Achieve body fitness through household chore activities

If you are a housewife, who spends most of the time in kitchen and courtyard, why can’t you make it a physical exercise to maintain body fitness? If it’s the case of a working woman, she complains most about the lack of time to do physical exercises. If you can’t spare time for exercises, your household activities can be tuned to workouts and release a few fat deposits of your body. Though they can’t give the benefits of heavy exercises, they definitely provide some benefits of light workouts. When you think chore activities as methods to reduce weight, you may feel interested in completing them too. Here I suggest a few household activities to improve physical fitness and reduce obesity and tummy.

Sweep your courtyard for 25 minutes to reduce 100 calories

Broom is a magic which can burn 100 calories of your body if you are willing to do ‘workout’ with it for 25 minutes in the early morning. A lengthy broom with less physical effort doesn’t do the job. Instead choose a short one and put some physical effort to sweep your courtyard for 25 minutes. Exchange the broom between the hands, and stop bending in between, to give relief to hands and backbone occasionally. If you bend for a long time, it may result in back pain.

Have a brisk walk for 5 minutes before you start the job – A warm up exercise. Walk slowly on your courtyard or simply a stretching exercise is sufficient. Slowly fold your fingers and release it and repeat it a few times and also rotate both hands in both directions. Gently fold and release your legs as well. Now take broom in your hands. This broom exercise is good for muscles of hands, waist and belly. Try to do it regularly almost at the same time to get better results. It brings a good discipline to your life style also.

Floor cleaning for 20 minutes to burn 100 calories

House cleaning and maintenance is exclusively reserved for ladies. Though it’s to be done in daily basis, due to busy job schedules it may not be possible always. You can do it on alternate days. Otherwise, categorize rooms and clean two rooms each daily. It’s not a fixed task done in a uniform pattern. You may walk, bend and arrange things for this task. Use broom to clean dust behind almarahs and beneath beds. It is an effective physical exercise and burns a few calories also.

Days have gone when ladies used to sit on floors and clean it using cotton clothes. Now majority people use mops. Exchange mop between two hands once in every minute. Also put some physical efforts, take steps forward and backward during the process. But if you are deeply interested to achieve good shape and fitness, sit on floor and take some extra efforts. You can use both your hands for this process, and it is a good exercise to hand muscles. You can also give your legs a little bit exercise by doing the process using legs occasionally.

Washing clothes for 20 minutes to burn 100 calories

Give a little bit rest to washing machine. Instead wash clothes on stone as it gives you best body exercise. If you take some physical efforts, giving work to hands, and bend once in a while to give some effort to belly, 20 minutes of efforts can burn 100 calories. You can change it to an exercise beneficial to all body muscles if you desire so. Once washing process is complete, you can dry clothes on clothes line tied a little bit high. You can take cloth once by one, shake it well and hang on cloth line. This exercise strengthens muscles of belly, apart from giving a combo exercise to back, neck, shoulders, hands and waist.

Wash bathroom for 20 minutes and burn 100 calories

Bathroom should be kept clean and tidy and it’s an everyday process. If you clean it daily, only a little effort is sufficient. But to reduce calories, it’s not sufficient. Rub the walls and floors to burn some extra calories. You can do this job once in every week, may be at weekend. Use a brush to rub walls and floor, and exert some manual pressure too. You can move your hands clockwise direction for a few minutes and then in anti-clockwise direction while cleaning process, to give some exercises to shoulder and hand muscles. You can also clean ceiling and windows by using a lengthy broom. Clean the ventilation and wash it using soap powder.

Work in kitchen for 3 hours and burn 100 calories

Though cooking is not a great manual effort, you can change your passion to a good exercise too. Find more time to walk to and fro within the kitchen, to burn some calories. While cleaning vegetables you can keep a little distance from tap, and reach it for washing vegetables once in a while, adding more efforts to work. Similarly you can change many of your easy habits to difficult ones, giving your body some extra work effort.

Today’s modular kitchen is designed in such a way that everything is easily accessible, and convenient for cooking and cleaning as well. Machines are provided each and every corner to lessen our manual efforts and time consumption. Cooktops with auto mode are also available. You can change the easy accessibility of things in kitchen to give some extra efforts to body muscles to find them. You can reduce the use of vegetable-cutting machines and grinding machines in your kitchen too.

Washing cutlery is also a great manual effort. When you complete this process too, along with cooking, at least 200 calories will be burned off. It burns more calories if you wash dishes together, instead of washing them in between the cooking and preparation process. When same type of muscle movements are repeated for long time, the exercise is more effective.

Gardening for 40 minutes and burn 100 calories

You can use your leisure time for gardening, and also make it a daily habit too. It gives refreshment to both body and soul. Plucking of weeds and digging pits to plant new saplings, and watering plants can give you some physical exercise. Instead of using a hose, you can collect water in a bucket and walk a few steps to water your plants. If so 20 minutes of efforts can burn 100 calories. You can also change the position of flowerpots to give a new look to garden. When you take each and every effort in your garden, keep in mind that you are taking this effort for your body fitness too. If you are willing to work at least 1 hour in garden, it can burn 250-300 calories. Though processes like changing the position of pots can’t be done on a regular basis, you can do the rest tasks in your garden daily to stay slim and fit.

Arranging things in room burns 100 calories

You might be taking a lot of efforts for cleaning process and arrange things in your rooms. If you can find time to remove dust and rearrange things in every room once a week, it can burn a lot of calories. Walk through the room to and fro to complete the process. You can also take objects in hand during cleaning process. Otherwise you can arrange things in a corner for some time, then go to another room and continue the process. In short, never stick on to one place or room during the process.

Change curtains and bed sheets once in every week. When you remove dust from curtains, blankets and pillows, it increases the amount of energy spend for the process. You can postpone the tasks like cleaning almarahs and shoe racks to some another day. You can fold your clothes once again and place them back to almarahs or wardrobes. Some clothes may be moist due to fungal attack. Dry them under sun before placing back. You can remove dust from books and place them back. Bend down to take books together, giving some physical effort to back bone and stomach. Do the same process for shoe racks too. Such tasks for 20 minutes can burn at least 100 calories easily.

Image source: Pixabay        

Also read a few more articles on body fitness. Click on the images in the gallery to read

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Sandy

A freelance writer and blogger by profession since October 2011, interested in writing over a wide range of topics. Hope you enjoy my writings. I belong to one of the beautiful places of the world, Kerala, nicknamed as 'God's own country'.

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