Week #33

How was your week? I hope you all got in enough exercise to make yourselves feel good about what you are doing! I hope that all of you are keeping up on your push-ups, squats and weights. Remember they are crucial!!

This week has been crazy so to get right to items of business -

The Rec Center is still closed until Sept. 7th so make sure you take Desert Palms up on their offer to let you come use their facilities for just $10. We do have classes on labor day Monday so if you have any one visiting and you want to show them what Zumba is all about bring them over. If you only come one day then it is $5 for drop in. Hope to see you over there!!

The new schedules for both places has been bumped a week so the new ones will not be coming out until the 20th of Sept. They are getting an over haul for the better so I am sure you will all be excited for the new schedules to come out!!

I have heard there is a big Zumba to-do at Hansen Stadium coming up on Sept. 24th. More info to come as I get it!!

Most important -

"Zumba Gives Back" It is time for all Zumba lovers out there across Southern Utah to give back to our community. We have been so blessed with he opportunity that all of our gyms and rec center facilities have offered us so much Zumba that we need to give back! Mark your calendars for October 9th from 7-9pm at Town Square park! All proceeds will be going back into a local business that needs the money to help provide women with post mastectomy's with prosthesis. October is breast cancer awareness month so we would like to honor anyone and everyone that has experienced this through themselves, though a family member or friend! This is all for charity so please open your hearts and spread the word! The event will cost but it will be the best dollars you have spent knowing where it is going and who it is helping out! More info to come!! (I do know that there is going to be great prizes)


Our next instructor highlight - Josie Jones

Hi ladies. Here's a brief introduction to my life and how Zumba came to be a part of it. I taught Jazzercise for five years up in Salt Lake City and was so sad, when I moved to St. George in the fall of 2007, to find that there were no similar dance aerobic classes. That sadness was short-lived, however, as I discovered Desert Palms the month I moved here and, within two weeks of my joining the gym, Kerry became certified to teach Zumba, the first introduction of Zumba to St. George and the first I had ever heard of it. I loved it immediately. However, as a newly single mom of an adorable and very demanding toddler, I was not ready to get back into the teaching thing again, so I just enjoyed being a student for a couple of years before making the leap to go through workshop and begin teaching Zumba myself. It has been such a joy to me and a major stress reliever in my life. It is my "ME" time. I currently teach classes at Desert Palms, Gold's, Rezults, and occasionally sub at St. George Rec Center. My main job is being a mom to my little diva, and then I do medical transcription work from home at night while she sleeps, which means that I rarely get more than 4 hours of sleep M-F. This is all the more reason why Zumba is sooo important to me - I crave those endorphins to give me energy to get through my weekdays. I have also VERY SLOWLY started going back to school during my daughter's preschool hours to try to finish my Bachelor's degree in elementary ed. As for spare time, I love anything that lets me spend time with family and friends, I read anything and everything, I love to bake, and I especially enjoy anything crafty or that lets me unleash a bit of creativity. More than anything, I just love to laugh and to surround myself with happy people so that I can do that often. I love Zumba and I have thoroughly loved getting to know all of you. That's basically me in a nutshell.

Josie :)

Josie is awesome! She has quite the following and rightly so, she is great! You will never know if you get Josie at Desert Palms or the Rec Center, she is a faithful reliable sub for us and we love her because of that! You just may get her one of these days!!

Week #33 Challenge - Power Strength

Have any of you taken the advantage of Power Strength class at either facility? If not you are missing out on a great opportunity to get a full body workout in just an hour. It does not cover cardio but like in the past I have said it is not all about how much cardio you do, you need to add in some weight training. This class will give you an overall full body kick your butt workout!! It will push you to the next level of working out. If you have been going then up your weights and push yourself to the next level. It truly is a great class so check one out over the next week and see what it does for you!

We love you all and thank you again for being who you are!

Week #32

Another week has gone by and before we know it, it will be the end of 2010. Life goes by so quickly so you might as well enjoy the ride while it flies by, right? I hope that all of you are falling nicely into your routine schedules now that school has been in session for a couple of weeks. It is so important to find the time in your day to call your own so make sure that is top priority when it comes to scheduling! Your kids will be fine if you have leave so don't feel guilty, in fact they will notice that you are even a nicer parent when you return home due to those fantastic endorphins that we have all been blessed with! Our bodies our amazing and if you take care of your body, your body will take care of you!

Items of business - The Rec Center will be closed August 30th thru Sept. 6th. Classes start back up on the 7th. There will be a new schedule coming out but not until Sept. 13th. There will be some new changes and new additions so it will be great! Also - Rec Center attendees, Desert Palms is letting anyone that goes to the Rec Center come and enjoy the their gym facilities and all classes for just $10 for the week that it is closed! This is a great deal so take them up on it so you can still get your exercise in for the week. All you have to do is tell the front desk at Desert Palms that you are from the Rec Center and they will take care of you! We would love to see you all at the Zumba classes at Desert Palms next week!

