Posts in Home Organization

I liked Elizabeth's thinking. Take the Motivated Moms planner and tweak it be more personal. For me, the $8 annual purchase of the Motivated Moms planner is worth its weight in gold and I will continue that each year. The Bible readings help me to jump into Scripture when I need some direction and the monthly, quarterly, or annual chore reminders are extremely valuable to me. But for this season of my life, I need every little task spelled out for me. The distractions are aplenty and I need the thinking pre-done.

Two of My Favorite Distractions

I made my Excel Spreadsheet so I could see everyone's chores at a glance, but I also made a daily checklist that allows me to readily see who is doing what on which day. If I have to check it off, I am far more likely to check up on their work.

Here's the breakdown:

Mom's Daily Chores

Breakfast Dishes, Clean Guest Bathroom, Laundry, Prep Dinner

Monday: Clean Under Kitchen Sink/Other Specific Kitchen Tasks

Tuesday: Spot Clean Kitchen Cabinets

Wednesday: Clean Out Diaper Bag

Thursday: Wipe Down Dishwasher and Fridge

Friday: Clean Out Car

Saturday: Prep Church Lunch, Iron, Clip Children's Fingernails

10 (11 in October)- year-old Boy's Chores:

Morning:

Prep Breakfast, Empty Kitchen Trash, Empty Clutter Basket, Feed Turtle & Gecko, Run a Load of Laundry, Wipe Down Boys' Toilet and Sink

Evening:

Tidy Entry and Stairs, Tidy School Shelf, Tidy Kitchen Desk, Walk Property, Pour Dinner Drinks

Monday: Bring in Trash Cans

Tuesday: Clean Windows Dining Room/Kitchen

Wednesday: Change Boys' Bath Towels

Thursday: Wipe Down Washing Machine/Dryer

Friday: Stock Diapers and Wipes

Saturday: Prepare Church Clothes, Organize Closet and Drawers, Change Sheets (Every 2 Weeks), Clean Turtle Cage, Make 3 Bottles of Red Juice, Fold/Put Away Clothes, Fold Boys' Socks

9-year-old Girls' Chores:

Morning

Brush Teeth and Hair, Prep Breakfast, Clean Girls' Bathroom, Put Clothes Away, Empty Clutter Basket, Feed Dog and Cat, Gather Eggs

Evening

Tidy Family Room, Tidy School Shelf, Fold Laundry/Put Away, Dinner Prep Helper

Monday: Change Bath Towels

Tuesday: Wash Out Kitchen Trash Can

Wednesday: Stock Diaper Drawers

Thursday: Change Bath Towels

Friday: Organize Shoe Rack

Saturday: Prepare Church Clothes, Organize Closet, Dust School Room, Dust Office, Dust Living Room, Dust Family Room, Change Sheets (Every 2 Weeks), Iron, Bake for Sunday

7-year-old Girl's Chores:

Morning

Empty Trash, Empty Dishwasher, Brush Teeth and Hair, Empty Clutter Basket, Sort Girls' Laundry

Evening

Tidy Upstairs Hall, Tidy School Shelf, Fold Laundry, Dinner Prep Helper

Monday: Change Hand Towels

Tuesday: Fold Rags

Wednesday: Sweep Front Porch

Thursday: Stock Toilet Paper

Friday: Tidy Book Buckets

Saturday: Prepare Church Clothes, Stock Diaper Bag, Organize Closet, Clean Doors (Family Room, Front, Office, Garage), Sweep Front Porch, Sort Girls' Laundry, Change Sheets (Every 2 Weeks), Gather Everyone's Bibles

4-year-old Girl's Chores

Morning

Take Wet Kitchen Towels to Bucket, Brush Teeth and Hair, Gather Phones, Help Empty Dishwasher, Empty Clutter Basket

Evening

Dinner Prep Helper, Set Table, Tidy Living Room

Monday: Bring Rags and Red Juice to Mom

Tuesday: Bring Rags and Red Juice to Mom

Wednesday, Thursday, & Friday: Help Mom

Saturday: Get Girls' Church Shoes & Put Them By the Front Door, Clean Light Switches

It seems like a lot when it's on paper, but the morning chores take us no more than 20 minutes. Saturday work days last longer, plus we tend to have projects as well. We get the jobs out of the way and then we can enjoy the rest of the day.

Amy asked about expectations and reminders. When they are young, I have learned to have really low expectations. I mean really, the help they give is not the work of an adult, nor should we expect it to be. I will remind them gently and sometimes not so gently. I have radically changed my attitude in regards to my responsibilities, their responsibilities, and what I can expect. And yes, I'll be blogging about that soon, too.

The older ones, on the other hand, have an income of some kind and so I have found that charging them a dollar amount if they neglect a regular chore is the most effective consequence. This week I made $8 :)

Our 15-year-old and 13-year-old are responsible daily for the dinner dishes, the chickens, and the pool. They have a full plate of chores on Fridays and Saturdays, but we are happy to let them focus their time and energies elsewhere after so many years being faithful in our home.

