Fitness is a life-long journey. Once you learn how to ride a bike, you don’t forget, but if you go years without riding, as soon as you get on one it’s a little rough getting started again. The same holds true for fitness of any type—running or walking. You know you can do it, but your joints are tight and you feel every step the next day.

If you’re pregnant and exercised before you conceived, you can continue at a less intense pace as long as cleared by your doctor. (If you didn’t work out at all before, now is probably not the time to start, but perhaps some walking around the neighborhood might be in order.)

The benefits of staying active include more than being fit for labor. Prenatal workouts can reduce stress, release feel-good endorphins, burn extra calories, keep up your endurance (for walking up steps and doing errands in your last month), cut leg cramps, help you sleep, maintain good posture, and tone your arm muscles for holding the little tot when he/she arrives!

Now’s the time of the year when it can be easy to stop your exercise program and wait for the weather to turn. But, it doesn’t have to be that way! There are ways to beat the cold weather without having to head inside, and to keep running during winter.