My 5-year old asks me from time to time if we can do yoga together.  So yesterday we decided to do a little bit of yoga before bedtime for some mindful movements.  We kept the routine pretty simple and short.  Here’s the break down of the routine:

• Mindful Bodies: Sat facing each other- straight and still
• Mindful Breaths:  Took 5 deep breaths together
• 5 Cat/Cows
• 1 Downward Dog
• Walked her dog back to her hands and hung in Rag-Doll posture
• Slowly came up with arms above head into Mountain Posture
• Tree Posture on both sides
• 1 Childs Posture (aka Turtle)
• Drop to knees, roll onto back
• 1 Happy Baby

What I learned: 

• Important to keep it super short and sweet.
• Guide the deep breaths.
  • Deep breaths are not easy for young kids to grasp, so we counted 1-2-3 with each breath in, and 1-2-3 with each breath out.   This really helped as she initially did her deep breaths super fast and short.  
• Take baby steps.
  • For instance, tree posture is challenging for kids, so I just had her stand on her toes on 1 foot instead of going into the full tree posture.  Just like adult yoga, important to take baby steps to do the yoga at the level that you are at. 
• Keep it light-hearted and fun.
  • My daughter loved the postures that she could visualize as a real object.  We pretended we were the animals- we mooed like a cat or hissed like a cat.  We tried to stand up straight and tall like a tree. Her favorite part was pretending to roll on her back like a baby, which really made her chuckle.  Keeping it light helped us get a bit of relaxation before bedtime together.