We are quickly entering cold and flu season so I thought we should kick things off with a few gentle reminders…

You might be too sick to workout if…

• You used a search engine to research symptoms and/or remedies for pneumonia, bronchitis, swine flu, or Bubonic plague in the last 24 hours.
• You feel like you could throw up and it’s not because you just had the hardest training session of your life.
• You accepted a delivery of flowers with a card that reads “Get Well Soon!” on the same day.
• You stuff the pockets of your gym shorts with tissues and/or cough drops “just in case.”
• You need to say the words “excuse me” and you’re not in anyone’s way.
• You start sweating before you step foot in the gym.
• You slept with a bucket beside your bed last night.
• Your nose runs faster than you do.
• You lift more tissues than weights.
• You called in sick to work.

If any of these things apply to you STAY HOME! It’s not going to kill you to miss a workout. I promise.

Now I really must go to the gym in hopes that I don’t catch anything except a medicine ball!

Before you paint, carve, smash, or bake your pumpkin this year, why don’t you pump it?

A pumpkin makes an instant substitution for a medicine ball workout as they come in similar sizes and shapes.

Here are a few tricks you (and your little goblins) can do with your PUMPkins, pumpkin:

• Front squats
• Squat to overhead press
• Overhead squats
• Lunges (forward, backward, walking)
• Deadlifts (including single leg deadlifts)
• Swings (starting in a squat position, hold the pumpkin between your legs then thrust arms up above your head ending in a standing position)
• Overhead presses
• Shoulder presses (two-handed or single-handed depending on the size of your pumpkin)
• Overhead tricep presses
• Bicep curls
• Push up variations (both hands on the pumpkin, one hand on the pumpkin/one hand on the ground, feet on pumpkin/hands on the ground)
• Chest presses
• Calf raises
• Lumberjack chops
• Mountain climbers (hands on pumpkin/feet on floor)
• Crunches
• Planks (hands on pumpkin/feet on the ground)

I hope you’ll carve out some time and add in some pumpkin and spice to your workouts this season. A pumpkin workout just might lift your spirits and have you looking even more gordgeous in no time.