Fit For Free?

When I first started my fitness journey, there was always one question in the back of my mind. Can you really get fit for free? I've been trying to lose weight for just over a month (read the first documentation here) and have found that you actually can get fit and healthy for free... Shocking, right?

As I mentioned in the post linked earlier, Blogilates is your best friend when you're losing weight. Cassey is such an amazing PT and the hundreds of free videos on her YouTube channel are so encouraging and motivating. Her app is also a life-saver for the I'm-stuck-in-the-supermarket-trying-not-to-buy-the-chocolate moments. Trust me, we've all been there.

If you're a runner or more of a cardio girl, get your earphones out, download the Nike Running app and away you go. I'm not that advanced yet (plus, cross country was my worst enemy in school) so I tend to stick to toning and aerobics. As for clothing, I just usually wear a baggy tee, a pair of old leggings and some running shoes, although I am eyeing up a pair of the pink Nike Free Runs. Post-exam treat?

The most exciting part of this post is how you could win £350 worth of fitness goodies - simply click here, follow the instructions and you'll be entered... Simple as that. :)

Healthy Living

If you follow me on Twitter, you'll probably have noticed me raving on about my new favourite thing - Blogilates. I'm sure it'll come as no surprise to you that I am another teenage girl that is completely self-conscious and determined to lose weight. I've had this problem for around two years now and I'd never had the strength to be able to stick to healthy living and clean eating until now. I'm so determined to lose weight and without finding Blogilates, I'd never be so determined and focused as I am. Everything from the healthy recipes to butt workouts (let's face it, everyone wouldn't mind a bigger bum) on Cassey's channel make it so fun to eat and live healthily.

So, this morning, as focused as ever, I finally cooked for myself and made poached eggs on toast. I'm a sucker for sugary things and don't want to go into this all guns blazing, so I had a glass of pure orange juice to go along with it. It was actually one of the nicest breakfasts I've had in months, even with no bacon, sausage or white bread. Amazing.

For the last part of this post, I need your help. Would you like to see some healthy recipes on the blog? (Don't worry, I'm sure they'll taste nice and won't be too expensive to make!). Or even some workout routines of mine? Let me know in the comments!

Health Kicks

In an attempt to get a bit more healthy (and lose a few pounds), I'm trialing a new theory. Nope, it's not one of them fad diets that means you eat greens with everything and do 2 hours of exercise a day, but the theory is in fact drinking one cup of warm water with a lemon plonked in, every morning before eating or drinking anything.  

The apparent health benefits to lemon water are endless; aiding in digestion, clearing skin, reducing any pain and also cleansing your system by flushing out all of the bad bits (toxins). The latter seems perfect for me - I've been feeling a bit 'meh' recently so I'm hoping that this can make me feel a little better, plus I'm still feeling all of the effects from Pancake Day. I'm also unfortunately been blessed with the sniffles, so blankets, hot tea and tonnes of tissues has been my life for the past few days! Although it doesn't taste the best (why is that always the story with healthy things?), I'll keep trying it. Don't worry, I'll keep you updated!

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Headspace

If there's one valuable thing that I've learnt in my short sixteen years of existence, it's about how therapeutic long, candle-lit bubble baths can be. Recently I've been trying a new app called 'Headspace' which is basically gives you a ten minute audio that you silently listen to for ten minutes everyday.

I ended up trying this new app whilst in the bath. My conclusion? The thing is amazing. As I said earlier, you only need ten minutes to spare and just simply close your eyes and listen to the audio. It is free from the app store and once my ten minutes was up, although slightly shrivelled, I felt so relaxed and I could easily fall asleep in the bath.

I think it's nice to feel that relaxed sometimes as we live in such a hectic world. I just happen to live in one of the biggest cities in the country and with a fairly large family, sometimes it's hard to have some "me" time. You can also do what I did and throw some Elemis Quiet Mind Relaxing Bath Elixir in there which is designed to give you a restful sleep and de-stress the mind. I also followed up with a cup of hot chocolate (of course, with squirty cream) and then popped my head under the duvet. The perfect ending to a long day, if you ask me.

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fitness friday #2 - apps

Welcome back to another edition of Fitness Friday! Today we'll be talking all things app-related. I'll share some of my favourite apps with everything from help with nutrition to daily workouts. It's really handy if you have an iPhone to make a new folder called something along the lines of fitness, health, exercise, etc and store all of your apps in there so that they're easy to find. This was really useful for me so I'm not rummaging around the hundreds of apps trying to look for a group of them!

