3 Ways to Stay Fit Through the Holidays

Here come the Holidays!! If you’re like me you’re excited and a little bit stressed with your to do list (because it’s more like  “to decorate”, “to bake” “to shop” and “to see” list). It’s the time of the year where we all scramble to get our life and home together but the heavy work load and pressure makes that even more of a challenge! Events, parties, volunteering, and if you’re a teacher – grading, get priority and your health typically takes the hit. The holidays are the time of the year that it is statistically most difficult to keep up with a healthy lifestyle – working out, eating habits, and more! Staying fit through the winter in general is more of a challenge for everyone. While I’m still working on these things myself, I’m here to share with you a few ways to stay fit through the holidays and all those busy weeks ahead!

Raise your hand if working out makes you feel good about yourself (afterwards of course) ??????. Okay, that’s what I thought! So now that we have determined that working out makes us feel good, let’s make sure we keep feeling good through the holiday season! I’m going to help you out with this by giving you some workouts that are totally doable with NO SHOES, NO GYM, NO EQUIPMENT, and NO TIME. Before I give you the workouts, I want to identify the 3 major deferrents that typically keep us from working out during the Holidays and accompany each with some motivational fitness tips. Knowing these and looking out for them will help you better combat a sedentary holiday season!

Ways to stay fit over the holidays- and what causes us NOT to:

1. We decide that our health and fitness is “all or nothing” and consider the Holidays as a time to excuse the “nothing”. Most of the time when we are consistent in our workout schedule we have a greater motivation and desire to keep up with our health in other areas of our lives – primarily with our dietary choices. Yes, we occasionally use it as an excuse to chow down on that special occasion chocolate cake, but for the most part, working out consistently motivates us to make healthy choices because we feel better and want to continue on our “health train”. The Holidays pose a threat to this “health train” because we decide that we deserve the indulgence and allow ourselves to enjoy the season with our favorite traditional comfort foods, no matter what the nutrition label says. I am a huge advocate for indulging on occasion, and Holidays ARE that occasion! But, we need to recognize the psychological effect that choosing unhealthy meals has on our motivation to stay fit. Go ahead and allow yourself to pig out on your favorite stuffing recipe! BUT, make the conscious decision to fit your workout in beforehand and expect it to be more difficult to get off the couch. Yes, wind down on a cold December night with some hot cocoa by the fireplace! But, set your alarm to get up and get your work out in first thing tomorrow. Expect to have a lower motivation to keep up with your workouts and make conscious choices to combat this decreased motivation. This way, when you sit down to eat those 2nd helpings at Thanksgiving dinner, you know your body can handle (and deserves) the indulgence! If you want some yummy and healthy fall comfort food options, head over to my post about how to make white turkey chilli, autumn squash soup, Healthy broccoli cheddar soup, and some other fun healthy snacking tips to hold you over!

2. We don’t have time to get our workout in. We all have busier schedules and higher priorities in the holiday season – this is part of the fun of the season – but to enjoy these fun-filled schedules even more we need to make sure we feel good about ourselves! This means that we are going to have to get a bit creative (and disciplined) about when we get our workouts in. Expect that you may not be able to stick to your typical “routine” and allow yourself to put up with a more sporadic workout schedule. All too often people excuse their daily workout because the time that it typically fits into their schedule does not work for them on that particular day. For example, if you workout everyday after work but one day have a meeting that runs late, it is all too easy to excuse yourself from getting in your workout. This is fine during the seasons that are more routine, but if we follow this same habit through the holidays, we will ALWAYS have something getting in the way! To combat this, look at your week and at your schedule. Plan your workouts ahead of time and come up with a couple “Plan B’s” in case something pops up. If you miss your workout one day because of an unplanned circumstance, set your alarm for early that next morning and get it in. Make a choice to work out “X” amount of times each week – however much your schedule can feasibly allow – and do whatever modifications it takes to get those in! 

