Schools out and summer holidays are here. Along with this comes day camp, sleeping in and of course summer vacations! As parents at times we need a vacation to recover from the vacation we just had with our family. The list making of what to bring, the packing of suitcases, bringing food along for the drive, packing games and activities for the car and making sure pets are taken care of while you are away and the mail brought in, is just the beginning preparation of getting away as a family. My husband and I, being new parents, just took our first family vacation. The amount of stuff we had to bring with an infant and the two of us was out of this world! You can read about our journey at Nameste Mommy.
If you have a long car ride ahead you may be a little worried about the possible endless “are we there yet?” requests. Why not do a little yoga in the car to calm your own nerves while having fun with the kids piled in the back of the van?
1) Tense & Relax- tighten up your whole body from the top of your head to the tips of your toes. Scrunch up your faces while you do it and see who has the funniest face! Then relax your whole body, becoming limp like a piece of cooked spaghetti. Relax your cheeks, mouth, shoulders, arms, etc.
2) Visualization- Take a look out your window and find a tree that catches your attention. Maybe it was the tallest one you saw, shortest one, had many leaves, large branches, etc. Then close your eyes and visualize that tree in your mind. Can you remember what the branches looked like? Was the tree was blowing in the wind or standing still? Was the tree close to the road or farther away in a field?
3) Cooling Breath- feeling a little overheated while in the car full of your luggage and your kids? Kids complaining that their sibling is looking at them or has happened to touch them (gasp!) Take time out to chill your mind and bring down your internal body heat with this cooling breathe. Stick out your tongue (not at each other!) and roll it to mimic a drinking straw. Slowly inhale through your “straw”, feeling the air become cool as it travels over your tongue and down into your body. Exhale through your nose. Continue to inhale through your “straw” and exhale through your nose until everybody in the car is laughing and enjoying the car ride together. Well, for now anyways
Namaste
~Amanda
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