Chores, Home Organization, Training Little OnesKendraAugust 13, 2008 Comments

Revamping Systems, Part One: Chores

Since January of 2006, I have been either pregnant, post partum, breastfeeding, or all of the above. We lost the first sweet baby but were expecting again three months later. We had that sweet guy and then were expecting (surprise!) five months later. Makes me tired just thinking about it. I get really, really sick for the first 18 weeks of pregnancy, and life tends to fall apart around me. Just the essentials are tackled, but everything else falls way off the radar. For over two years now we have held to many of the same systems although our lives have changed dramatically. Two new babies, a new kindergarten student every other year, a baby clinging to life in the ICU, and many other small changes that warranted reorganizing the way our household was being run, but those alterations just never happened. I began last Thursday night to take a serious look at what was going wrong. Seems we were accomplishing most things (granted, we aren't really studying much right now and it's a lot easier to focus on laundry, meals, and the house when there's no schooling going on) but I was doing all the brain work. I was having to think about what everyone was supposed to be doing at any given moment, and the mental work of it all was exhausting me. If I write it down, I eliminate the repeated mental work. That's step one. Step two was to decide which areas needed immediate attention. I chose to begin with chores because our lives have been so full of change this year and the old chore assignments were beginning to be cumbersome. Additionally, I am losing my 13-year-old* to his dad's office in September, and so those remaining at home during the day will be 11, 9, 7, 4, 1, and Mighty Joe (3 months). That cute four-year-old currently has no regular chores, so she has just been promoted on paper. An old and meaty post of Elizabeth Foss's got me to thinking through how I wanted to even present our chores. Did I want to do an Excel spreadsheet as I've done in the past, color coded so each child could see their chores at a glance? Or chore cards, a la the Maxwells? Both have worked well for us in the past. I ended up doing something entirely different, really a fine meshing of both methods with a little Motivated Moms (see sidebar) thrown in for good measure. Elizabeth had done something similar, and I thought it an excellent addition to my chore repertoire. Oh, my kids are gonna love this! Mom staying on top of their chores! Yippee! I am kidding, you know. Don't start bashing yourself because you're kids aren't ecstatic about their chores. Mine tend to have good attitudes and helpful spirits, but they aren't as excited about them as I am. Next post I'll share with you what our new system looks like and what each child is tackling. And guess what? I got my very own chore list, too. I was thinking of adding things like, "Drink a glass of cold ice tea" or "Lock bedroom door and take a 15 minute nap", but I knew my kids would quickly be onto me. *I'll address what the 15-year-old and 13-year-old do all day at Dad's office in an upcoming post.

Chores, Home Organization, Training Little OnesKendraAugust 11, 2008 Comments

Help!

Before Mighty Joe's stint in the hospital, I had meant to write a post about the help I have in our home. At the time, I had a weekly housekeeper and an "Alice", but Alice broke her arm and the housekeepers are nursing a mother in the hospital. Not sure what God's trying to tell me, but I have had to rethink the way we're doing some things here. We did a "room by room" cleaning this week, in which we all (13yo, 10yo, 9yo, 7yo, 4yo-- the 15yo, 1yo, and 3mo were off the hook) tackled one room at a time together. Our tasks were spelled out for us, using the Fast Clean/Deep Clean Standard Cards from House of Order and our knowledge of Speed Cleaning tactics. We only cleaned the downstairs, and it took us at least two hours. There are 4400 square feet of house here. My plan was to tackle the upstairs the next morning, but life got busy and we didn't quite do that... today we spent another hour in the disaster zone school room, but the one vacuum we have that actually works got a purple marker jammed in its tube. Did I mention that someone threw away the dustpan by accident last week? At least that's what I think happened, but the bottom line is that we now have no working vacuums and no dustpans. Whatever God is trying to teach me, I need to learn it fast. Because I have a feeling we'll be using old toothbrushes to clean next, but we have plenty of those.

Home Organization, Life with PreschoolersKendraAugust 1, 2008 Comments

Leaving the Older Ones in Charge

When we have to leave for a portion of the day, the older ones are happy to run things. Making a list or schedule helps them to know what to do, and it gives them the ability to tell a little one, "This is what Mom and Dad said you need to be doing". Everything runs much more smoothly, and we can call them at any given moment and ask where they are on the day's list. When we had little Joe two weeks ago, we left six of the seven at home with this list: GOOD MORNING! • Breakfast—French Toast Casserole • Breakfast Clean-up: H- clean up Ch, play with him, change his diaper N- counters and table J- dishes, including helping C put the high stuff away C- clear table and empty dishwasher A- floor (somebody help her!) • Pray together. H lead by reading the Proverb for the day. • Chores. DON’T SKIMP ON YOUR CHORES! Work as if you are working for God, because you ARE! • Math- C do your math puzzle, and only do the ones (1 + 3= 4, etc.). A with J (J do math, A do clay. Help her pick it up and put it away when she’s done). C with N. • C goes down for nap at 11:00 • PE- N lead this. • Everyone clean bedrooms except J. J- help the boys and do the hallway. You’ll clean your room after C wakes up. • Get C up at 12:30, change his diaper • Lunch- sandwiches on Schroeder bread, chips • Lunch clean-up: same as breakfast! • Quiet Hour. C with J. A on my bed with books. • C down for nap at 3. • After Quiet Hour, do the rest of your schoolwork. When it is finished: Boys- take turns with computer games Girls- Short video, then you may go to Grammy and PopPop’s • Make sure you talk to Grammy and PopPop about what they want you to do for dinner. • Get C up at 5! Change his diaper! We love you ALL! Pray for us, and for your new baby brother, too. Dad will be calling you throughout the day to make sure everything is ok.

