Hide & Seek Clean up

One Saturday morning I was frustrated beyond belief. I was trying to clean my house and was having no luck, I would clean the front room and move on to the kitchen, meanwhile my kids were going into the front room and destroying it. I was at my wits end, what was the point in cleaning my house?

I finally sat down in a state of frustration and defeat. Right then my daughter came up to me and asked if we could play a game. At first I said, "no, I have to clean the house," then I thought what if they were helping me a bit more? Right then I had a brilliant idea. Hide & Seek clean up was the answer. The rules were simple and fun.

Rules to Hide & Seek Clean-up

• the first person who is it, counts to 20 and everyone else hides, including you
• then they seek out everyone hiding
• once everyone is found everyone cleans up one room as fast as they can, working together. For example everyone cleans up the kitchen together.
• Then the first person found on the turn before is it and the process starts over.

I found this to work great. Everyone works really hard to clean up a room because they want to play some more.

Do you have any particular ways to make cleaning fun? Or maybe even just a way to get it done without it becoming undone in a matter of minutes?

Family Time

With everyone's schedules so chaotic it is hard to find time just to spend together. My husband and I have started spending time walking in the evening times. This has become a family affair. We tend to do it all together, and then when we get back to the house we spend time throwing the football around or the volleyball. It turned out to be a great way to be active with the family. Once we come in we get the babies bathed and in bed and then on the weekends we spend time with the older kids at the table playing cards.

What do you do as a family to spend time together?

What do you do when your kids fight?

What do you do when your kids fight? Like I have said previously I have five kids and with that many kids emotions fly high. Someone always seems to be stepping on someones toes. My oldest seems to think she should be in charge of everything because, of course shes the oldest. My son who is the second oldest and he also has ADHD, his temper fly's high in the evenings when his medicine wears off; well he thinks when someone looks at him thats cause for a fight. And my 8 year old seems to be very emotional and cries or yells at a drop of a hat (the doctor says she is going through puberty a little early), you never know which is going to happen. Of course there is my four year old and two year old as well but they don't really fight that much and are very quiet unless their other brother and sisters are home. So with all these high emotions and our hectic schedule their are bound to conflicts of interests. My two girls fight the most lately and I have finally come up with a system that is seeming to work. First of all I don't choose sides, I feel this could cause problems when they are older. Next I put them in a room, just the two of them and tell them to talk it out. Sometimes this takes hours, but they are getting better at it. Obviously if it is something big I intervene and try to find out what the issue is. However normally I let them work it out on their own, they don't come out until it is resolved and almost always they come to me afterwords and tell me how they solve it. They seem proud of themselves and happy with each other. I feel this is a great way to teach them how to resolve conflicts with out yelling and with out physical contact.

So...What do you do?

Finding your schedule

Hello everyone, today I am just going to talk about organization in the home and how easy it is to feel overwhelmed. Every mom has a lot on their plate and for most the plate feels small. We probably have all felt or said "there are not enough hours in a day." There are things you can do to make your life easier. What I do is every semester of school I reorganize everything and redo everyone's schedules. So for those of you who don't go to school find a time a couple times a year to reorganize things as well as reschedule. When scheduling things the first thing I do is put my kids on a strict schedule. By keeping them on a strict schedule helps things be less chaotic in the afternoons.
Of course everyone has there own times of the day that are the most chaotic and in need of organization. For me it is in the afternoon, three of my kids rush in the door all talking over one another and shoving papers in my face and telling me every second of their day. So the first thing I did was to put a container on my desk, and anything my kids want me to look at or sign gets put in there. They do not say another word about it, then latter in the evening sometimes even after they are in bed, I go through all their paperwork.
Everyone has their own schedule and their own organization that works best for them. I am always looking for new ideas. If you have any please leave a comment.