seems on the low side, but I'm 5'1 and I have to cut low to lose fat. Yeah, it blows. I like food.

[homeworkoutguru-blog]

over the hump day

I hope everyone is having a good week :)

Here's what I've done so far for exercise:

Monday: Upper body Weight workout with my trainer and some cardio

Tuesday: My trainer (Sam) told me to burn 800 calories (based on cardio machine readout). I'm not a big person, so this takes me at least 1.5 hours to do. I did 30 minutes of stair climbing, 50 minutes walking on 11% incline on the treadmill, and a 10 minute treadmill run.

Wed: work out with trainer again, mainly lower body workout and cardio

Thursday: I will be going out for a run and something else (Sam wants me to burn 800 again...)

Friday:?? I'm suppose to go up to boston with @marissalosesit so it depends on what time I have to leave.

My diet is a work in progress. I'm trying to make good choices, but be realistic about what I will really continue long term...the next goal is to log food every day. Dieting sucks.

[homeworkoutguru-blog]

I'm back...

Living in CT is nice in summer...It's not usually too hot, and the beach is pleasant. Fall is nice when the leaves change, but not so nice when the hurricanes hit and knock out your power for a week and flood your studio. Also it is before thanksgiving and we had like 10 inches of snow. AND I have been sick for over a week. 

That being said...my power is back on, and I'm starting to feel better! I'm looking forward to seeing my trainer for the first time in 2 weeks and start logging my food again...FYI I really, really hate dieting...but I also want to improve my body, so it's necessary. 

[homeworkoutguru-blog]

post vacation

I forgot how hard it is to "get back into the swing" of things when it comes to a break from diet and fitness routine. It's especially hard, because when I came back from vacation, suddenly it's like fall weather here! Fall makes me want to hibernate. Time to cut the crap, though. No more excuses, back to working on awesomeness!

I'll be making organic chicken for meals today, and cutting up veggies for snacks.

[homeworkoutguru-blog]

back from vacation

Well... Had a fun vacation. I ate and drank to my heart's content, and I'm pretty sure I'm back to where I was when I started this blog. On the bright side, I started before so I wouldn't be even worse when I started working on my body. I've been on a 9 day vacation, so I'm going to guess it will take about 2-3 weeks to work off the damage. I've got until the end of February before I go to Hawaii, so here's to the next 5 months of kicking my ass! If I can lose one pound per week, I'll be down about 20 lb before my trip.

[homeworkoutguru-blog]

It's my second anniversary today...I want to be upbeat so badly, but I'm PMS and have pimples and bloated :(

[homeworkoutguru-blog]

Just keep swimming

Another week of fitness and nutrition fun for me. I'm not being sarcastic, I'm really looking forward to the benefits of the positive nutritional changes and scheduled exercise will bring in the upcoming week.

I started my day with about 45 minutes of step aerobics (it's a GREAT workout, don't laugh!) with Cathe's Body Max 2 DVD. I then had 1 egg and 5-6TBS cage free egg whites. I ran about 1 mile at 80% exertion to my massage appointment, which I nearly forgot about. I have not had a massage in about 6 months, so it was well kneaded (harharhar). For those of you who have not had a real professional massage- it's not 100% relaxing. It bloody hurts, especially if you go for a sports massage. I do feel much better now, and I feel renewed physically and mentally. The massage therapist event massaged my head/face. Sounds weird but when she massaged my forehead, she used her thumbs kind of pushing outward from the center of my forehead, I imagined her opening "the third eye".

Anyway, I've been drinking lots of water, and that's especially important after a massage. Bottoms up!

[homeworkoutguru-blog]

Went for about 5 mi run, maybe slightly under. I ate breakfast which was 2 whole eggs, 5 TBS egg whites, and 30 gm oats cooked with almond milk and water with a handful of organic blueberries and 1 TBS flax.

I then did some weights...

dumbell chest press on yoga ball

pulldowns with resistance bands

ball crunches

lower back extensions using yoga ball (used a stair to anchor my feet)

tricep dips

pushups

[homeworkoutguru-blog]

feeling great

I think the tweaks are really helping. I woke up this morning feeling light as a feather, and low and behold (angels singing, bells a'ringing) my girth measurements are down. I think the increased water is whats helping the most.

[unique-desu]

[homeworkoutguru-blog]

A little tweaking!

Good news, I weighed in this morning a pound lighter after changing my diet up a little. I hope this trend continues :) I made some changes to my diet...

I decided that I am going to remove wheat and corn from my diet. Instead of my usual ezikiel bread with eggs at breakfast, I'll be having a veggie egg white omelet with 30g (dry weight) of oatmeal made with almond milk and 2 salmon oil capsules and a multivitamin supplement.

Regular exercise will be done by 9am at the latest, but runs longer than 3.5 miles will be done after breakfast.

I'm eating 75gm of lean protein from poultry (prefer organic) or fish at meal 3 and 5 with one carb (ex. sweet potato or hummus) and lots of veggies.

For meals 2 and 4 I'm having hummus and raw veggies or a protein shake and a few almonds, 1 egg and 3 egg whites, or a comparable vegetarian substitute along with 2 salmon oil capsules at each.

I'm also upping my water.

