Here’s How You Can Lose Weight While Doing Household Chores

“If winter is here, can spring be far behind?” Well, excuse us for getting all poetic, but we can’t wait for the beautiful spring to announce its presence. The lovely weather, the trench-coats, the cherry blossoms and the sunny days – oh how we miss those sunny days! Besides, what’s not to like about spring? Well, maybe there is just one thing though. Spring cleaning. All the cold weather and the snow is a pretty good excuse for not cleaning up the house well and proper. But when spring is here, it’s time to get busy. But here is some good news for you! Spring cleaning is still happening, but this might be something even better. Since lifestyle is a new religion these days, staying fit and healthy is a must. If you find that going to a gym every day is challenging, we have news. Household chores can actually help you lose weight too! Depending on the intensity of a chore, you can  lose a lot of calories. Does spring cleaning sound too bad now? We hope not! So here are a few chores that you should be doing every day in order to get a nice waistline and a tidy and clean home!

Mopping Floors And Cleaning

This surely tops the list for our spring cleaning. Vacuum cleaning the entire house, mopping the hardwood or concrete floors and cleaning the kitchen can be done in a day, but it is a huge task. Half an hour of carpet cleaning with your vacuum cleaner itself can burn you as much as 90 calories, which is 15 minutes worth of kickboxing! Okay, now we have gotten your attention. If you have a step tracker, vacuuming can help you reach 10,000 steps easily.  As for mopping – it is great for your arms and shoulders and can help you lose 153 calories in just an hour. Show those dirty, dusty floors some love and see how your body benefits from it. If you are cleaning bathrooms too, remember scrubbing bathtubs for just 15 minutes burns 90 calories and can help to remove that extra flab that you hate.

Washing Dishes

Think again before handing the dish-washing chore to your spouse. 15 minutes of dish-washing every night can result in 560 calories burnt in just about a week. It can be very well your post-dinner light work out too. Especially if you need to scrub very hard. Add to this the loading and unloading of your dishwasher and you can get another 100 calories burnt provided you spent around 30 minutes doing everything. Just imagine how gratifying the chores will look like when you also get to think of the calories you are burning each time while doing it.

Gardening

Now that everything looks spic and span, and the snow has melted, it’s time to make the place look beautiful and since it is spring, we can’t forget seasonal flowers. Gardening is a great way to keep fit, be active, burn calories and make your front yard or backyard look great. But first you need to mow the lawn and an hour of doing it will help you lose up to 325 calories! Most of us would feel like mowing the grass every day of the week if possible after reading this! Wait – there’s more! 30 minutes of planting trees, clearing weeds, watering plants will help you lose further 213 calories, while also creating a healthier environment.

Ironing

Are you currently thinking “how can ironing help us lose calories?” Just three hours in a week, as you try to make those creases go away, can help you lose 425 calories. Standing helps us burn calories too and add to that all the moving around the clothes helps as well. It also works the muscles on your hands, so make sure you are switching hands while at it! Apart from helping you lose calories, who doesn’t like to wear freshly laundered and pressed clothes to the office every day!

You can, of course, use machines or hire people to do the work for you. But since, now you know how your body benefits from all these chores, we are sure you will have or being to build the motivation to do it all by yourself. Washing cars or moving around furniture also helps lose 100 or more calories. Not calling the handyman or going to the drive-thru car wash will help in saving money too. A win-win situation for all! So the next time you think about cleaning your house, don’t say “not again”, but be happy that you 1. have a house to clean and that 2. you can do it!