I'm usually pretty hands on at the park, but age has made the swings less enjoyable (renders me dizzy) and anything that spins virtually impossible (vomit-city!). To be honest, once I plunk my butt down on a park bench it isn't long before I start thinking about the things I should be getting done at home. I love to watch my kids play, but the park bench feels like an assault on both my productivity and my sanity. So I'm hopeful that my new deck of Playground Pump cards will make park visits as much fun for me as they are for my kids this year.
A husband and wife team who work extensively in the field of health and fitness, Chris Rauchnot and Nancy Levin, created the cards as a way of "incorporating working out into your life" and to get clients "out of the gym and into the fresh air, sunlight, and sounds of nature." Sounds like a perfect fit for moms, doesn't it?The deck includes cards that are color coded by type of exercise (warm up, upper body, lower body, abs, and stretching), each using familiar equipment found at most playgrounds--swings, parallel bars, benches, monkey bars, rings.
For those of you who don't visit the park or have kids that nap, these exercises will work great on a backyard play structure, too. Focus on upper or lower body exercises, pick out cards using only certain types of equipment, or do a little of everything for a circuit training workout.
Got any great playground or backyard workouts to share? Maybe it's just your favorite piece of equipment (monkey bars for me!) or a funny experience. To help celebrate the March 29 release of Hot (Sweaty) Mamas: Five Secrets to Life as a Fit Mom (Andrews McMeel 2011), I'll pick a winner from the comments and send off a box of Playground Pump cards next week.
