Mrs. Troop

Wednesday, August 6, 2008

Answer time - CHORES

Monday I told you how we deal with the huge amount of laundry, here at the Troops.

Here are the daily piles on the fireplace that I told you about.

Here is Daughter (#7), who is 3, putting her pile away.

Today, I'm sitting here in my less-than-clean house, with 11 kids running around (not all mine, of course), wondering why in the world I am answering questions about kids doing chores.

What kids?

What chores?

Aren't we just hanging out, making messes and having fun?

Oh.

Yeah, you're right. This won't last forever. So. . .

I have three ways that we keep our house in order.

1. Room list.

Each room has a sheet with a column for each occupant and their morning and evening jobs to keep that room and themselves in order. I edit these at the beginning of each school year.

This includes things like: getting dressed, making beds, picking up toys, brushing teeth, washing face, putting laundry away, brushing hair, etc.

All of the kids do their own jobs, sometimes with myself or Daughter (#2) helping the three year old.

2. Kitchen list.

This sheet has seven columns, one for each day. We have six different jobs (Daughter #2 and Daughter #7 are teamed up for this). Clear table, wash table, sweep dining room. Unload dishwasher, wash dishes, sweep kitchen. They rotate each day, so that they only do each job once or twice in a week.

Note: Keep things simple. We have a Swivel Sweeper for the floors, the dishes are not fragile and the list is posted so the older readers can check their job in the morning and know what to expect for the day. During the Summer they do these jobs all three meals. During school it's just for dinnertime.

3. House Helpers.

My older six go to school all day every day, so when they ARE home, I want them to play outside, ride bikes, read and enjoy being kids. When we do have company coming, or things just need to be put in order, we have a family meeting. During the Summer we've done this once a week.

I make a list of what needs to be done that day: Dusting, vacuuming, glass and mirrors, kitchen floor, bathrooms, spot clean the carpet, sweep porch and deck, weed flower beds - whatever. Then I let the kids pick what they would like to work on. Usually they all have something they want to do. Our oldest does all of the mowing and yard work, so sometimes he is already occupied. If someone is being difficult and doesn't choose something, I assign them a job.

If the bathrooms need extra attention, I take that job. Otherwise the kids use Clorox cleaning wipes to get them in shape. All of the other jobs the kids are able to do themselves. The vacuum can be shortened for the younger ones. I buy Swiffer dusters and foam glass cleaner. We also have a Swiffer wet jet mop for them to do the kitchen floor. Obviously it needs a good mopping sometimes, but I can do that every now and then.

Using these three tools, our house stays in fairly good shape.

Some of you asked about jobs for children under 7. My three little girls (6, 5 and 3) do all of the same jobs the older ones do, they just need more help. Think about it like you are investing in the future. Training little helpers for years to come. Because you are! They especially like to dust and clean glass. They need more supervision, of course.

I recently read "Jumping Ship" by Michael Pearl. One thing he talks about is that being a perfectionist makes you a poor parent. You are better off letting your kids help than having things done perfectly. By you.

As a recovering perfectionist, I am telling myself the same thing.

Let your kids be part of the working order of your home. Let them know that they are needed. That they do a great job. That things look SO nice when they clean/pick-up/help around the house. And it's a lot more fun with music on to sing and dance to!

If you are interested in seeing my chore charts, I'd be happy to e-mail them to you. Just send me a note at mrs8troop@sbcglobal.net.

Happy Cleaning!

Monday, August 4, 2008

Answer time - LAUNDRY

Thought it was about time I get around to answering some of your very good questions!

Truth is, I have been busy DOING these things, hence the lack of time to WRITE about them.

Basically there were three groups of questions:
Laundry
Chores
Meals/grocery shopping

So let's start with laundry.

Years ago, my system was a basket in each bedroom closet. Laundry on Mondays and Thursdays. We'd bring it all downstairs, sort it on the floor of the laundry room, wash till it was done (tossing the clean clothes on the couch and folding as I went). Then a pile for each child in each basket and back upstairs where the kids would help put it away.

