OT-chores, house cleaning

[pixxi]

I am overwhelmed. We have so many things going on in our family. We have 4 children ages 3-14. My husband and I both work 12 hour shifts that include weekends each month. Plus the kids have all kinds of activites.

We need to get a handle on cleaning and chores. I have all these ideas I could maybe try but then I don't impliment them. My kids do the dishes but nothing more...not even cleaning out the sink!

I want to try each kid having a chore list but what's the incentive/punishment if it's not done. If I offer $, I can see my son deciding he doesn't want to do some of the chores. This then backfires since he doesn't "need" the money for anything. So I would need to have some kind of other punishment for not helping the family out.

Plus I want to have maybe a family list like Mondays are washing dark loads, cleaning bathrooms, moping floors. Adding things for each day of the week.

I think that is the only way things will get done since we don't have a normal working schedule.

What does everyone else do to clean the house.

 

[jenndisney]

Get lingerie bags for each member of the family for socks and underwear. This cuts sorting.

I never have done $$ for chores. My folks always felt it was part of being a family. We had a chore chart that rotated so each of us (including my folks) had a set of chores each week. They used peer pressure to get it done. All chores started Monday morning and had to be done by Saturday ay noon. If one person did not complete their list, no one in the family got a treat. The treat was always Saturday evening...a rented movie, picnics upper at park, ice cream... What was interesting is that after a few weeks, we would start to help each other.

I only have one kid, so she is kinda stuck. But we do rotate our chores.

Best of luck!!!

 

[bababear_50]

We held a family meeting.

Stated the things that needed to be done to make our family work.

Listed things on a paper slips.
Passed a baseball cap around and each person took one.
Each person was given 5 minutes to exchange with another person if they were interested.
Points were earned and rewards were given.
No points earned then no extras were given--ie no ride to friends house,activities cancelled..

Hugs to you
Mel

 

[MSSANDRA]

Have you considered hiring someone to help keep your house clean? I know this is the budget board but sometimes it is just worth it. I have all "guys" and while they will help, they just do not do what I want, how I want without me staying on them contently. I have used someone before but working part time now and do not. If and when I go full time, I will budget for some help again.

 

[3happydancers]

I am overwhelmed. We have so many things going on in our family. We have 4 children ages 3-14. My husband and I both work 12 hour shifts that include weekends each month. Plus the kids have all kinds of activites.

We need to get a handle on cleaning and chores. I have all these ideas I could maybe try but then I don't impliment them. My kids do the dishes but nothing more...not even cleaning out the sink!

I want to try each kid having a chore list but what's the incentive/punishment if it's not done. If I offer $, I can see my son deciding he doesn't want to do some of the chores. This then backfires since he doesn't "need" the money for anything. So I would need to have some kind of other punishment for not helping the family out.

Plus I want to have maybe a family list like Mondays are washing dark loads, cleaning bathrooms, moping floors. Adding things for each day of the week.

I think that is the only way things will get done since we don't have a normal working schedule.

What does everyone else do to clean the house.

Get lingerie bags for each member of the family for socks and underwear. This cuts sorting.

I never have done $$ for chores. My folks always felt it was part of being a family. We had a chore chart that rotated so each of us (including my folks) had a set of chores each week. They used peer pressure to get it done. All chores started Monday morning and had to be done by Saturday ay noon. If one person did not complete their list, no one in the family got a treat. The treat was always Saturday evening...a rented movie, picnics upper at park, ice cream... What was interesting is that after a few weeks, we would start to help each other.

I only have one kid, so she is kinda stuck. But we do rotate our chores.

Best of luck!!!

We only have one kid too but we don't rotate chores (though a very interesting idea!). Our small family is considered a team which requires team work. No team work, no rides to the mall, a friends house etc.

I did read once where a family would do a 15 minute power clean-up nightly which included everyone (you could alter this to meet your family's schedule). I've actually done this on occasion and it works quite well for picking up "clutter".

We held a family meeting.

Stated the things that needed to be done to make our family work.

Listed things on a paper slips.
Passed a baseball cap around and each person took one.
Each person was given 5 minutes to exchange with another person if they were interested.
Points were earned and rewards were given.
No points earned then no extras were given--ie no ride to friends house,activities cancelled..