[homeworkoutguru-blog]

Getting through disappointment

I worked really hard this week, maybe my diet just wasn't on point? I ran every other day, and even did an 8.5 mi run yesterday, and also did insanity workouts in between. I haven't been doing much with weights lately, but that shouldn't be a problem as far as weight loss goes. My plan was to add that in after my vacation. If anyone has a message of encouragement, please send it along! It's very frustrating to work hard and see nothing for your efforts :( About 4 weeks in, and only 1.5lb of weight loss. I'm 135 right now, and have an initial goal of 120lb (I am 5'1 and fairly muscular) and 28 years old.

This week I have some goals that will hopefully help me see a drop in my weight 

log food EVERY day, no exceptions.

weigh in daily, this will help me stay motivated every day, especially at night (makes me think 2x about what I eat at night if I have to weigh myself in the AM)

Drink 20oz of water after morning weigh in, and at least 3 liters of water for the day.

pre pack meals. 

Anyone have advice on eating breakfast before or after working out? I've been eating post-cardio in hopes to have a fasting "burn" or burn off stored fuel if there is some left from dinner. Any other advice some of you who are having success might have would be helpful!

[homeworkoutguru-blog]

Today I got up and ran 6.2 mi with my husband and had time for a green juice (spinach, apple, berry) for breakfast before my gig. 

I own an entertainment biz that does lots of cool stuff...face painting, balloon twisting, henna tattoos, airbrush tattoos, etc... Although I have a wonderful staff of artists, including @marissalosesit, I still entertain at a lot of events myself. Today it was balloon twisting at the New Haven Open Tennis tournament which my staff and I are entertaining at throughout the week along with the other events. Basically, my weekends are nuts, particularly May-New Years. 

Planning fitness and diet around a schedule that is never consistent is definitely a challenge. The best thing I can do is try and get my workout done in the morning and pack some food for long days when I either have to wait until I get home (ravenous) or stop and get something that will likely not be an ideal choice for nutrition. Today was one of those days when I didn't pack or stop. I went home and met my friend for an early dinner. We got some appetizers, which included hummus and some pita triangles and a small portion of black bean burgers, which we split. I also got a salad with grilled salmon. We did get a dessert (was sooo good, but should have restrained), and shared it, although we only ate about half between the two of us...not too bad. I definitely was within my calorie restraints for the day.

We also went bowling for 1.5 hours, which although it's not intense, it's still exercise. I'm all about fun activities that are also good exercise. Exercise shouldn't be awful. I try to think positively about it, and once a routine is formed, my body craves it each day. If you're dreading the thought of exercising, maybe you should try another type. I prefer outdoor cardio exercise, like running or biking (I even bike to my office a lot). If you hate treadmill running or stair machines, don't commit to that. You'll just talk yourself out of doing it, so it will be hard to get into a routine. I've lost only 2 lb so far, but progress is progress. I think getting the diet right is key, exercise is not torture for me, although I prefer doing cardio workouts over weight training for sure.

[homeworkoutguru-blog]

Nothing can be better than homemade sauce using garden tomatoes. It was a lot more work than just using canned, but totally worth it! My husband ate the sauce with spaghetti, and I marinated some garden eggplant and zucchini squash in balsamic vinegar and olive oil, then grilled it. Was so good with the homemade sauce on top. I wish I could grow food all year long. It's so awesome to know that we aren't eating food covered in pesticides etc. Plus everything tastes amazing when you can eat it the day it was picked. If you have the room to grow a small garden, I totally recommend it. If you don't, a lot of towns and cities have community gardens where you can grow your veggies.

[homeworkoutguru-blog]

Gazpacho Recipe

I found this gazpacho recipe on the Food Network site. I made a batch yesterday and used my garden veggies. It is seriously good and unbelievably healthy.

Ingredients

1 1/2 pounds vine-ripened tomatoes, peeled, seeded and chopped

Tomato juice

1 cup cucumber, peeled, seeded and chopped

1/2 cup chopped red bell pepper

1/2 cup chopped red onion

1 small jalapeno, seeded and minced

1 medium garlic clove, minced

1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil

1 lime, juiced

2 teaspoons balsamic vinegar

2 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce

1/2 teaspoon toasted, ground cumin

1 teaspoon kosher salt

1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

2 tablespoons fresh basil leaves, chiffonade

Directions

Fill a 6-quart pot halfway full of water, set over high heat and bring to a boil.

Make an X with a paring knife on the bottom of the tomatoes. Drop the tomatoes into the boiling water for 15 seconds, remove and transfer to an ice bath and allow to cool until able to handle, approximately 1 minute. Remove and pat dry. Peel, core and seed the tomatoes. When seeding the tomatoes, place the seeds and pulp into a fine mesh strainer set over a bowl in order to catch the juice. Press as much of the juice through as possible and then add enough bottled tomato juice to bring the total to 1 cup.

Place the tomatoes and juice into a large mixing bowl. Add the cucumber, bell pepper, red onion, jalapeno, garlic clove, olive oil, lime juice, balsamic vinegar, Worcestershire, cumin, salt and pepper and stir to combine. Transfer 1 1/2 cups of the mixture to a blender and puree for 15 to 20 seconds on high speed. Return the pureed mixture to the bowl and stir to combine. Cover and chill for 2 hours and up to overnight. Serve with chiffonade of basil.