Desert Palms members - there will be a new schedule coming out as well on the 13th of Sept. so get ready for some changes and new additions as well!

Zumba Gives Back - Our charity event is in the planning mode and I hope to have a date, time and place for you by next Wednesday. It is going to be fabulous! You will not want to miss out! We have instructors from all over Washington county that will be helping us out that evening! More info to come........

Our DVD's are on sale this week! We want to push them so that we can make a new one. We need to sale out before Vol. 4 can be made so they are buy 1 get one 1/2 off. So team up with a friend or sister and get 2 for $22.50. Marti and I have them on us at all times and we can always ship them out as well!!

Next Zumba teacher Highlight - Christy Ellis

My Husband Dave, and I moved to St.George about 8 years ago, so he could be a real estate agent, (which I might add he is the best in St.George) ( okay , tied for best with Kerry’s husband , Joe Langston.) I worked in a salon as a hair stylist for 7 years, I also graduated from massage therapy school, I spent three years with Comedy Sportz doing improve comedy every weekend, I also spent time traveling around the world and the United States. But all of that life got put on hold when I had my three kids and decide to be a stay-at-home mom. It was a hard transition for me, to be “just a mom”, so when Zumba came into my life, I had something to call my own again. I have become very interested in the fitness world. Our bodies are so incredible, no matter what they look like. It is amazing what they will do for us, if we love them and take care of them. And we all know our bodies love zumba! Thank you all for letting me be a part of your Zumba lives! I absolutely love teaching. Be healthy – be happy - be kind – and Zumba!

You can catch her high energetic personality on Tuesdays at the Rec Center at 5:30pm!!

Week #32 Challenge - weights!

Who is afraid of weights? You see those dumb bells and you just walk on buy because you are scared of them. You need to change your mind set! You need to fall in love with weights! They are so good for you! You need to build muscle to lose the fat. That's it, lift some weights on a regular basis and you will see changes! I promise. So along with your push-ups, squats and now weights you will have a great workout that will help you speed up your metabolism and lose weight.

Speaking of weights - I am now in the Saturday rotation at Desert Palms for Strength training and Spin. I will be teaching the 8:15am strength class follow right after a hour spin class this Saturday. If you would like to try it out please come. If you want to do strength and then catch Zumba right after, that will be just as good!

Have a wonderful week everyone and remember how great you are each day!

Week #31

I hope you all had a great week getting used to school being back in and hopefully getting in a little me time! I hope that you are feeling the need to get back into a routine and more importantly get exercise back into your routine on a regular basis. It is so important to exercise each day in some form. It really does release endorphins that will help you through your day. It releases the stress and anxiety that we feel sometimes with our kids busy schedules! Come the 1st of September you should all be feeling good about your routines!

Items of business-
The Rec Center will be closed starting on Aug 30th to Sept 6. They clean and remodel and they also switch up the aerobics schedule so make sure you pick up a schedule when they have them available.

Marti and I are putting together a huge Zumba Event along with our fellow instructors and it will be coming up in October. The date should be set by next week so I will let you know so you can mark your calendars because you will not want to miss out on this, I promise!

I have gotten word that Desert Palms will be doing another Loser Club that will maybe start in October. If any of you are interested then get your teams together because I will be taking on 2 teams this time. I am ready to get you in shape and push beyond your limits! I can have 6 per team and remember that you do not need to be a member of Desert Palms to be a part of the Loser Club. I had so much fun with my group last time and they all did amazing things so I am excited to take on another challenge!! More info soon!

Check our blog / www.zumbagirls.blogspot.com / I updated the music finally, so those of you that listen to it at work you can shake at your desk with some of our new songs!

We have one black tank left and DVD's! Get them before they are gone because we don't reproduce the volume once we have sold out!


Our next highlight - Melesa Kohler

I fell in love with Zumba in Dallas years ago. Then in 2007 she moved to St. George and fell in love with Zumba all over again...when she started doing Zumba at Desert Palms with Kerry & Marti. She was certified last year and LOVES it. She teaches Zumba Kids and Zumba Mommie and Me and rotates in on Wednesday evenings and Saturday mornings at Desert Palms. She also teachers a "Grown-up" class =) on Mondays at the Rec center.

Melesa has been married for 17 years, has twin girls that are 8 and her caboose is a 4 yr old little girl. She is an ASL interpreter, Choir Director at Little Valley Elementary and loves serving in the church she is a part of. She loves tennis, swimming and riding her bike. But her true love and passion for exercise has come with Zumba. She loves baking and laundry! She is so thankful and happy to be part of the Zumba team at Desert Palms and Rec Center.

