I know that walking counts and so does organized exercise, biking, swimming.

Any chance that mowing the lawn with a push mower could count or what about gardening which involves, bending, pulling, shoveling, hoeing, etc?

What do you think?

Are you kidding? Walking around in the yard pushing heavy machinary while in the heat, sweating your butt off? Uh, yeah, i would think that would count BIG TIME.

I do a lot of gardening and i count that too. Anytime there is movement and i am sweating, i count it. Ha ha.

W/W does allow for it but for me personally I don't count anything except for traditional exercise.

We have a large hilly yard, and when our old riding mower broke my DH wanted to run to Lowe's to buy a new John Deere. I wasn't too hip on spending that kind of money, so I said what about the push mower? It works. He responded that if I wanted to push mow it, that was fine with him, and that I was now 'in charge' of the yard. Well, I'm a little stubborn, so I got out there with the push mower in the middle of a hot July day and started to push. I was determined to finish the whole yard, and with my husband peeking out the window, I pushed and pushed. Let me tell you, that was one of the hardest workouts I think I've ever had. After about 1 1/2 my husband came out with a glass of gatorade and a sandwich and told me to stop (I wasn't nearly finished). He proved his point, and I felt like I had run a marathon.

My point is that any activity where you have your heart rate up for a sustained period of time (20 min or more) DOES count as cardio exercise, so of course it would count toward your activity points.

p.s. That was 2 summers ago, and yes, he got his new riding mower!!

Yep, I sweat and feel like I'm getting a work out with my push mower too - it's not self propelled.

And my gardening works muscles that I forgot I had. After a good day of gardening, I can get so stiff I can hardly move. That's why I asked.

I agree with the idea of anything that can break a sweat. Traditional exercise just doesn't always *happen* for me... but if working in the yard can count, and I do count it, then I'm moving my body and it's worth counting.