What weight do you think you'll start with?

Are you looking at any specific sets?

I have my eye on the Atlus Athletic 32-Pound set. I would love to get something adjustable, like the Jillian Michaels set or The Firm set, but klutz that I am I'm afraid they'd break or I'd fasten them wrong and they'd go flying at an unprotected body part at the worst possible moment.

If the Jillian Michaels set is supposed to be pretty secure, I think that looks pretty nice and space-efficient. It has a good range of sizes. Something like the Atlus looks good, too. I'd be a bit worried about doing something like The Firm that has handles, my paranoia has my picturing it catching and hurting my fingers if I ever needed to drop it quickly (like if I suddenly had a cramp).

I can comfortably do most exercises with a 5 lb weight, however for the exercises that target the back of the upper arms, i.e. where I need the most work, 5 lbs is too much for me. I like the Atlus set because the light pair is 3 lb: lighter than the 5 lb weight I have now, but heavier than the 2 lbs offered in the Tone set, which I believe you're right about: useless.


@ Miss Voluptuous:
I LOVE to swim. However I don't have pool access. I used to belong to a club, but I got tired of it being unavailable for large chunks of the day because various high school swim teams hosted their afternoon/evening programs there. You'd think they'd keep at least one lane free for the adult members, but no, heaven forbid an adult use the pool while the children! were present. Apparently all us adult swimmers are child molesters.

@ MaryExy:
Space-saving appeals to me, but I would be stressed out at the thought of the weight coming apart and landing on my foot or worse, my face. I think I've decided to get the individual pairs, and just put the ones I grow out of on craigslist.

Use your own body weight. In our class we use our body weight, a kettelbell and a towel.

You'd be surprised what some pushups and squats can do (10 mins a day). Kettel bells are my favorite and can be purchased at Walmart. They come in all different sizes and work better than dumb bells IMO.

Anyways, you can use a towel to do towel slams, iso pull downs, and tons of other moves that actually woop you into shape good! Google some exercises and check out how much you can really do with, well, yourself.

Actually, I take it back. 2 lb weights are good for walking. I did a power-walk exercise video which has the victi-- I mean exercise devotee holding weights for 95% of the workout, and 5 lbs was far too much even though I now do that weight with ease for other exercise videos.

ETA: Wow, that's pretty freakin' awesome. I just realized that it was only two weeks ago I was having difficulty with 5 lbs weights, and now it's no problem. Cool.

I just started lifting weights this year. They're only dumbbells and I'm starting out slow to allow for my tendons and joints to build up some strength along with my muscles so they're only 20lbs each.