Strength Training for stay at home Momma...

Jillian Michaels - I only have her 30 Day Shred, but hear the others are good work too. If you have streaming Netflix, you can find lots of work outs there too.

Search around the web for bodyweight exercises; body squats, triceps dips, lunges, etc. There's plenty you can do without ever stepping foot in the gym. Add in a really small weight set and you can truly work wonders in the privacy of your own home, not to mention avoiding all the expenses that come along with gym memberships!

If you can, get a workout bench and some weights. You can do a lot with just a little, and a little goes a long way. Get 3, 5, 8, 10 lbs to begin with. You can do it.

oxygen magazine frequently has ideas for exercises you can do at home. personally, i do horrible exercising at home. as soon as i get down on the floor i think, "man, it is dirty under there...." and then get distracted!

I did this tonight, and although it doesn't look that hard I feel like jello now. That's either a testament to the workout or how out of shape I am http://www.acefitness.org/workouts/13/

I have been doing some workouts from Netflix (if you have it) - I just did 10 minute Target toning today and thought it was good for toning. Netflix has alot of 50 minute workouts that are broke down into 10 minute segments. I like to mix up my workouts and keep it new. Being a stay at home mom, I completely understand the need for quick! Another good suggestion is any walk away the pounds dvds especially the ones that add weights because you get your cardio and toning in one workout which I like. Same thing with those dvds, you can do as little or much as you want. You only have time for 1 mile you can do just that.
If you are more advanced, the Jillian Michaels workouts will kick your butt into shape and you will loose inches and pounds but it is not easy. It is 24 minutes that will help melt off the inches if you are adding a healthy diet with it.

You can use your own body for strength/resistance training. Working the biggest muscles in the body will result in progress being seeing faster. Squats, crunches, push ups, calf raises. You can do these exercises using JUST your body weight and be find and see progress for up to 3 months, after that you'll need to add more weight to see more muscle growth if you want more muscle tone which will burn more calories. And as others said just simple weights will do this for you. I like the dial a weight. It's compact and gets heavier and heavier. You could also start doing push ups with a kid on your back, (its what I do, my sons love it), you can do squats with a kid on your back or holding one in your arms, my boys love it. Calf raises also with kids,and crunches need never any more weight, different styles of crunches to reach diff parts of the abdomen; obliques, upper and lower torso.

Good luck!

I have been doing some workouts from Netflix (if you have it) - I just did 10 minute Target toning today and thought it was good for toning. Netflix has alot of 50 minute workouts that are broke down into 10 minute segments. I like to mix up my workouts and keep it new. Being a stay at home mom, I completely understand the need for quick! Another good suggestion is any walk away the pounds dvds especially the ones that add weights because you get your cardio and toning in one workout which I like. Same thing with those dvds, you can do as little or much as you want. You only have time for 1 mile you can do just that.
If you are more advanced, the Jillian Michaels workouts will kick your butt into shape and you will loose inches and pounds but it is not easy. It is 24 minutes that will help melt off the inches if you are adding a healthy diet with it.

Also on Netflix is a 10 minute Pilates workout that I like. It's 60 minutes, but broken up into segments of 10. Good core, strengthening stuff. Hope you find something you like!