Gem and Jo Take on Fitness: Fashion

If you've missed the first post in this series explaining everything you can click on the image below, also if you like any of the products seen, just click their image. If the product is no longer available, we've linked a similar one instead.

This week we're talking about the fashion side of fitness. Now we all know how expensive workout clothing can be, from the sports bras to the footwear, it can add up and cost a fortune. Fortunately for our bank accounts, there are plenty of budget brands that have cropped up with the rise of fitness in the last few years.

Almost every high street store has their own workout range, including the handy ole Primark and H&M. This means you don't need to spend all of your wages on one leg of a pair of yoga pants. In fact with these new budget brands you can get completely kitted out (gym bag and shoes included) for an unbelievable price. The only problem that comes with these cheaper brands, we all know they just aren't the same quality. Especially the footwear and having the right shoes is really important. But we'll talk about that in a later post.

Looking good makes you feel good and that is just a fact of life. In fact, it's a fact that we love. We think it's important to get up and get yourself dressed in something you like in order to feel motivated to get fit, or to just enjoy whatever workout you're going to do.
Think of it like this: you've just gone out and found some really cute new running leggings and cannot wait to put them on when you go home.
Will you
 A: get home. put them on and sit on the couch, eating chicken wings while binge watching Kardashians?
or will you
B: get home, put them on, grab headphones and go for a run in them. Preferably while it's bright out so everyone can see you pretty new leggings.
That's motivation right there. We're not saying you need to go out and buy new leggings before every run, that just silly. But if you buy a pair that you really like, or if you already have a pair you really like, the chances of you wearing them and exercising is pretty high. Fashion, especially with us girls, is really important. And if you get compliments on those leggings, that's just a plus, right?

There are plenty of ways to motivate yourself with your clothing. You don't need the brightest, most high fashion sportswear, sometimes all that's needed is one thing that makes you feel good while you wear it. Be that a t-shirt that fits like a dream or some pants that make every exercise comfortable. So, to try help you find that one thing that motivates you, check out some of our favourite brands that we wear while we workout.

Primark (Penney's)

One thing to be careful with when buying from Primark is that your bum isn't showing through the bottoms. That would be a little embarrassing. You'll need to try on a couple of sizes to make sure they fit right without showing the ole bum bum. 

All of these Primark products are under £10 each. What a bargain. And that sports bra, love it!

H&M

H&M is probably Gem's favourite place to buy sportswear at the moment. The leggings are incredibly soft and comfortable, especially the yoga ones and their sports bras come in a range of different supports, which is important for when you're preforming high impact activities such as running. Gotta keep them girls protected! H&M is more pricey than Primark but the quality and longevity of the clothing is much better. They have a good range of colours and the prices rarely go over €40. 

New Look

New Looks sportswear is along the same lines as H&M, cheap and cheerful. They have quite the range of colours, shapes and sizes. Makes it kinda hard to choose something to be honest, it's just all so pretty! Again the prices are similar to H&M, hardly anything is over €40, in fact the sports bra shown above is only €15 and the top is only €13. And wait for it... the shoes are on sale for just €12! 

Aeropostale

Personally, we've never bought anything from Aeropostale's sports range, but after looking at their stuff for this post we are getting off our bootay's and getting over there. How cute is this stuff? Plus their leggins claim to give you "#bestbootyever". How could we resist testing that out? 

The new trend this season is to have details on the back of your workout clothing and Aeropostale have jumped right on that bandwagon. 

This range is slightly more expensive than the others, however we're still talking under €40 for the majority of their products. 

Ladies (and fellas) get up, go to your wardrobe and find something you enjoy wearing while working out and get going. You don't need to go for a 10 mile run, some simple yoga on this lovely day would be perfect too. And by simple we mean simple. No need to go doing headstands, we're all for perfecting the easy ones first. 

Be sure to keep an eye out for some more cute sports ranges and let us know! We're always looking for new places to shop from. 

Until next time,

*All images are from their respective websites and there is no copyright intended.

Gem and Jo Take on Fitness

It's something that a lot of people really dislike the sound of. However, as people who recently started, we are here to share with you a couple of ways to make exercise sound more appealing.

If you just scoffed and murmured "yeah, right" to yourself, stay with us for just a moment. We know a ton of bloggers share their fitness and lifestyle tips, and we're no different. But, and there is always a but, we think that we have a slightly different attitude towards fitness.

