Exclude sticky posts from Home.php

I am attempting to exclude all sticky posts from my home.php page in Adventurous theme. I have specified a category to be shown on the home page. When I stick any post, it appears above the category posts - which is normal. What I want is not to show the sticky posts in the home page. I tried this code in home.php $the_query = new WP_Query( array( 'post__not_in' => get_option( 'sticky_posts' ) ) ); but it removes the front page category's posts. How can I exclude the sticky posts from Home.php??!