Melesa is great and all her kid Zumba goers love her!! Take your kids to her classes at Desert Palms or join her for hers on Monday mornings at the Rec Center!

Week #31 - Squats!!

Tight butts is every one's dream but we don't like to put in the time and honestly we don't like the hurt when we are done but you need to do it or after time our cute butts will start to sag, that is what we don't want!! So along with your push-ups which you should have increased on over the past week I want you to add in your squats or lunges. I want your butt to burn and so push yourself. If you are finished at 20 squats then go for 30! You need to feel the burn and I want you to feel it every day this week. Embrace the squat and love your butt!

Week #30

School is in session :) I truly do love my children and I love hanging out with them but I don't like the fighting and how dirty the house gets when they are home all day so this is a good change!! So one might ask themselves, what are you going to do with your free time? I respond, take sometime for me first so that when they do come home I have already had me time! I love to work out with me so now you might catch me doing extra stuff after I teach classes and hopefully fill up my schedule with training! I hope I can be of service to you!

Soon there will be some schedule changes because of fall coming so I will keep you all posted with what is going on at the Rec Center and Desert Palms. The only change that starts next Tuesday at Desert Palms is the Zumba kids class will be moved back to 4:30pm due to school. Melesa and Cherie teach that class and they do a great job so get your kids involved and teach them a good habit of exercise!

For our next instructor highlight is Cherie Hoopii - (the greatest massage therapist ever!)

Ok stuff about me... Hawaiian/Chinese, Caucasian. Age: Older than everyone else teaching zumba! 2 children-Tei (12yr) & Lahela (6yr). Grad from BYU, Provo where I played volleyball for 4 yrs. Served an LDS mission in Okinawa, Japan. (So did 2 of my brothers so we still speak Japanese.) Masters in accounting from SUU. CPA for almost 20 yrs. Still do personal consulting and tax work. Real Estate licence (why? who knows? ha ha). Run the SDI Massage School (for 5 years) and own Bodyssage for 2 1/2 yrs. Love my Hawaiian culture and have done many, many luaus- cook, sing and dance. Love family, sports, music, travelling, drawing, learning, teaching, trying to stay fit, and pretty much anything that has to do with the body fascinates me. Oooh, and I LOVE Zumba and our Zumba gang!

Cherie is a woman of many talents so make sure you check out one of her classes!

Week #30 Challenge - Chest (who doesn't love a bigger chest)

Ok, I want you to focus on your chest this week. No, we don't want huge pecs like guys do but we need to have a strong foundation so that other muscles can work properly when being worked. So I want you to throw out the idea of girl push-ups, there is no such thing!! I want you to start slow and then gain each day. If you can only do 3 regular push-ups the first day then the next you add 2 more. I want you to build big and achieve big. Please report to me how many you ended up with at the end of the week. If you are sore one day then do a few less but you need to do push-ups every day! Each week we are going to build-up so I want you to start making some good habits. Now is the time to take an hour for yourself to workout. Summer is over and there are no more excuses so lets get our butts in gear and work on our goals!!!

Week #29

So our summer is almost over, crazy! That went by really fast. I love summer but I love school too!! This is the year for me that all my kids are in school all day :)! I am excited to focus on Zumba and Personal training once school starts. I have some fun things that are turning in my brain that I am excited to share with you in the near future!

Ok, who went to National Dance Day at the Washington Walmart? I was there and about 15 others from the Rec and Desert Palms that I know of. I didn't get to see everyone but it was so much fun! It was so awesome to see all the crazy Zumba lovers in Southern Utah. We (instructors) had so much fun that we are going to do it again soon. I was put in charge so I will have my cohort Marti help me out and we are going to bring a fabulous event to Southern Utah for all Zumba lovers that love to give of the heart!! I will keep you posted when the action will start happening.

Items for sale -
DVD's are $15 so pick one up before they are gone
We only have 3 tanks left / small black - medium black - medium gray/ they are $18 and I have them with me so if you go to Marti's class let us now so we can have it there for you!

Instructor Bio -
Tricia Longmore joined us at Desert Palms and the Rec Center over a year ago! We love her and are so happy she is back!!

When I was a kid I loved to dance. I was in many performing groups including: drill team, cheer leading and musical theater. As an adult I found it more difficult to get out and dance. I have always exercised but it was drudgery until I fell in love with Zumba. I joined Kerry's and Marti's Zumba classes over two years ago. I was totally hooked on Zumba from the first day. Kerry encouraged me to get certified and I started teaching in January of 2009 and have been smiling ever since.