MY FITNESS PAL

First of all is one of my favourites, My Fitness Pal. Every time I think of losing weight, this is the first that comes to mind. It really helps me stick to guidelines about how much I'm eating with everything from fats to vitamins - something I tend to lack in. Simply log in what you've eat (there's even a barcode scanner if you're too lazy to type) and it'll tell you goals, what calories you've eat and you're even able to log exercise. It's an amazing app and one that I'd recommend to everyone.

NIKE+ RUNNING

Another of my favourites is Nike+ Running. It's very rare that I actually run outdoors so I rarely ever use the GPS function but it's a handy little app to have. You can even measure how many miles per hour you've walked/run to the local shop and it's a simple pedometer in your pocket. Even if you don't use it that often, it's really fun to play around with an see how much you actually run!

DAILY WORKOUTS

Finally is the Daily Workouts series. There's five apps to download in this series - simply type in Daily Workouts and you'll find arms, abs, cardio, butt and leg workouts that can be done in 5, 8 or 10 minutes. I keep these stored in the folder I was talking about earlier and if you have five minutes to spare, pop your headphones in and follow the video and instructions on your screen. It's really that easy! 10 minutes of these exercises a day really do make a difference.

What are your favourite fitness/health apps? I'd love to know!

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fitness friday

Keeping my New Year's resolution in tact, I'm setting up a new feature on this blog called Fitness Friday. I've been really unhappy with my weight/health for the past three years and it's only now that I feel motivated enough to actually stick to a proper routine. I'm sure there will be a few of you reading this, wanting to get into shape but not really knowing where to start so hopefully we can all be motivated together! I've put together a few motivational photos to kick off Fitness Friday so keep on reading!

ALL IMAGE SOURCES

So, here's our first of Fitness Friday. All of these images were found on one of my favourite fitspiration Tumblrs, Oh So Fitspo. If you're lacking in motivation, bookmark this page! It's one of my favourites to check if I'm not feeling in the mood for exercising or eating healthily and it's jam-packed full of healthy recipes, exercises and photos of what your body could look like if you work hard enough! Here's the exercises I did this week:

Monday- Yoga / Tuesday- Running / Wednesday- Swimming / Thursday- Running / Friday - Swimming

I was thinking of making this a link-up kinda thing so leave me a comment telling me what exercises you've done this week and if you'd like to see more of Fitness Friday! Next week's will be all about the best fitness apps so make sure you stay tuned!

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my diet / exercise

Hello there :) I was asked on the #bbloggers chat last night to do a post on how I keep healthy, lose weight, exercise, etc. I've been debating whether to do this or not because it's more personal than some of my other things on here so if this does get posted, please be nice! To be completely honest, I can 100% guarantee I'm not the most healthiest person you will ever meet. Yes, I eat chocolate. Yes, I eat fast-foods, and yes, I do have a love affair with sweets. (Especially rhubarbs and custards! Yum.)

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Since the New Year I've started to cut down on the amount of chocolate, fizzy drinks and sweets I eat. I've also learnt to keep an eye on my calorie intake. To do this I use the app on my phone called My Fitness Pal - it's free and it's amazing. It gives you a certain amount of calories as a target for the day depending on your weight, height, and how much weight you want to lose per week. Everybody in my house now has an account! It helps me keep motivated.

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My day-to-day routine usually consists of Weetabix with a banana or a piece of fruit, then I wait right up until lunch where on a school day I have a sandwich on brown bread and another piece of fruit. This keeps me full right up until tea-time where I just have a normal meal, such as baked potato, chilli and rice, steak, fish and potatoes, etc. If I get hungry, instead of eating junk I try to eat a piece of fruit or some vegetables just for snacking on because I try to get my 5-a-day.

I try to go to the local gym 2-3 times a week and the other days I alternate with going for a quick 10 minute power walk. I let myself have a treat like a little chocolate bar on a Sunday, well, just to lighten the mood of Sundays!

I think that's about it! Sorry if it's not as helpful as you might've expected, but if you have any questions or would like to know anything else, comment below or email me on elisedopsonblog@gmail.com and I'll try to answer!

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