We've decided to make this a bit of a segment on our blog, mostly because there is just so much to talk about and if we made it one big post people would be 700 years old by the time they finish. So instead we are going to discuss, topic by topic, how we've started bringing some exercise into our lives without dramatically changing everything we do. Sound too good to be true? Stick with us and you'll see what we mean.

To kickstart this little segment, we want to start by saying we are in no way disputing what any other blogger has to say about fitness, lifestyle or anything else to be frank. As a blogger you know that the nature of the business is that everyone has a different opinion. It's the reason the blogging world is so successful. So, feel free to share your opinion with us, but please don't lecture or create a space for negativity within these posts. We want to create a place for people who don't want to change their entire lives just to become a little healthier, for them to be able to freely share their thoughts and progress. And for that to happen, positivity and motivation is a must!

Like everyone else on planet Earth, we've been told time and time again that exercise and a healthy diet are seriously important if you want to live a long life. Recently, we feel that the 'super fit' lifestyle is being shoved at us from every direction. There are so many videos, channels and instagram accounts dedicated to girls and guys showing off how fit they are. Fair play to them and their dedication to total body fitness and to their ability to create a community through which they can earn a living. However, not everyone has the ability to become that fit, or to do 70 reps of squat jumps (Gem can do around 10 and then feels like she'll puke up that pizza she had for lunch). Some people have limitations, and that can be obesity, an injury/ disability or the fact that they just don't know where to start. We're here to tell you that you don't need to let them limitations...limit you, for lack of a better term.

All you need is some determination and a pair of runners ('trainers' for y'all Americans). What we want you to do is get out and go for a walk. Start simple. Now we're not talking about a stroll around the park. You need to get your heart pumping, get some sweat breaking. If you feel you can jog, do it for a few minutes then slow back down. Walk for a little bit more and then try again. Wanna know the important part? The part that will get you back walking/ jogging the next day and the day after that?

Let yourself feel pride in that fact that what you just did was an achievement! No matter how far you went, how long you ran. You feel that pride and revel in it! You did good, you made a start and you should be super proud!

If you feel like you're just not ready to go for a walk or jog, start smaller. When you walk up the stairs, lift your knees a little more. Google how to do a squat properly and use it in everyday life. When you take washing out of the machine, squat down and back up again. When you get dinner from the kitchen cupboard, squat down. Feeling brave? Set yourself a targets and stick them to the fridge. Use this one if you're stuck for inspriation:

• Open the fridge: 5 squats
• Stairs: 3 squats at the top and bottom
• Waiting on washing machine: 3 squats followed by 3 lunges, 

These are some easy ways to introduce exercise into your daily life without it taking over completely. Another thing we've done? We've started with exercise, and yet we've made hardly any change to our diets. We feel that if you try to change everything at once, it's a lot harder to succeed. So maybe a diet change will come to us eventually. For now, we're happy eating some chocolate and doing some exercise.

And please remember that we are not professionals in this area, just some girlies looking to motivate. You should always consult a health care professional before you make any major lifestyle changes, especially if you suffer with health problems. 

Make sure to keep an eye out for our next post in this little segment, we'll be talking about the fashion that motivates us to keep on trucking. 

Until next time,

Gem and Jo's Water of the Week - Flavoured Water

This week we've decided to do something a little different, and it wasn't because of the fact that neither of us happened to have any fruit in our houses today (that's a lie, we got a little lazy...oops)

The other day we happened upon something amazing, magical in fact. 

Flavoured water.

Don't rush to judge us now, we know that the general opinion of flavoured water isn't great but this one seems pretty good to us!  We picked up Tesco's Orange and Peach Still Water, just to try something a little different and we were surprised at how good it is!

It's seriously tasty and from the ingredients the only thing it contains is a little flavouring and some sweeteners. All the GDA information is in the green and it contains hardly anything! Check for yourself, here's the nutritional information for Tesco's Peach and Orange Still Water:

You can pick this 1 litre bottle up for just 40c! How good is that? You can also get it in a pack of 4 for €1.99 or you can go fancy and get Volvic's version for €1.45

You can pick these up from Tesco stores or you can order them online here

Have you tried this water or any other flavoured water? What's your opinion?

Until next time,