Definitely heavier weight, fewer reps. The recommendation I've read most often is to find a weight that will fatigue your muscles in 8-10 reps. If you can do more reps than that, you need to up your weight. Most women simply do not have enough testosterone to bulk up. The bulky women weight lifters use steroids to achieve that look. The average woman who works out HARD several times per week is lucky to put on 1-2 lbs of muscle per month. There is also no such thing as "toning". You are either building muscle, or losing fat. If someone wants more shapely muscles, that comes from muscle building. If someone wants better definition of those shapely muscles, that comes from losing fat.

I lift max 25 lb and i thought no woman can go above that!!!!!
Now, I will try and push myself to 30 or 40.

my two cents - speaking as someone who's been into bodybuilding and powerlifting:

MYTH: you cannot change the shape of your muscle. you CAN but only to an extent. take a look at the hind end of a marathon runner - long, skinny, even corded muscles. now look at the hind end of a sprinter - thick, chunky, bulky muscles.

that's because the marathon runner's muscles are developed to emphasis slow-twitch (endurance) muscle fibres. she's not "built" more of them - the fast-twitch fibres she's got are acting like slow-twitch. they're not very thick because they don't need to hold so much ATP (adenosine triphosphate, the only fuel your muscles actually use - the muscles use ATP that's in the cell, then they get tired; they replenish from glycogen (long-chain sugar) stores around the liver and when that's gone, they scavenge further afield; but whether it's glycogen, blood sugar, or body fat, it all gets turned into ATP) the sprinter's muscles, however, are developed to emphasize fast-twitch (explosive movement) muscles - these muscle fibres need to hold more ATP at a time in order to get that "BAM!" power explosion. that's why sprinters tend not to do so well over the long haul and why marathon runners tend not to do very well over the quarter-mile.

you also cannot change the shape of your muscle by doing an exercise in a particular fashion. iow, doing pronated bicep curls isn't going to build the "centre mass" of your bicep. your muscle is exactly like a rubber band: it fires or it doesn't and it fires the entire length. you can't make "this" part of the muscle fire and not "that" part.

that being said, do not do reps over 15. you're not stressing your muscles enough for any good - you're basically doing a form of cardio that will leave you open to RSI (repetitive strain injury) that can be permanent.

for big muscles - lats, quads, hams, glutes - use a heavier weight in the 8-10 rep range; for smaller muscles - arms, delts, abs, calves, etc - use a lighter weight so you're in the 10-12 or 12-15 range.

I agree with all of the above. I just wanted to add another tip about pace. Mix up the pace of lifting from time to time. Concentrate on lowering the weight slowly as well as lifting the weight slowly. Studies show this can increase the effectiveness of lifting up to 50%.

oh, heck yah - they're called "concentrics" or "negatives".

for example, to do negative bench press, you power up as usual but on the way down, you count to ten as opposed to the usual power-up-let-'er-down rhythm.

another way to make things more fun is to add rubber bands to the barbell - loop the power band around the barbell and hook it under the bench, rack, some really big dude's foot. this way, you are forced to control the barbel every cm of the way - gravity and inertia are taken totally out of the picture.

chains also make things even more interesting: get a length of chain on each end such that when the barbell is in the fully extended position, there is still 6-8" of chain puddled on the floor. what happens here is as you extend (iow, push up for the barbell or stand up for the squat or deadlift), the weight increases (because you're lifting more and more chain) and as you lower, the weight decreases (because more and more chain is puddling on the floor).

these techniques will allow you get even more "oomph!" out of smaller amounts of weights and they emphasize a whole-body participation - you're less likely to run into imbalance issues, such as "chicken legs" (you've seen him: Buddy with the *massively* developed upper torso and then little itty-bitty chicken legs underneath).

You can't get bulky or manly from lifting weights. I've been lifting for 6 months and I'm in no way, shape or form, any less feminine. DH tells me I look more compact since lifting weights.

I wish more women could see all the health benefits related to regular weight training and not be so tied to all-cardio workouts. But that's a discussion for another thread...

I would just like to add that if when you try to use heavy weights and it hurts you-don't do it!!

I'm one that would read all the advice to lift heavy and then I'd get elbow tendonitis or a shoulder injury and then I couldn't strength train at all.

There's a fine line between lifting enough to see results and getting injured.
Listen to your body.

I stick with light weights (3-5 lbs.) or resistance bands, and higher reps now. If I do a set until I feel the burn, I can see results.

Good luck

So, what is BodyPump considered? I do that twice a week and if I come out looking like the instructors? That is FINE WITH ME! Each muscle group is one song - for reps - some singles, some slow, some middle, some low...For squats I use 20kgs, , Chest, 10kgs, Clean press and rows (for back), I use 18kgs. For triceps, 10kgs, and for shoulders - depends on the exercise. but about 7kgs, and biceps, 7kgs. For lunges, again, depends on the routine, but about 7-8 kgs. And then sometimes we use weights for abs (5 kgs on the shoulder or overhead).

If a female is eating at a surplus and lifting heavy weights, she may start to look bulkier. This is almost certainly not because she is gaining large amounts of muscle. It is because she is gaining fat along with muscle, and her body fat percentage is getting higher. Bodybuilders often do a "bulk" (eat at a surplus while training to build muscle), followed by a "cut" (eat at a deficit, presumably while training & eating a relatively high amount of protein, to minimize muscle loss during the dieting process), to build more muscle mass and then shed the fat to look leaner.

Here's an article I've seen posted on 3FC before. The photo of a woman's thighs in cross-section is really illuminating:
http://www.stumptuous.com/honesty-is-the-best-policy

That bodypump class is amazing (I'm assuming you go to GoodLife?) I've been to the class a few times and I'm always sore afterwards. I find the reps with a low weight really work and builds up on endurance. I do heavier weights to build up muscle. I think it's good to change it up a bit and challenge your muscles, so although the bodypump is a great class, I also like the challenge of conditioning.....such as:

1) burpees up into a squat, lift up then down for 4 man pushups (do 10 of these) gets your heart rate up and builds strength and stamina!

2) burpees, then with 2 12lbs weights lift up into a shoulder press, drop weights and do a burpee. Do 20 of these. Less if you can't and build up to 20. Do 2 sets.

3) Planks on your elbows, then up on your palms (do 10) then back down into a plank on elbows and do an overhead reach. No break in between! Gets heartrate up and strengthen's your core

4) Milkmaid walk. This one kills haha....take 2 20lbs weights in each hand, shrug your shoulders as hard as you can, hold it and walk as fast as you can about 40steps.

Lower weights if you need to and build up.

Forget about 4. Focus on heavy weights for fewer reps, no matter the goal. As somebody mentioned earlier, "toning" as we know it is a made up concept.

I'm glad you posted this because I was thinking the exact same thing.

The thing is that your diet will really control how much muscle you gain (well, that and your hormones) and how much fat you lose. After your newbie gains, you'd have to be working really hard AND eating at a surplus to keep adding much muscle.

Heavy weights with fewer reps is the way to go. (Though it can be good to mix things up from time to time: like alternate workouts between low reps and higher reps. It's called periodization.) But there's really no good reason do be doing more than 12 of anything. "Toning" is just a euphemism for "building muscle."