3. We are traveling or hosting and have no where to go/ no way to leave home to hit the gym. And on top of this all, if you have kids they are restless and home from break. I’m here to help with this! Keep reading to find a weeks worth of home workouts that you can do right in your living room, guest room, hotel room, or wherever you might find yourself for the Holidays – and in a short amount of time! If you finish the below workouts and you want more, click here ???? to see my home workout post from September! Typically I pick a focus (arms, legs, core, etc) for my workouts BUT since many people will have such a sporadic and random workout schedule this season I have designed some quick “full body blast” workouts. I recommend that you attempt to get 4 (30 minute) workouts in each week over the holidays – see my plan below an commit to make it happen! ???? ( **Another way to make this happen in the most inconvenient of locations is with the amazing new Kanthaka App! Read all about my experience with Kanthaka and their amazing “personal trainer on demand” app that services all of Houston and surrounding areas! This app really is a game changer with making fitness easy and convenient – you can even use my code to save some money on your first session!**)

**Holiday Workouts with No Gym- I understand that the holidays come with hindrances to equipment, space, and weather. As such, Each workout requires nothing but your body, a small space on the floor, a coffee table or stool, and maybe a sports bra ?. And, each of these are sure to help you break a sweat to stay fit during the holiday season! **

 

 

Day 1 Holiday Workout No Gym:

Warm up: 3 minutes – repeat intervals of 10 toe taps (on coffee table) and 1 burpee.

Circuit: 4 rounds of the following (as fast as possible)

• 20 squat jumps
• 20 Plank Jacks
• 20 Skiers
• 20 Plank Walks
• 20 Bulgarian Split Squats (10 each leg) – back leg on coffee table.

Abs – 3 sets of 20 of each: Leg Lifts, Ab Rows, Planted-foot upper ab crunches

Day 2 Holiday Workout No Gym: 

Warm Up: For the duration of your favorite song respect 10 high knees, 10 butt kicks, and 10 jumping jacks

Circuit: Reverse Ladder

• 1 push up/20 air squats, 2 push ups,/19 air squats, 3 push ups/18 air squats – all the way until you get down to 20 push ups/1 air squat. (Try to maintain push ups with knees off the ground the whole time, but if you must modify, bring your knees down for the final 5 sets of  push ups).

Abs – 40 lateral hip raises on each side followed by 20 bicycles.

Day 3 Holiday Workout No Gym:

Warm up: set timer for 3 minutes and repeat the following ?? start standing upright – walk hands down to push up position – push up – and walk your hands back up to standing upright (keep your feet planted). (Click here to see a video of me doing the exercise ?? Walkout push ups correct form).

Circuit: Go up AND back down the ladder (as fast as possible)

• 10 burpees
• 20 tricep dips (on coffee table or stool)
• 30 squat jumps
• 40 lunges (switching legs halfway)
• 50 squatting skiers
• 60 plank hip dips
• 70 wall taps (small jump on toes with arms over head)
• 80 penguin crunches (side to side with feet planted)
• 90 butt kicks
• 1 minute handstand hold (or pike pushup hold)

(Abs embedded ??)

 

Day 4 Holiday Workout No Gym: 

Warm Up: 300 High-Low jumping jacks

Circuit: 4 Rounds (as fast as possible)

• 20 Jumping Side Lunges (10 each)
• 20 In and outs
• 20 mountain climbers
• 20 plank walks
• 20 tricep dips

Abs – 200 count any abs of your choice ???? (a few options are: crunches, penguins, leg lifts, ab rows, star crunches, hip dips, corkscrews, bycicles, Russian twists, strict sit ups, planted foot crunches, lower ab crunches, reverse crunches, and that should hold you over?!)

Want more?? Click here ?? see a time lapse of another quick home workout – repeat the round 6 times as fast as possible! ??

Cheers to a little indulgence this Holiday season! ? Enjoy your time with loved ones, yummy food, and football this Thanksgiving – just remember that there is always a way to fit in that sweat sesh! ?????  Because sometimes the best way to enjoy a football game you don’t really care about is upside down ?. Happy Thanksgiving!!

Kelsie