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Recently we’ve been—ok, I’ve been—more bothered than usual with both the amount of stuff we have in our house; AND (perhaps more) how often way too much of it is left out all over our floors!
So I told the kids this past weekend—in no uncertain terms—that at 6:30am or so every morning when I get up, I was going to pick up anything that was on the floor, not in its place, and just throw it away. Yes, I know… there are poorer people than we who would love to have such things… I shouldn’t just throw them away. But we’ve tried everything we can think of … and now we’re trying just discarding. (Although, I did add the disclaimer that if I found something of greater value that I would either keep it for myself or sell it on ebay…) 🙂
“I will be like … the House Cleaning Fairy!” said I, “Who will come in while you’re sleeping, without you noticing, and get rid of all the extra stuff!” The big smile on my face didn’t quite match the smiles on their faces, but… well… I did just call myself the “House Cleaning Fairy”…
So, we’ll see how it goes. I have collected a little bit so far, but thankfully, not a lot! The kids have done a good job cleaning up just before they go to bed. What we’re really hoping for, though, is that they will learn to put things in the right place before they move on the next thing in their day. Then less stuff would be lost, more stuff would be easily found, and our floors would be much less cluttered!!!
Till then, the House Cleaning Fairy visits us early every morning…
Greg I hope you can stick with it. Boy … if I had a chance to do it over again (oh my goodness – my mom was the one who said that – not me – I can’t believe I am there already!)
I was bad. The kids didn’t pick it up – I did – and I still am.
They just got so used to me always cleaning (not that I was the clean house fairy – oh I am so far from that) but they were never held responsible and now … everything is always still a mess – especially now that Larry and I are both working all day long – and I am the taxi driver all evening long.
I didn’t follow thru on the “train them when they were young” – and now I have to deal with it and their spouses (if they are blessed to have one) will deal with it as well.
Good Luck!
Yeah, that’s why we are really trying to get them to learn now 🙂 It will just be much easier when they are responsible for themselves. You know … it’s probably easier in our large family (in a way) because due to the sheer volume of people and stuff in this home … well, they already are responsible! We need their help! 🙂
And, your boys are certainly not lost… something will be a kick in the pants eventually… when you’re not there to do it for them 🙂