Chores, Home Organization, Life with Preschoolers, ResourcesKendraMay 19, 2008 Comments

Can Homeschooling and Housekeeping co-exist?

Hi Kendra, I have been reading your blog on and off for about a year now and it has been such a blessing to me. I am a mother of three, ages 4,2, & 1, and I hope to start homeschooling next year. I don’t know any women experienced in homeschooling, so I have really taken in your thoughts and advice as a woman dedicated to God and her family. Thank you! This year I have started really getting organized with my house cleaning. It isn’t perfect but it is much better than it used to be. I finally realized that everyone is a lot happier, including mom, when they have meals on time, can find their clothes and can walk without tripping on something! Anyways, I have lists of different things that I do on different days to keep my house in somewhat of order and it basically keeps me pretty busy. So it is seeming overwhelming to add homeschooling to the daily load! Did you ever feel that way? Someone told me that if you homeschool you won’t have a clean house because there is just not enough time in the day and you just have to deal with that. I don’t want to deal with that because I get stressed out when the house isn’t in working order. I am not a neat freak at all, but I just want peace and order in my home. Is that possible? I would love to hear your thoughts on that. Thanks for all you do! Jamie Hi Jamie- Yes and no. Does that answer your question?

This is an area where I struggle, because I really like things neat, tidy, and clean. But there are nine of us living here all day long, and so I have had to learn to give it up to a reasonable degree. What is reasonable? Well, sanitary and tidy tend to be my criteria, but as my dear friend Cheryl has told me before, a perfect home is not worth sacrificing the relationships we have with our children. Amen and amen again. I have had to come to terms with the fact that my first three children are boys. They do not see what I see. One is decidedly more organized than his brothers, but he is a pack rat and is learning what to hold on to and what to let go. And what *I* think is a clean kitchen and what *they* think is a clean kitchen are two different things. Entirely. So now I have changed my MO. I still require that beds be made and rooms tidied before breakfast. I still require chores that help maintain cleanliness as much as possible, such as wiping down toilets with anti-bacterial wipes and emptying the trash. But I have also created a list that helps me to "hit" each room on a rotating basis to be cleaned out, decluttered, and put into some semblance of order. If it returns to disorganization within a few days, that's ok. I'll be getting back to it shortly. I have written other posts in the past that address this topic, and I hope they are helpful on some level: The Clean Team How Can I Homeschool if I Can't Even Keep My House Clean? ( a reprint of an excellent article, but not written by me) Large Family Logistics Lastly, I am a huge proponent of hiring help, if it is within your means. Even if it is once a month to bail you out, consider it. We are one of a few nations who don't hire household help, and I think we women have come to believe that it is somehow shameful if we do. Nonsense! Think back in history- has there been a time when moms did all the laundry, did all the housekeeping, did the gardening or sewing or decorating, cooked three meals a day, did all the shopping, cared for and nursed the babies, drove children to appointments, and were solely responsible for the education of their children? When you see all of that in print, does it seem unreasonable to hire someone to help you? Are there young women at church who would be delighted to iron basic items for you for a quarter per piece? Or come alongside you as a mother's helper? Or weed, mow, or plant flowers? If you can get a few things off your plate, you might feel that the essential things like meals, laundry, household cleanliness, and school aren't quite so unreachable. Blessings, Kendra

Home OrganizationKendraSeptember 22, 2007Comment

Changing Station

Why did it take me seven babies to figure this one out? All these years I've done what the baby furniture manufacturers wanted me to do and faithfully changed my babies on their changing table/dresser. Then had stinky diapers in their room if I didn't get them taken out to the garbage. Then called another child to pleeeease bring me a plastic bag to put the grossest diapers into. Then called the same or another child to fetch the antibacterial wipes in the event of a blow-out. Etcetera. Our home has a laundry room upstairs with a nice long counter top and a sink. I finally got smart and made a baby changing station there. This has been such a time saver and so convenient to have the sink readily accessible. I can also pitch dirty clothes right into the washer or hampers.

But we didn't always have such a nice set-up, and I am betting many of you don't necessarily, either. Still, I can think back to our little (as in 600-square-feet little) apartment in San Francisco and see in my mind a place where a baby changing station could have been created quite nicely. Even having a large tub or basket stocked for every possible scenario would be great. A portable station might work well in some homes, too; you could have a clean towel folded neatly into the tub for the baby to be changed upon, and stock the tub with wipes, rash ointment. fingernail clippers, baby shampoo, washcloths, and diapers. And a little dark chocolate. I don't think there's a situation in which dark chocolate doesn't come in handy

Home OrganizationKendraAugust 7, 2007Comment

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