If you have a dog or a child, you know how difficult it is to try to work out at home. Sure, they’re all occupied when you make up your mind to work out, but as soon as you begin, they arrive like ants to a picnic. The dog wants to lay on top of you, under you, has to go out, or wants a treat for absolutely no reason (for a good laugh, check out this video). The child wants help, has a burning question, wants to work out with you, or also wants to eat something. It’s Murphy’s Law applied to a mother’s home workout.
Usually this will make me try to schedule my workouts around when both the dog and child are sleeping, except in the case of yoga. I love doing yoga. It may sound cliché, but it’s both grounding and a great workout. During this pregnancy, yoga has been a necessity. When I don’t practice, my body feels so much worse: more soreness, more swelling, more back pain – overall, it’s not good. When I find time to practice yoga, however, a wonderful thing happens. I feel great!
Yoga is also something that both Little Bear and Ziggy love to join in on. And when I mean join in, I mean they take over my mat and both practice their downward dog! This doesn’t make for the most relaxing practice, except that now I’ve found a way to beat them at their own game! I stage my yoga practice.
Part One: Yoga for Little Bear
Part Two: Yoga for Momma Bear
(Part Three: Yoga for Ziggy, aka Doggy Savasana on Momma Bear’s mat)
For part one of my plan of attack, I had been trying to just work through some poses on my own. It never went very well, as Little Bear always wanted to join in on one of the yoga videos I would use to do my own yoga practice. However, since discovering Deb Weiss-Gelmi’s Sing Song Yoga program, Little Bear has been more than happy to have a chance to do yoga that entertains him while he practices!
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Getting ready to start the Sing Song Yoga DVD!
Image may be NSFW.
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The Sing Song Yoga program works through core yoga poses by introducing them through short songs sung to familiar tunes. Weiss-Gelmi has developed a DVD, app, a classroom yoga program, and also offers Sing Song Yoga classes in Grand Rapids.
The first time we worked through the DVD, Little Bear wanted to try to sing along to Image may be NSFW.
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every song and was paying close attention to what he needed to do. Since it was his first time with the DVD, he obviously couldn’t sing along to all the words and lagged a bit in terms of the moves and poses, but the difference between using the DVD and trying to get into poses without the songs was enormous! He was way more interested in achieving the correct poses and wanted to try to do more than the poses he had been previously exposed to.
The whole DVD runs for 45 minutes, but it is broken up into chunks, so you can choose to go through one section or even choose certain poses to practice. Little Image may be NSFW.
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Bear is almost 3 and a half, and enjoys working through about two thirds of the DVD. Older children would naturally be able to work through more of the DVD, while younger children would benefit from watching poses that you pick out for them. Furthermore, because the program works on the basis of song, kids can practice listening to the songs for instructions, obviously with reinforcement coming from the video itself. It even came across my mind that it would be great to have this available as an MP3 on my iPhone! That way no matter where we went, if Little Bear needed an opportunity to stretch, recharge, and burn off a bit of energy (read: road trip), we could turn on the Sing Song Yoga songs and get a little workout in! While that isn’t an option in the program, the Sing Song Yoga app makes the program totally portable and easy to stream onto any TV with HDMI adapters or Apple TV.
Yoga is not just a way of exercise, it is a lifestyle. It helps relax, calm, and soothe. It’s something that I think is extremely important to introduce children to, and the Sing Song Yoga program makes it easy, convenient, and fun to do just that right at home. I can’t wait to continue using the program with Little Bear.
What’s your favourite exercise routine to do with your children?
Deb Weiss-Gelmi kindly sent us the Sing Song Yoga DVD for purpose of this review. All opinions expressed here are completely our own
Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Image may be NSFW.Clik here to view.
