How to Be Physically Active During the Winter Without Leaving the House

If you live in a climate that has snow half the year it can be challenging to be physically active as much as you'd like and maintain a good weight. Winter sports can get very expensive and walking around the mall gets boring very quickly. Here are some ideas to get you moving without having to leave the house or spend a lot of money.

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Radio or CD's
• Yoga book or video from the library
• Exercise video from the library
• kids-yours or a friend's
• household chores

1. Turn up the music and dance! It doesn't matter what kind of music you play or how you dance-just move. Even slow dancing is better than sitting on the couch or in front of the computer.

2. Learn Yoga. It doesn't take long to learn yoga and it is good for any age. Yoga will help to energize and align your body. It is a great low impact way to move your body and exercise. Check out books or videos from the library that teach you how to do different styles of yoga. Carpeting or a yoga mat is very useful for some poses.

3. If you want higher impact or even just faster movement, check out aerobic or weight lifting videos from the library. Eventually you could make your own workouts based on the things that you learn.

4. Play with kids. Kids have amazing energy and will love it if you push all the furniture and breakables out of the way and run in circles with them! Play hide and seek with them. Play Simon Says, The Hokey Pokey or copy-cat games. The point is to just move, so who cares how silly it all looks!

5. Do household work by hand. Forget the dishwasher and wash dishes by hand. Let the mixer sit in the cupboard, and knead and shape bread and pasta by hand. Get on your hands and knees and scrub that floor. Leave the scrubbing bubbles in their can, and use natural cleaners like baking soda, vinegar and elbow grease to scrub the tub.

Tips & Warnings

• When running around with kids, make sure that there are no corners to fall into. You wouldn't want you heart rate to be up due to a trip to the emergency room instead of exercise.

[QueenofMisc]

on 5/13/2009 great tips! i love yoga and playing with the kids will certainly get you active; plus it's lots of fun!:-)