Here comes the sun, or rather here it stays out longer. Hip hip hooray, it is that time of year that we get back our long days and short nights. I am a sun worshiper, so I know I am happy to be back to fully taking advantage of the longer daylight hours. A lot of us that are parents have to also contend with the kids on this extra time outside, so how can you have some valuable me time but also family time out in the great outdoors? One of the easiest fun ways to take advantage for me is to hop down with Tristan to our local playground and get my workout on while he plays, and sometimes my cutie likes to mimic me and try out what mommy is doing. It is a great way to show my little stinker that even mommy thinks it is important to ‘play’ outside and get some exercise, and get to spend time with him. I mix in a lot to my playground workout because of my varied background, I do a little yoga, some martial skill, some personal training movement/cross training, some Pilates, and throw in some runs around the playground chasing my little man for fun.
I am featuring some yoga exercises in this month’s blog below. This is a great way to enhance your current yoga practice and with some of the beginners poses add in to any playground workout. Well, enjoy sharing the extra sunlight with your loved ones and get your yoga on.
What are some of your favorite ways to enjoy the extra daylight with family? Share below.
Until next time, enjoy the good life,
Woman on the Journey
{img 2138} Here are some great ways to practice your yoga even when you have the kiddies. Take it to the park. Remember to warm up with movements like this seated twist. This would also be a great place to put up a leg on the other step and do single and double leg stretches. Use your imagination, be like a kid again and have fun at the playground with the kids or without them. When doing seated twists remember to keep your back straight, thinking of a string pulling up at the top of your head, keep your shoulders relaxed and down. Let your gaze more over the shoulder you are twisting towards to get full seated twist, causing the twist to move from base of spine all the way up the neck. Always use deep yogic breaths in poses. (In and out of the nose, warms the body faster).
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Balance beams are an obvious and terrific spot to work on your yoga balance moves like tree and dancer poses. There is no cheating on a beam, so you will get to really work on your concentration and form. This is a spot to practice martial balance poses too if you practice tai chi or any martial art, like crane pose.
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A ladder like of chain climbing area is a great way to start to get your reach deeper in triangle and warrior poses. Start reaching for the bar in front of you if you can hold for 20 to 30 seconds using your core and not putting pressure on the bar you can continue to move down till you reach your foot. Remember in triangle not to let top hip rotate down, think of one hand on that hip and another on your chest rotating hip back and chest open; like your heart wants to greet the sun. Arms straight across and shoulders relaxed down. Make sure not to lock your knees.
Here are two ways of using planking to get your workout on. Pictures at to the side are showing a swing plank crunch. Starting in plank hands directly under your shoulders and core engaged to keep back flat, slowly bend knees and pull them into chest, gluts in the air, core engaged, breath. Go in and out slowly to get a stronger core for jump through in yoga salutations. (Always keep shoulder down and elbow rolled in toward body in plank it is easy to crunch shoulders up and can cause shoulder issues).
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In bottom pictures we see plank moving into different levels on a ladder to add less or more of a challenge. You can also add a yogic triceps push-up here to encourage even more arm strength. Keep elbows rolled into the body as you drop and lifts with heels pushing back and core engaged to a flat back.
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Monkey bar hanging extensions are great for shoulder strengthening and core. Keep your shoulders back and down, don not let them shrunk to your ears. Core engaged flat back, begin to lift knees, you can hold or extend and pull up knees, also eventual straight leg lifts into a yoga/Pilates boat variation.
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The Superman pose, again using a ladder effect, you can slowly raise your upper body higher. Keeping shoulder rolled back and down, legs together and lifted, core engaged and lift torso to first rung. Slowly lift hands off rung slightly and hold 20-30 seconds when you can comfortable do this several times try to see if you can reach the next rung and go back to lifting for 20-30 seconds at a time and so on. Keep your hip and belly button on the ground!
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Locust is our next pose. Bring your chin to the ground, with your hands behind you and slightly under your torso, palms flat. Then lift both legs to bottom rung of ladder. Core should be engaged to keep back from arching. Slowly lift one leg up as high as you can and hold for 20-30 seconds, then switch sides, this is half Locust Pose. Rest between with belly on ground knees bent. After try engaging back to ladder with both feet then engaging core muscles try slightly lifting both legs in full Locust Pose. If can hold 20-to 30 seconds try next rung in ladder.
Back bending fun, to help learn beautiful open and safe back bending skills it is nice to use a wall or in this case a pole to grab into to help guide you deeper into a back bend while still helping to keep good form by keeping hips forward and heart lifted to protect the lower back. To the left we see standing back bend like in Sun Salutations and eventually can be a good place to learn how to go into Wheel Pose from standing position. To the right we see a starting version of Camel Pose. Only practice these poses by yourself if you are a more advanced practitioner if you are choosing to go into the pose deeply. It is also good to have a spotter to catch you if needs be.
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Elbow Stand and Scorpion pose, these are advanced moves so please do not try these on your own if you are not experienced. I loved this playground wall because it has slits to walk your feet down to help with scorpion. To get perfect arms for your elbow stand and scorpion poses start by getting into table top put elbows down and measure by grabbing opposite elbows with hands, keeping elbows glued to floor open hands out slightly wider then elbows. Curl toes under and get into a perfect inverted v pose with hips and legs. Step one leg into lung then kick up back leg to wall, keeping core engaged and shoulders rolled back, and chest lifted forward as you look up to wall. when reach wall pull up other leg as well straighten lifting slowly one leg up to the sky engaging core, switch, eventually lifting both legs up to sky without collapsing back to wall. To do Scorpion pose just do Elbow Stand pose then with leaving legs from wall slowly using walls to walk feet down towards head, keep opening heart towards wall and looking up, core strong.
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