Parent-Child Yoga

A mom's (or dad's) life is pretty busy, and often you can find yourself wondering when you will have the chance to relax. I’m here to tell you that time can be today (and every day if you choose)! How?

Parent-Child Yoga!

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Not only is it relaxing for you, but it is also a bonding experience with your child, that offers them many developmental benefits such as:

• Fine Motor Skills

• Mental acuity and focus

• Hand-eye coordination

• Mind/body developmental awareness

• Coping skills 

• Increased awareness and "sense of self"

A child's brain is doing a ton of growing in between birth and eight years old. Breathing and stretching has been found to be very helpful for developing the brain and keeping the child's emotions under control. Yoga combines both breathing and stretching--awesome! 

I have a friend who does this with her 3 little girls EVERY DAY, and they love it! They actually started doing it together because her oldest (who was only 4 at the time) asked to join her, and slowly, as the younger ones got old enough, they joined in too (her youngest started trying at 2, but it was only sporadic and more like tumbling than yoga). 
Her advice is if they don’t seem interested or they get tired of it quickly to just let them do their own thing for a while. The trick is to have something quiet already prepared for them to do in the same room as you; such as reading, coloring, playing with balls or blocks. Just remember that kids have short attention spans, and need to move to learn, so don’t expect your sessions to be very long nor to stay on one pose for very long. There are many places in the Utah County area that offer children’s Yoga classes; this may be a good thing to check out to get some ideas for at home (one time passes are usually between $6 and $12 dollars), and so you know what to expect.

Please, leave comments with your experiences and/or tips in doing mom and child yoga!