One of the things I love most about Zumba is it's always changing. No two classes needs to be the same, each new song adds more fun to the mix with an endless possiblities of songs and zumba moves. I enjoy choreographing my own songs plus learning the songs that other teachers have done. Zumba helps me not only to be more healthy, but also de-stress and escape from reality. I can stop being "mommy" for one whole hour and be Tricia instead. Zumba helped me find myself; I didn't realize I was lost until I found me again.

Zumba has changed my life and I hope it gives others as much joy as it brings to me. Tricia

You can catch Tricia alternating Saturday's and Wednesday's at Desert Palms and the STG Rec Center. She is always willing to sub so you might show up to a class and get a treat with Tricia filling in!

Week #29 Challenge - enjoy your last week off!

This doesn't mean take exercise off but it means if you have kids or Grand kids do something crazy with them! Make your last week of summer memorable. Get out and do fun stuff. Have a fun week filled with exercise, laughter, sunshine, friends and family! Enjoy this week because starting next week our challenges are going to get a little bit harder. I am going to test your physical strength so have a happy week and I love you all!!

Week #28 / NAtional Dance Day

Thank you Marti for emailing out last week and yes she is right, we need to take at lest 10 minutes a day for ourselves so that we can focus on whats important! Thank you for reminding us!

Back in the early months of 2010 I was hand selecting some great girls to teach Zumba along side with Marti and I and I don't think I have paid enough tribute to them for all the hard work they have done at both the Rec Center and Desert Palms. So for the next little while I will be highlighting them so that you can get to now your teachers a little better. Their names are:
Cami
Cherie
Christy
Josie
Melesa
Tricia

I hope you have enjoyed taking their classes!

Week #28 - National Dance Day

Coming up on Saturday the 31sy of July is National Dance day. Zumba is based around dance so one of the great instructors (April and daughters) have put together something really fun for our Southern Utah Zumba family this Saturday night. She has asked a handful of instructors to help her and I have happily accepted (sadly Marti will be out of town) to bring the east and the west together at the Washington Walmart parking lot to have a full on Zumba dance party! Here are the details, there is a dance that you need to learn that is choreographed by Nap and Tabs from So you think you can Dance so we can do it all together. It will be filmed and sent into the TV show. Here is the link http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zKUyp1GMQVg it has step by step instructions! April will be picking the song so just learn the moves and get the feel for it. The Dance off is free to the public!! The time is 9pm -10pm. We are going to have cars parked in a huge circle with all the lights facing in. The radio station will be there and those of us instructors that have merchandise will have it there for your convenience to buy. It is going to be awesome so this is your challenge this week to learn the steps and even if you don't learn the steps come to the Dance off on Saturday! I would really like to have the westside be represented well so come one, come all and join us for one hour full of Zumba craziness!!

Invite for all!!
For: National Dance Day
When: Saturday the 31st
Time: 9pm-10pm
Where: Washington Walmart parking lot

See you there!

Week #26

Did you get your game on? Our numbers were up at the Rec Center and Desert Palms in all the Zumba classes so I am thinkin' you got your game on. Good Job!

So now that our summer is half way over :( we need to start thinking about our schedules and how we are going to get in our Zumba for the week or every day. It is so crucial to stay active during the summer. The afternoons are getting so hot that most people tend to stay inside. You need to make sure you get in your workout in the morning time or evening. We get so caught up in our daily stuff and the hours fly by and we think to ourselves, "Dang it, I missed my exercise today. I will do it tomorrow!" What are the chances that the next day is going to be less busy, not so much! You need to make it top priority so that you can have the positive serge that comes from exercise!

Our DVD's are finally here! Marti and I opened one and watched some and the picture is a little blurry so whether it is the widescreen or the production company, we don't know but because of this we are going to sell them for $15 instead of $20. We don't want to return them again and all that hoopla, but the important thing is you can still watch it and get a great workout. The blurry part is our faces so that is good for us. You can still see all the routines and moves clearly! It was our favorite DVD to make so purchase one and make it a part of your daily routine if you can't make it to a Zumba class! We have them with us at our classes and we take checks or cash. If you are from out of town please reply and we will get one shipped to you.

Week #26 Challenge - Find a Friend!

I want you to find a friend that may be struggling a little with exercise or weight! So many people feel so alone in the workout world and some have no idea where to start. I would like you to bring her or him along to a class and show them that exercise can be really fun and then also tell them your thoughts and feelings about how you have achieved some of your weight loss goals. You have no idea how many people out there need some one to talk to about this. It is a major factor in depression and if we, all together, can help someone see that exercise is a natural way to release endorphins and can help pull you out of depression, then it is worth stepping outside of our comfort zone!

Again, I can't say it enough on how much I love our Zumba family! We have such a widespread group in Southern Utah and it is wonderful to be a part of your lives!