What It’s Like to Create a Garage Gym

You guys know how much I’ve written about the Fit Pit, right? The gym that taught me that I was stronger than I thought? And that I could overcome this and this. The gym that helped me to get my fitness groove back after babies? I’d even go so far as to call it the community that inspired my soul.

Yeah, it’s meant a lot to me — and my family. Gwen’s been there almost weekly since she was just a few months old — and so have the twins. Although some days it wasn’t easy to get everybody there and then keep everybody entertained long enough for me to get a full workout in, I’ve also felt really proud to show my kids that side of my husband and me. For them to see us do hard things, and be around other people pushing their limits. It’s a special place; a special energy.

But, late last year we got word that the gym was closing.

It literally brought me to tears, a number of times. So many memories. So many workouts. So many good friends. So much self-discovery. So much … LIFE.

I knew it would leave a big ol’ hole — not just in our fitness, but in our day-to-day lives. Like, what in the world would we do?

After a lot of thought and discussion, we decided that joining a new gym just wasn’t right for us — at least not right now. But you know what was? This.

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Say hello to our garage gym, which we’ve named “The Barn Box.” (Our house is a 1919 Colonial and looks a lot like a barn and I love alliteration, hence the title.)

We were lucky enough to buy some of the Fit Pit’s equipment (you can see most of it above but it consists of: a rower, dumbbells, barbells with plates, a slam ball, a box, kettlebells, and some mats), so we cleared out the mess that was our garage, and made it our very own slice of Fit Pit.

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