25 Days of Strength Advent Calendar + #MotivateMe Monday

If you’re new here, #MotivateME Monday is a weekly link-up co-hosted by myself and Running Rachel for accountability and encouragement. It’s a place for us to share goals, plans, successes and have each other to pick us up to keep moving forward.

Happy Monday everyone!

I hope you all had an amazing Thanksgiving and weekend! It was just a normal weekend up here in Canada, full of the usual hockey, housework and an attempt at relaxing. I managed to get caught up on laundry, and we put the tree up for Christmas… I can’t believe that we’re only 3.5 weeks away!

Because we’re 25 days away from Christmas I thought I would share with you the 25 days of strength advent calendar. I admit that I made this last year, but it’s still relevant. There are a few different ways you could use this :
1) Do three sets of as many of the day’s exercise as you can in a minute for each set, or
2) Build up the exercises into a kick butt circuit, ie: Day 1: Three sets of Tuck Jumps, Day 2: Three sets of Tuck Jumps and Pushups with Shoulder Taps, Day 3: Three sets of Tuck Jumps, Pushups with Shoulder Taps and Wall Sits.

However you choose to approach this is up to you. This is a great compliment to the #RWRunStreak that I’m attempting to do. (I admit that I missed Saturday in the streak due to family commitments). Most of these are body weight exercises that you can do anywhere and almost all of the exercise instructions can be found in this one great post on Greatist. I did this on purpose to keep things simple.

[Tweet “Follow @fitcheerldr’s 25 DAYS OF STRENGTH ADVENT CALENDAR to stay active during the holidays #LiveActive #Fitfluential”]

Last week I started the #RWRunStreak. I love that it helps me to get moving everyday, though as I said above, I missed Saturday. On Sunday I walked for a mile with the kids so I’m going to count that. I’m not sure I can really keep the streak as a run streak because the way the girl’s hockey and softball schedules work out I often find myself home with our youngest and one other daughter. Our youngest is still too young to leave alone in the house so that I can run twice around our block (a mile). Instead I can take her for a mile walk, so I’ll be counting those (perhaps I should ask Santa for a dreadmill?). Last week I did a yoga workout on Tuesday, swung my kettlebell on Wednesday, ran on Thursday (5 miles), ran on Friday (3 miles), rested on Saturday, and walked a mile on Sunday.

Here’s this week’s plan:

Monday: Walk 1 mile + kettlebell workout
Tuesday: 5 mile run + day 1 of advent calendar
Wednesday: 3 mile run + day 2 of advent calendar
Thursday: 3 mile run + day 3 of advent calendar
Friday: 1 mile walk or run + skating after work with the girls + day 4 of advent calendar
Saturday: 1 mile walk + day 5 of advent calendar
Sunday: 3 mile run + day 6 of advent calendar

All in all it has been a great week, but I’m also ready to make this week’s fitness plan happen!

PLEASE JOIN THE #MOTIVATEME LINK UP!

THE RULES ARE VERY SIMPLE:

1. Every Monday share your fitness, nutrition plan etc by linking them up.  All you will need is your post’s URL, and a photo you would like to attach.
2. Posts that aren’t related will be deleted.
3. In your post, please mention that you’re participating in #MotivateMe Monday link up, and link back to the hosts, Fitness Cheerleader at FitnessCheerleader.com, & Running Rachel at RunningRachel.com. 
4. Read what the other linkers, are sharing.  Visit at least 2 other bloggers’ posts and share some support by commenting and engaging with each other.  The more you support, the more support you will get back.

[Tweet “Share your training plan and join the #MotivateMe linkup w @fitcheerldr and @runningrachel: “]