Clean Up, Clean Up, Everybody Do Their Share

So after my last post I had an epiphany. My thinking went something like this: my house is messy-->my kids are key donors to this state-->my kids are as able bodied as I (if not more)--> therefore...

wait for it…

I. Will. Pay. My. Kids. To. Clean.

I know brilliant, right?! After all when I was a kid my parents made us do chores too but for FREE! In our home, rewards (ahem, bribery) and star charts (read competition) have worked for other things such self-dressing in the morning, or doing homework right after school; why not this crazy idea of cleaning up after ourselves??? Clearly what I have been doing to this point was not effective. I ask, beg, demand, scream, and mostly resolve to do it myself or simply hide when company comes. When I do ask the girls to perform certain tasks around the house that resemble cleaning up after themselves I am whined at, subjected to selective hearing and have even been ignored. From my children I have learned that on play dates which occur in our home, my dear, sweet offspring sit quietly with hands folded in lap as their friends storm through bedrooms and playrooms tossing toys and books around willy nilly. I have learned that ‘just-a-sec’ in kid time translates to ‘never’. And yes, I have even been told that cleaning up after them was in fact MY Job, gasp!

What kind of snot nosed brats am I raising you ask? Well, I think the run of the mill type actually. Given the choice would your kids clean? When told to clean or do a chore do your kids comply with a smile and ‘Yes Mother Dearest”? I doubt it, and if they do I so want your life!!!!!

So on to my lesson inducing method of getting help around here…I came up with some basic chores that I expected them to do every day. Simple things like bleaching the tub, polishing the woodwork and ironing my underwear. Don’t I wish! Speaking of ironing, I truly hate it! I live a wrinkly life, why shouldn’t my clothes reflect this? Actually my sister introduced me to this stuff and I swear it has changed my life, or at least changed how my t-shirts look as I live my life! But I digress, the chores my husband and I really decided the girls should do resemble things such as: Feed Dog, Walk Dog, and Empty Clean Dishwasher, Pick up Playroom, Make Your Bed, Put Your Dirty Clothes in Hamper, Take Trash Outside, etc.

The next big question is how to track all of these good works? Did you know that if you Google 'Chore Charts’ you will get a quarter of a million hits?? Wow, some people really are on board with this whole get your kids to clean up after themselves novelty. I found tons of sites offering printables or suggesting how to implement chore charting at home. One free printable that seemed cool was on DLTK’s website. It allows you to customize your own chart using various graphics, characters, colors, fonts and personalized chores. This is great, but not what I wanted. Material Girl that I am I wanted something cool and colorful and pretty. I also needed to appease the orderly Type-A me as well as the Lazy Don’t-Have-To-Remake-Every-Week me. Hey I never said I wasn’t complicated! To do this I simply zipped on over to Amazon and found exactly what I was looking for…thanks Board Dudes! And did I also mention how the Instant-Gratification me was thrilled with next day delivery?

The girls were actually pretty excited about the chore chart, and although they might have been happy with hugs and praises (oh they get lots of that too) they are really stoked about the money. It is not a lot of cash either, Hubby’s idea of one quarter for every two stars seemed pretty frugal to me. But wouldn’t you know we are just 4 days into this thing and my kids have

racked up nearly 5 bucks each, as a matter of fact I think I need to pay more attention to the doling out of stars, just take a look at what this thing looks like right now:

Errr, has anyone ever seen a star chart for working on the virtue of honesty and the peril of greed? You know I'm gonna have to check Amazon for that one.

Sorry I Missed You

My house is messy. Really, if you know me you may not believe it but it is just soo messy today. Not filthy, gross or pig sty worthy. Just plain messy and even a little dusty. Webster's defines messy in 3 ways:

1. marked by confusion, disorder, or dirt 2. lacking neatness or precision All perfectly describe my home today. Marked by confusion or disorder, check! There are shoes randomly strewn about, piles of paper in various locations around the kitchen, valentines door wreaths lying on side tables. Lacking neatness or precision, yup! Dirty clothes that missed the hamper, breakfast dishes at the table, hair and toothbrushes on bathroom counters, stuffed animals that the puppy decided belong to him chewed up all over the house. I could go on and on, most things are simply out of place, oh and the floor could totally use a vacuuming too.

