I am tired of doing all of the household chores myself. Seriously tired. Household chores are not a talent of mine. I have a hard time cleaning up after just me. Add 5 more people who think I'm responsible for their mess as well (Ok, Kev is pretty good) and that spells disaster. I mean that in the most literal sense of the word. My house is a disaster.
Tonight for FHE I introduced the chore sticks. It's a bunch of Popsicle sticks that have chores written on them. Some are everyday chores, once a week, only Mondays, etc.
I really hadn't thought it all the way through or discussed it much with Kev. So as I was explaining the individual chores I got to bathrooms and realized it would be easier to divide up all the jobs need to complete one bathroom instead of one person doing the whole room. I was thinking out loud and said, "Well, I think for the bathroom, we'll break it up."
To which Beckham immediately asked for clarification, "Why are we going to break up the bathroom?"
At least I know he was listening.
They seemed excited.
I'll know it's worked if when I hear the doorbell ring I don't have to hurry and clean before I answer it.
5 comments:
So how many chore sticks do they have to draw a day? Do they go into a "done" pile?
I had a hard time following through with making the kids get their chores done. My perfect motivation with our chores has been that the kids must be done with chores before they can watch tv or a movie. Usually the motivation is for me (hurry, help the kids get their chores done so they can go downstairs and watch a show, then I can have a break!) It has been a firm, firm rule (Saturday's excluded) and has worked really well. Good luck!
It is one of those unfortunate truths of this life that it is much, much more work for us to get the kids to help and do their jobs the right way than to just do it ourselves... and doing it all ourselves is way too much work too.
The best way I ever heard it described was in a newspaper article on my SIL's blog (which I am sending you) that was describing what being a mother of small children is like.
"It's resisting constant temptation to seek short-term relief at everyone's long-term expense."
And if that doesn't make you tired just reading that... you don't have young children. :) I hope that the chore sticks work the way you want them to.
Um...really. Could we possibly be sisters - or the same person?
You just made me remember that my front room is definitely not "doorbell" ready right now.
Great. Now I have guilt.
Off to clean.
Let me know if the chore sticks work out.
Bri- See....I hadn't really thought it through that far. At this point they just come and ask me to check it off and we are keeping a mental record.
I do however need to make some little container/chart thingy that I can slip the sticks into to help me keep everyone organized. Maybe I'll at a "done" spot to that....if I ever figure out what will work.
Em - I seem to recall Andy (sorry) Andrew saying you kept a very clean house. Pretty sure Kev has NEVER said that about me to anyone.Sigh. A future goal for sure. But I want to earn it.
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