It worked great for a long time.

Until the Monday laundry started taking until Wednesday to finish.

Seriously frustrating.

One day I was communicating my frustration to my mother-in-law. Who has quite of bit of laundry experience, having raised 10 children.

At this point we had 7 kids.

She said that I was really beyond the two-day-a-week laundry system that I had used for so long. That if you wait three or four days the amount of laundry is too daunting.

She told me that when her kids were young, she did a load of laundry in the morning and a load at night. Folding it as soon as she could when it came out of the dryer.

This way, you aren't taking a whole day or two each week JUST for laundry, but you can spend five minutes here and there throughout your day. When you have eight (or ten) kids, it's rare to have a whole day to do anything. Pretty much everything has to be done in little blocks of time, as you go.

The beauty of this system (as much as you might hate doing laundry every day) is that you never have very much. It's never the entire laundry room floor covered in clothes like it used to be.

SO. . .

I start a load of laundry after breakfast in the morning after the kids are dressed. Sometimes I have to do two loads. With the exception of special items or delicates, I only separate colors if I have enough for two loads - otherwise it all goes in together. And no, I haven't ruined anything, yet.

As soon as it is done, we toss it in the living room chair where it is folded as soon as possible into piles for each person, which I line up along the hearth.

Before lunch (if it's Summer) I have the kids get their pile and put it on their bed. Before bedtime, they put their laundry away.

During school, I put the piles on their beds for them during the day.

Everyone down to the three year old does this.

The only laundry basket we use is the one in front of the washer where they put their dirty clothes at night and in the morning. No laundry baskets in the rooms or closets. No gathering laundry for me.

Since everyone puts their own clothes away, their drawers are a mess. But after years of therapy, I'm OK with that.

I also start a load of laundry at night. That goes into the dryer before I go to bed, or in the morning when I start the morning load.

After the morning load, I do towels once a week and sheets on a couple of other days.

Reality is, there is a lot of laundry with 10 people. I can't give you a magic formula that makes it "easy" or makes it go away.

But I've found that keeping up with it is so much easier than letting it pile up. Easier for the kids, too, as they only have a small pile each day to put away. Not as overwhelming for them.

And another plus to the daily laundry system is that they don't need very many clothes. My little ones often put on what came off the night before, after it's been washed - which is really nice!

Go forth and wash!

Happy Monday!

Thursday, July 31, 2008

Thankful Thursday

1. For my parents - who celebrated their 45th wedding anniversary on Tuesday. Wow.

2. That this is the last week of Summer workouts for the Coach and the athletes at school. No more leaving at 5:45 a.m.! Just trying not to think about practice starting on the 12th.

3. School clothes (or at least most of them) are ordered!

4. For Daughter (#2) and my niece who finished putting the last year's pictures in albums on Tuesday. All caught up! Yeah!

5. For A/C that is working well on these HOT days - especially the days that reach 100 or higher!

Makes me miss that cool Colorado weather!

6. For family and friends who have POOLS!

7. For the surprise visit from the Bride and Groom today! What fun!

8. For date nights - the Coach has been so sweet to make sure we get away by ourselves once a week. Reminds me why I love him so much!

Be sure and leave me a comment and tell me what YOU are thankful for today!

Happy Thursday!

Wednesday, July 30, 2008

Wanted:

Someone to follow Baby Boy around the house and make sure the bathroom door is SHUT and he doesn't get in the trashcan, climb up on the dining room table, or destroy Lego creations that took hours of precious Summer days to build.
Please hurry.

Sunday, July 27, 2008

And OH the food!

Last week I told you about the FUN Bridal Luncheon that Daughter (#2) and I hosted for our Sweet Sitter.
And I mentioned my lack of attentiveness in taking pictures of the pretty FOOD that we made for it.

Well, someone else DID!

The bride's sweet photographer friend took wonderful photos of the whole event!

Menu:

Chicken Salad with Red Grapes

Broccoli Salad

Fresh fruit

(cantaloupe, strawberries and blueberries)

Croissant