I know that my kids will never look back on their lives and think, “Wow, Our house sure was clean/messy!” Nope they will look back and think what a great childhood they had! Won’t they? That is the goal anyway and when I think about my own childhood, that is what I think, not whether or not our house was messy or clean. I really don't remember but either way, my mom worked outside of the home so if the place was messy she sure had a reason! Conversely though I am a stay at home mom, if not cleaning what else could I possibly be doing with my time??? Hmmpph that sentence really made me laugh and reminded me of this:

I really want you to think my life is just like that first picture only with a gleaming wood floor and organized closets in the background. I swear most of the time I get such great satisfaction from organizing and cleaning my own home! When I have time to do it and really get into it, it becomes all consuming and hard to put down the label maker and broom and focus on my girls and hubby. Yes sometimes I have to force myself to let it alone and enjoy my family! However, when I do let go of it all and live life without regard to the piles of stuff piling up, things get really out of control. It snowballs and then the place is really messy. But eventually someone will want to stop by and I need to start cleaning again…someone even asked me once to NOT clean before she came because it made her uncomfortable! What?! I can’t help it I just like my home to be clean and inviting when you come to visit. I won't judge you if you feel differently, I don't even care what your house looks like! It really is just all about my own freaky quirk.

The funny truth is that is not how we live day to day and frankly I am not always up to the task of cleaning for visitors! Like today my house is in what a friend and I call ‘Lock Down’. For her this means she turns that extra door lock on her way to work so that no family members can drop by to check on the dog! For me this just means I would not answer my door if you stopped by this morning. Yes my car is in the driveway. Yes I must be home because you did just speak to me on the phone. But I am on Lock Down so when you surprise me and press that door bell I simply freeze and drop to the floor. I will crawl over the piles of junk to a window and sneak a peek. The lucky UPS guy doesn't need to come in so yeah I'll answer the door for him, but you? Nope, I will lie against the wall like a cat burglar waiting for you to get the hint and leave. Oh I am not ashamed of this either, after all it is reasonable that I did not hear you because I was in the shower or deep in the basement doing laundry. Seriously, my house is just too damn messy to open the door!! Sorry I missed you!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Thanks to my Pinterest addiction I have found the absolute cutest Valentine's Day hairstyle for my little girl!

I know. I know...it looks soooo complicated and you may be thinking 'umm does this crazy woman actually think i have time in the morning to turn my kids hair into hearts?' Well I am here to tell you that yes you do!!! I seriously did this style in under 10 minutes, that includes finding the supplies and taking pictures for you to see! I did not even practice this before doing it! I watched the video tutorial on this awesome site yesterday Adopt'a Do and at exactly 7:34 this morning began brushing my little ones hair, only to have this masterpiece that is guaranteed to get ooohs and aaaahs all day long just 10 minutes later! I promise there was no screaming or yelling at her to stay still and definitely no do-overs, I actually got it on the first try with NO DRAMA (a rarity in this house if you didn't happen to catch my blog title)!!!!!!

Ok so here is the one caveat (sorry moms) you have to have one of those doohicky things called a Topsy Tail Tool. I happen to have one that my mother gave me when my oldest was born. So why, do you ask, did I hold onto a potentially useless piece of plastic for the past 10 years? Well every time I cleaned out that drawer, I put it in the trash. But I always went back and rescued it because you see, like many mommies of girls I dreamed of the day when I would be making gorgeous hair styles on my little angels. Well, my first born only had a halo that first year, she literally had red peach fuzz until she was nearly a year old! When her hair finally began to grow, the dreaded hair-curse from my husbands family made the growing so slow she was 5 years old before I could do anything with it!! Oh and what did grow was so damn fine all manner of barrette or bow would just slip out. I should have invented those Velcro baby bows, I certainly had enough inspiration, too bad my inner entrepreneur sleeps late!

Anyhoo, just as that baby fine hair started to change into a thick mane of brushable auburn hair, she decides that no, she is definitely not a girly-girl! And while I am totally cool with that, her idea of hair 'style' is anything that isn't pinned, pulled, pony-ed, bowed or banded. Sigh. Well, my dreams of gorgeous hair styles is starting to become a reality because this year, my second born at 6 has begun to grow out of that baby fine hair! She is more the diva type and likes that her mamma so desperately wants to play with her locks. YAY!

OK back to this awesome do...so let's say you are not a beauty school dropout or even just a poser hair stylist like me, you can pick up one of those doohicky thingys called a Topsy Tail Tool or Mindy even tells you how to make one right here on her blog! Honestly though, I would bet that you could pull this style off using a drinking straw taped in a loop...hmmm damn inner entrepreneur always late to the table!!

Happy Hair Hearting!!!

OK so that's my first post, be sure to check back for some more cool stuff I find on the web that just maybe I should have invented myself!!!

<3

tammy