I admit, I went shopping the day after Thanksgiving but not during the wee hours of the morning. Instead, my sister and I woke up, had our breakfast and went to face the masses around 10:00 in the morning. Now, my sister is a shopper. She had a list of stores she wanted to go to with a list of hopeful purchases. Even though we were not super successful on the purchasing side of things we did shop for six hours. I was exhausted to say the least. Fighting traffic, finding parking, waiting in line, dodging people to get to where you want to go and waiting in line for food felt like I just ran a marathon. Thanksgiving weekend I also decorated the house for Christmas and baked 500 cookies. To say the least my Thanksgiving weekend wasn’t as relaxing as I had wished. However, while I looked back on my eventful holiday weekend I wondered, how much energy did it take for me to do everything that I did that weekend.
Holiday Calorie Busters
- Carrying Groceries for 5 minutes –> 13 calories
- Changing bed linens for 15 minutes –> 40 calories
- Standing in line for 30 minutes –> 47 calories
- Wrapping gifts for 30 minutes –> 48 calories
- Decorating the Christmas tree for 30 minutes –> 85 calories
- Baking and preparing food for 1 hour –> 159 calories
- Cleaning house for 1 hour –> 191 calories
Now, even though I did every single one of the list lists above this is clearly not something I do on a daily basis. However, take advantage of these opportunities when you can.
Burning Calories during the Holidays
- Shop till you drop –> When you shop this holiday season don’t look at parking in the back as a bad thing. Instead, relish in this factor that you are getting exercise. To add more steps to your day each time you buy something take it out to your car to burn more calories.
- Think of Snow as your Friend –>It does not take a lot of shoveling snow to increase your heat rate. Just by shoveling for 30 minutes you can burn 223 calories. Now that is a great workout!
- Prepping the house –> Guests add another level of stress to ones life around the holidays. Housework is one of those extra stresses that comes with guests. Just by doing normal household chores can burn up to 200 calories.
This holiday season enjoy it, with everything it takes just to prepare for the holidays, you deserve it!
Resources
www.webmd.com/fitness-exercise/features/10-ways-to-burn-off-holiday-calories#1
www.healthland.time.com/2013/12/10/11-ways-to-burn-calories-with-holiday-cheer/