7 Creative Ways to Burn 200 Calories ...

1. Go Bowling

One of my favorite ways to burn 200 calories is to go bowling. It's an activity that can be enjoyed by people of different ages and is a great way to tone and strengthen your upper body. Bowling can also speed up your metabolism and improve your balance. If you enjoy bowling, consider joining a bowling league in your area. If that's not an option, perhaps you could make it a regular family activity.

2. Jump Rope

Did you enjoy jumping rope when you were a child? You may be surprised to know that if you jump rope for 15-20 minutes, you can burn 200 calories. Jumping rope is a great way to build both upper and lower body strength. Best of all, this is an activity that can be done anywhere. If it's been awhile since you've jumped rope, it's best to start with a beaded rope because it will keep its shape and be easier to use than other types.

3. Just Dance

You don't have to be a professional ballroom dancer to burn a ton of calories while dancing. Depending on the intensity and duration, dancing can actually burn just as many calories as activities like swimming and bike riding. Dancing also helps improve your strength, flexibility and endurance. There are a variety of different types of dances that you may enjoy doing, such as line dancing, Zumba, Salsa, Jazzercise and Belly Dancing. When doing any of these dances for 40 minutes, you'll burn at least 200 calories.

4. Play Video Games

While I do not play video games very often, they can be fun. My favorite ones are those that can be played on the Nintendo Wii, such as golf and tennis. Video games like these get you up and moving and can burn a surprising 250 calories per hour. Videos games that you play while sitting down will burn about 80 calories per hour. This is also an activity that you can do with your kids from time to time.

5. Yard Work

When the weather is nice, you can easily burn 200 calories by doing yard work. If you mow the lawn with a push mower, it only takes about 30 minutes to burn 200 calories. It also speeds up your metabolism and increases your upper body strength. Raking leaves and planting flowers are some other ways to quickly burn calories outside. Yard work is also an excellent way to clear your mind and relieve stress.

6. Shopping

You can quickly burn 200 calories by shopping for a few hours. Plus, every time you try on a different outfit, you can burn an extra 11 calories. If you don't enjoy shopping for clothes, that's okay. You can burn some serious calories while grocery shopping. Pushing a shopping cart around the grocery store for an hour will burn up to 243 calories. If you bag your own groceries and load them in the car, you'll burn even more.

7. House Cleaning

If you need a little extra motivation to clean your house, you should know that you can burn a lot of calories while doing many household chores. When you clean your house for 1 hour you can easily burn 197 calories. Household chores like scrubbing the bathtub for 30 minutes will burn 200 calories and tone up your arm and shoulder muscles, too. When you vacuum for 15 minutes you'll be able to burn as many calories as you would kickboxing. If you hand wash your dishes instead of putting them in the dishwasher, you'll burn another 160 calories.

As you can see, exercise doesn't have to be boring. There are many fun activities you can do to burn calories. What are some of the creative ways you exercise? I'm looking forward to hearing your thoughts.