When you’re a busy parent, finding the time for you and your fitness routine can be difficult. Here are some essential tips for staying active and having fun with the kids during half term and school holidays.
Introduce your kids to the great outdoors
Whether you’re exploring the wilderness on family camping trips or enjoying sunny walks on your local footpaths, little ones and grownups were born to be outdoors.
Finnish schoolchildren spend 15 minutes playing outside for every 45 minutes in the classroom to help develop learning skills, connect with nature, and reduce their dependency on technology for playtime.
No wonder Finland ranked as fifth happiest country on the planet in the 2017 World Happiness Report!
Teaching your kids how to navigate, asking them to help around the campsite and setting up scavenger hunts keep them entertained, teach them new skills and allow them to develop passion for wild places.
Naturally, walking is also perfect for getting fit, burning fat, building core muscles and destressing from the distractions of busy city lifestyles. We recommend using our abs belts to get ready for longer walks.
“When we all visited the Peak District, not only was I able to keep up, but I felt invigorated,” says mum and toning belt user Elizabeth. “I even carried my daughter in our baby carrier for stretches of the hike.”
Notably, clinical trials also found that toning with our abs belts while walking can enhance your results and boost body confidence (Anderson, 2006).
Inspire little ones to start a lifelong hobby
Spring half terms and summer holidays are the perfect time to introduce your children to the activities you’re passionate about.
Get some low-impact cardiovascular exercise while teaching your kids how to ride a bike or book them in for a supervised taster session at the local climbing centre while you build core strength on the wall.
When introducing your children to cycling, we recommend safe and sunny car-free spots like the park. You could even swing by the playground to work those abdominals and shoulders on the monkey bars.
Encouraging your bambinos to keep fit and have fun at an early age can inspire lifelong habits like bike commuting instead of driving and finding time for regular exercising. They may even climb mountains!
Include the kids in your workout routines
If exercise videos are part of your morning or evening fitness routine, inspire your children to take part and have fun.
“YouTube HIIT workouts are a godsend!” says mum-of-two and full-time city worker Wendy (pictured). “I don’t have to leave the house and I can either exercise when my kids are in bed or they can join in.”
Little ones are perfect for adding some weight to core exercises like squats, shoulder presses, Russian twists and stomach crunches.
You can also track your progress by timing how long you can hold the plank position with a munchkin on your back. Remember to engage your core and abdominal muscles while keeping a straight spine.
Don’t forget to turn up the music so that your kids can dance along to the beat and tucker themselves out before bedtime.
Slendertone Abs8 and Slendertone Ab5 include toning programmes which are perfect for getting more out of abdominal muscle workouts.
We have even more fitness tips for busy mums.
