Believe it or not this happened for me on Saturday. It very may well be the first time in my little family’s lives when it happened but it happened.

I have to set the right stage by explaining that with birthdays and a crazy work schedule that the house really fell apart in the past couple of weeks. It never ceases to amaze me how only four people can create so much mess. It seemed the best I could do was keep up with the dishes once a day while the rest of the rooms and floors continued to accumulate all kinds of attractions.

In the past, I’ve been reluctant to use Saturday time to clean the house. Partly because I find that with everyone home the next day too that Monday is like starting over so I may as well wait and do it once on Monday versus twice. This follows the truth that keeping a clean house while raising kids is like shoveling the walk while it’s snowing. The other reason is that I hate wasting precious time with my family if there are other things we could be doing together. It began with the typical moans and groans of the kids not wanting to help. Who could blame them? The place was a wreck and it looked like it would take a week to get it clean again. Then the magic began.

Positive Motivation:
I told my daughter if she’d just work with me I’d give her entire week’s chore allowance for this one day. She slowly started to turn a corner and the complaining dropped drastically. My son got tired of gathering his toys from the family room to return to his bedroom so I brought him over to the allowance chart and explained the same deal of giving him his entire week’s chore allowance for this one day of cleaning if he’d help me get it all done. He got a big grin on his face and went back to collecting.

Mom was happy too because this system took a little sabbatical of neglect recently and this boost made all of us feel better!

Small & Fun Job Breakdown:
The next stroke of success came in mixing in some jobs they consider fun and different with the others. My daughter beamed when I gave her the job of steaming the tile floor and her attitude quickly went from disgruntled to happy. My son loved getting his hands on the vacuum and replacing garbage liners. It didn’t matter to me that I’d have to redo some of the vacuuming my five year old would miss because he was learning how to help and he was delighted. I didn’t keep them in one place or room very long. I found they were most helpful and happy when they could come back asking for a new task quickly. You could actually feel their pride of success grow with each return and desire to be given another thing they could succeed at. It got to be so much fun that I started running out of little jobs while I finished one. We ended with a disinfectant wipe and instructions for each to attack the door knobs, light switches and walls where little hands had left prints behind. And all the while my expectation was just to find the floors. *big smile*

Team Effort:
Another turning point came when dad finished reading his book and joined the ranks. The kids actually didn’t care what they were doing anymore, just that we were all doing it together. It was amazing how having all four of us work together not only cranked out the work but became another “fun” thing our family was doing together. The time was cut in half and within a two hour window the entire house had been cleaned. The kids were so proud of their efforts and kept talking about how nice it was to have a clean house. Mom was happy, dad was happy and it was only 2:30 in the afternoon! We still had the entire rest of the afternoon and evening to fill.

So lesson learned - keep these keys in play and housework isn’t such a chore!

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Family Parenting Homemaker Sharing Housework Success