Fitness, exercise, lose weight ..... in the home

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so in two years you increased 33 lbs - must be something about 15 kilos, right? anyway, thats not too much increase, so i guess there wasnt some heavy duty feeding frenzy or whatever that made you explode in weight in a really unhealthy way. also, you mentioned that it all started with less bodily activity through your job.

so my guess is that you have pretty good chances.
basically, gaining and losing weight is energy input versus energy output. (yeah, there is more to it, but this is at its most basic level)

so, if you do some exercises and watch your energy input, you will get the desired results. you could of course go all in, having special this and special that meals at exactly the right time and moon phase - but i tend to dislike those. in most cases, they are overkill and rid one of all the fun that is a good meal before getting rid of your body fat. not a good tradeoff... never even let it take a toll on quality of life. huge no-no.

exercises at home can be very effective with only a little bit of -or no- equipment. i recommend to have a good mix of rather cardiovascular exercises and strength exercises. building up a bit of muscle will ensure you a trim figure, and more muscle burns more energy, also in stand-by mode (how great is that? fitness stuff in geek speak).

a good cardio exercise is rope skipping. get a basic skipping rope (those cheap vinyl ones are really good, and only a few bucks) and start getting some work done. i usually skip in rounds of three minutes with one minute rest (martial arts background, here). you can add some variety by jumping both feet at a time, changing from left to right (the way you see boxers skip the rope), two times left, two times right to feel some more strain on the calves and some artistic variety like double-unders (one jump while the rope passes under your feet twice) or even triple-unders or criss-crosses (crossing and uncrossing your arms during the skip circle).
also worth mentioning is that once you are accustomed to skipping for a few rounds, you can start skipping in intervals: jump at relaxed speed for one or two minutes and change to 30 seconds to a minute of skipping as fast and vigorous as you can, return to 1-2 minutes of slower skipping and so on. this kind of exercise will keep your metabolism up for far longer durations than conventional exercise.

strength exercise are many:
push-ups in different variations (hands together in front of your chest for loading the tricep, hands out wide for more load on the chest musculature,...)

pull-ups, if you have a pull-up bar somewhere

sit-ups: a common problem with sit-ups is that you circumvent using your abs for the movement and use your hip flexor instead. a good way is to try pushing your heels through the floor during the situp. flexing your buttocks will insinctively relax its antagonist, the dreaded hip flexor. voila, situps become a completely different talk that way.
also, i strongly advocate training the oblique abdominals because they look damn sexy. doing russian twists or similar exercises helps.

if you buy a dumbbell (there are affordable sets that allow adjusting the weight up to a maximum of ten kilos), you can use it for a variety of exercises. also, i hear that kettlebells are all the vogue for working out the complete body. a kettlebell is basically an iron ball with one handle. you swing it back and forth between your legs, snack it up, stop and hold it and stuff like that, requiring a lot of different muscle groups for moving the weight and keeping your body stabilized.

the internet is a great place for researching a lot of exercises... nothing kills motivation faster than having to do the same old stuff every day.
and finally, i recommend www.rossboxing.com and www.rosstraining.com - this guy heavily buys into the philosophy of training at home with minimal equipment, and damn is he creative at inventing new torture.

ive been doing about 75 pushups a day for about a month now to tone up my upper body, two months ago i started out doing 25, the next month i upped it to 50 and now im doing 75. for my lower body ive been doing trampoline work, i also take 2-3 walks a day that average 20 minutes a session. occasionally i do jumping jacks

to add one thing (must be my trademark recommendation):
it wont be possible at home, but taking up boxing, kickboxing or thaiboxing classes is useful, fun, and does wonders for the figure.

DDR is awesome, easy, and decently cheap to get and set up.

Sit ups work for belly flattening, but you can also do hip-hop dancing with the tv, and that is supposed to work as well. Or learn to do a few belly dancing moves.

Another good move is tightening your stomach and pulling down your arm at the same time as lifting your left.

Pelvic tilts are also good, and strengthen your back as well.

im too scared to do situps because i had hernia sergury awile back, and dont want anything to bust down there if you know what i mean, so to get a good stoumach workout i usually get on all four and crunch my stoumach kindof like revers situps exept yer on all fours its almost as good and not as much work as doing regular situps.

My advice is that you learn to like exercise.

When I was 13 years old or so I developed the discipline of exercise. I started running. First, at two miles at a time. Within a few months it turned into four; then it turned into six. I kept that up for a long time until college. By then I could never not exercise. I then started lifting weights.

My advice? Learn discipline. It's possible that you can lose weight without exercise, but not likely. Not many people are graced with perfect genetics. My advice is that you learn to like exercise. Start slow. Start running, power walking, weight-lifting. But beginslow--otherwise, in all odds, you'll get discouraged and you will quit. I repeat: start exercising, build discipline, start slowly That's what I did and I became a macho man. Ask, and I'll give you pictures. I don't care what kind of macho man I am, as long as I am buff in some kind of form (muscular, or the ectomorphic runner/cycling type). I don't care, as long as I am not some kind of disgusting piece of sludge. I suspect you that's precisely what you don't want either... so get buff, get ectomorphic... do. Something. I'll be cheering you on.

Tae Bo! Also, a treadmill. Best thing we ever purchased.

Here's a fun site, with a section on setting up a home gym:
http://www.stumptuous.com/cms/displayarticle.php?aid=47