We hope you had a great weekend filled with Independence Day Festivities. We kicked off the weekend by running the Peachtree Road Race in Atlanta. During our healthy lifestyle transition, we unfortunately did not have a big pile of money sitting around to use on gym memberships, equipment, or classes. Luckily we were committed enough to our process that we were able to get creative about our exercise and find free ways to make it happen.There are tons of free options out there like running, hiking, walking, stadium stair running, or calisthenics. Also, we did a little “Tour of Gwinnett County” and took advantage of week-long trial memberships at no less than five gyms. Most gyms will also have a drop-in rate (usually around $5-10) that you can utilize if nothing else is available. If you want to workout bad enough, just about anything will do!

When we first started, I swam a lot in out neighborhood pool. It will never be mistaken for an Olympic pool designed for lap swimming, but we just avoided the kids in floaties and stray pool toys and made it work. Mandy would do water aerobics while I swam laps. Also, we found that the Suwanee Greenway is an awesome place to train. From beginning to end, it is almost ten miles long and it has plenty of free parking along the way. We can run any distance there and we also love to bring Brinkley for nature walks. The whole thing is paved, there are some really cool views, and it is literally sitting in your backyard for free!Finally, I spent the majority of my exercise time simply running up and down the stairs in our basement. That was convenient for me in the event of rain or just not wanting to leave the house, but literally any stairs will do. I also went to Historic Fourth Ward Park and Collins Hill High School. You will burn some mega calories running stairs! Be careful though and protect your knees – mine got really sore after a few months because I ran without a brace.

What are some creative ways that you have found to burn those calories?