What You Should Be Doing While Your TV Is On

Confession time: Our TV is on a lot.

I love the idea of living without a TV and spending all of our time outside and/or playing board games, but it’s just not going to happen any time soon. We do spend a lot of time outside and we do play games together, but we also watch a lot of TV.

We don’t have cable and we don’t even have our TV hooked up to receive regular channels. We watch Netflix and Amazon Prime shows. Plus, my fella is a video game guy.

But for the hours that the TV is on, it’s pretty rare that I am actively watching it.

I like the background noise and I’m known for watching the same shows over and over again while I do things around the house.

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So if your TV is on a lot and you want to get things done, here is my list of productive things you can do while watching TV:

Exercise

You know from my 20-minute fitness routine that I often get some exercise while watching TV. We have a small exercise bike that is completely silent (this one) which makes it perfect to ride while watching TV. I also do strength exercises like lunges or squats. It’s a great time to stretch too.

If you’re looking for something a bit more exciting, you can search Pinterest for drinking-game-style workouts for the show you’re watching.

The Gilmore Girls workout cracks me up. I haven’t tried it yet because I know it would kick my butt. All of the moments mentioned happen multiple times in each episode!

Fold Laundry

Laundry is one of my weekend chores. I do it all in one day and get it over with for the week.

After everything has been washed and dried, I usually turn on a show to watch while I fold.

I can usually fold everything in about 40 minutes which means 2 episodes of Parks & Rec or 1 episode of You Live in What?.

Pay Bills

It doesn’t take too much brain power to pay the bills, so I can usually do it with the TV on.

Record Spending

If I have a bunch of receipts saved up that need to be entered on our budget spreadsheet, I grab a calculator, pen, and my spreadsheet and make it happen.

Declutter/Pick up

A great way to spend time watching TV is decluttering. Go through stuff in whatever room your TV is in or just straighten and pick up.

No matter how many times I tell him, Mozzie just won’t put his toys back in the basket, so I pick up dog toys often.

Since I can watch Netflix on my iPad or Lappy (aka Laptop), I travel around the house picking up while watching something.

Wrap Presents

I’m a bit nutty about wrapping Christmas presents.

There’s never even that many to wrap, but I have fun getting all fancy about it so it takes a while. It’s pretty mindless work though, so why not watch a show or two?

Organize Photos

If you have a laptop or your computer is in your TV room, take some time to organize your photos during a show, or at least during commercials.

I don’t think I know anyone who has their photos organized and printed how they would like them to be. Think of how much more organized your photos would be from working on them for one show a night.

Bloggers: Edit Photos, Interact on Social Media, Outline Blog Posts…

To all of my fellow bloggers out there, take advantage of TV time and work on your blog.

You can be editing photos, interacting with people on social media, or outlining blog posts.

I don’t usually write with the TV on because it takes more concentration, but if it works for you, do it!

Relax!

I have to add this in. I think a lot of us are used to multitasking and doing 5 things at once.

We’re making dinner, checking up on Facebook and finishing the laundry all at once.

Sometimes we need to stop multitasking and just relax. That’s part of the joy of TV, right? You can get sucked into a great show and unwind.

So don’t forget that sometimes you don’t need to be productive while you watch TV. Sometimes you should just relax, turn of your phone, cuddle with your puppy or special someone, and be 100% where you are.

Side note: I’d love for you to follow me on Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram(if you like pictures of adorable dogs, food, and flowers), and/or Twitter.

⇒ What do you get done while watching TV?

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