Encouraging your family to get more active in 2023 is a fantastic way of getting fitter yourself, spending more time together and adding a lot of fun into the bargain! Whatever your priorities, whether it’s weight loss, improving your family’s general health and wellbeing or anything else, it all helps. That’s why we’ve come up with some brilliant family fitness ideas that you can enjoy together, either at home or while you’re out and about.
The key to swapping the sedentary sofa regimes for healthier, more active habits, is to make sure they’re fun. You also need to make sure everyone in the whole family can take part, regardless of age or fitness level.
Family Fitness
Once the kids go back to school in January and we go back to work after the Christmas and New Year break it’s easy to make excuses or revert to old habits. We may say we don’t have the time to exercise or to train. But for most of us, family time is something we have learnt to appreciate even more and see as essential.
Why not combine the two? Make fitness and activity a priority and instil a love for exercise in the kids from a young age. This could range from walking more, taking more bike rides and even hosting regular dance parties in the lounge. You could even try the family fun swimming sessions at your local Everyone Active centre.
Walk More
If you’re fortunate enough to live within walking distance of your child’s school, or can walk to work, then why not do so? Walking regularly helps to improve your sleep and your mood, as well as increasing focus and reducing stress. It’ll also help promote long-term healthy family exercise habits and saves you from getting stuck in the school drop off queue/zone and rush hour traffic when the kids are back at school.
You can even extend this to your supermarket shop, particularly if you’re only picking up a few essentials. Use it as an excuse to leave the car at home and walk to the shops. Make it your family’s New Year’s resolution to walk more in 2023!
Living Room Workouts
We host a great variety of live and pre-recorded workouts on our social media pages. These are perfect for the whole family and the ideal way to get your family more active in 2023.
Take a look at our Facebook, Instagram and YouTube pages for some of our family-friendly workouts.
Alongside our free social media sessions, there’s also our Everyone On Demand service, which gives you access to an enormous range of video workouts from across the fitness universe. It gives you access to the widest range of fitness and wellness partners on the market.
Our hand-picked partners create a 360-degree solution, supporting you both in and out of the gym. Dip in and out of each product as you please – perhaps choosing a personal training session one day and five minutes of meditation the next. Nothing could be better for helping your family get more active in 2023.
Mini-Me Workout
Want to stay active but aren’t quite ready to hit the gym again and are juggling childcare and other priorities? Have a think if there any fitness classes or regimes you particularly enjoy such as BODYPUMP or circuits. You might want to take on the role of the family’s personal trainer and try adapting some of the moves into a child-friendly workout. You can show the kids what it involves and why you like it so much.
Dance like no-one is Watching
This is one our favourite kids activities, move your furniture aside and let the kids play DJ by turning your living room into your very own dance party. You’ll all have hours of endless family fitness fun, dancing, miming and singing the words to each other’s favourite songs.
You can even draw the curtains and take it in turns flashing a torch to create some cool lighting effects. You might even pick up a move or two from each other! There’s few better ways of getting active as a family than dancing!
Go to the Park
As we get out of winter and the weather improves (hopefully), there’s more opportunity to visit local parks and green spaces with your family. Visiting the park offers a whole host of family fitness fun for both kids and adults. Raise your pulse playing football or even jumping around the basketball court. Many parks also have exciting places to explore and are great for everyone to enjoy a bike ride – especially if the weather is playing ball and the sun’s out. The open spaces mean you can let you and your family’s imagination run wild and just enjoy yourselves. Why not make a day of it and enjoy a healthy picnic while you’re there?
Bike Ride
Cycling provides a scenic and superb low-impact family fitness workout, meaning you’ll burn around 300 calories an hour as a group and it’s the perfect way to get more active as a family in 2023. Many towns and cities have several bike lanes and cycle routes to help keep the public healthy and safe.
To hit the road, all you and your family needs are bikes, helmets and water bottles.
Depending on where you live, a few rides around your local area should help you all build or maintain your physical fitness. Vary your route as you begin to get more familiar with your neighbourhood.
Pick Some Treats
Although this is usually seasonal, fruit picking is fantastic way to have fun and exercise with family members. You’ll all enjoy a day out in the sunshine (this isn’t guaranteed, however…) sampling delicious fresh fruit. Strawberries, blueberries, raspberries and blackberries should all be able to pick/buy from your local farm shop or picking field.