Hugs to you
Mel

Love your "exchange" program!

 

[pyrxtc]

I have a chore list that has to be done before you can do anything else after school. They come home, eat a snack, do their homework, then chores and then they can do something else for the rest of the night. It is not an option and they do not get rewarded since they are part of this household and everyone has to chip in. Both my 9 and 12 yr old are pretty good at vacuuming, 12 yr old is better at sweeping and really good at getting the bathrooms clean. They feed and water the dog, pooper scoop, and keep their rooms up. they also put away clean dishes and help set the table for dinner. Sometimes they will help cook too, mostly my 12 yr old since he wants to learn how to do it all. they both bring their laundry down and I wash and fold and they put it away and hang up all their shirts. They have to know when it needs doing since they need to wear it.

As I said, everyone helps because we all live in this house together. I don't get paid to do this stuff and neither do they.

 

[SamSam]

I have a chore list that has to be done before you can do anything else after school. They come home, eat a snack, do their homework, then chores and then they can do something else for the rest of the night. It is not an option and they do not get rewarded since they are part of this household and everyone has to chip in. Both my 9 and 12 yr old are pretty good at vacuuming, 12 yr old is better at sweeping and really good at getting the bathrooms clean. They feed and water the dog, pooper scoop, and keep their rooms up. they also put away clean dishes and help set the table for dinner. Sometimes they will help cook too, mostly my 12 yr old since he wants to learn how to do it all. they both bring their laundry down and I wash and fold and they put it away and hang up all their shirts. They have to know when it needs doing since they need to wear it.

As I said, everyone helps because we all live in this house together. I don't get paid to do this stuff and neither do they.

This is similar to what we did. Kids are grown now, but we expected everyone to help out with housework. When they were little (below 4th grade),I would make a weekly chart listing what there chores were (they earned stickers on the chart). Everything from sweeping the kitchen floor to feeding the family dog. As they got older I would still write out chores for them to do (especially during summer), again it was everything from sweeping the kitchen floor to cleaning their shared bathroom. To me it's just part of being a family, everyone helps out.
We even had nephews that would visit for a week in the summer and I had a chore chart (with stickers) for them, they loved it because they hadn't been exposed to it before.

 

[momto3gr8boys]

Check out the fly lady. Flylady.net, I believe. She will get your life back on track!

Sent from my iPad using DISBoards

 

[SCDisneyMom]

Each room in my house gets its own "day" for a thorough cleaning. Monday is for the bedrooms, Tuesday is for the bathrooms, etc. I feel less overwhelmed this way. I used to try to clean the entire house on Saturday, but I hated it. I felt like I was wasting the weekend away.

I do have a morning routine and an evening routine where I do the same things every day - in the morning I make our bed and unload the clean dishes from the dishwasher so no one is tempted to put dirty dishes in the sink during the day. At night I always load/run the dishwasher, wipe down my kitchen counters, and quickly sweep our floors. (I say "I" but my DH does help out.) I work from home, so the laundry is pretty easy for me to keep up with. I throw a load in before I start work, then throw another one in during my lunch break. I do this every day - we go through a lot of clothes in this house.

School and sports keep our 15yo DS pretty busy, but he is responsible for keeping his room clean, taking out the trash, mowing the lawn, putting his dirty laundry in the laundry room, and putting his clean clothes away. If these things are not done, then he does not get to hang out with his friends on the weekend or loses his cell phone for the day. This doesn't happen too often, though. DH usually does yard work on Saturdays, and we pay DS for any yard work he wishes to help out with beyond mowing the lawn. On days when he has more free time then he is expected to pitch in a little more around the house. He does not get paid for housework.

 

[ForMyBoys]

My kids do have some assigned daily chores... dishes, laundry, trash cans, walking the dogs. I give them a $1 per chore they do each day... so theoretically they could earn up to $14 a week for this.

For everything else we clean as a family. What works best for us is to crank up the tunes and then we set a timer to clean for 15 mins and I give each kid an area. After the 15 mins the kids get a 10 min break. Then we do another 15 mins, then again they get a 10 min break. We usually get it done after 4 rotations. So it takes about an hour and half, the kids work for an hour (with 3 10 min breaks)and Dh and I work the full hour and half. We normally do this twice a week and it really helps us keep up with everything.

The key to this strategy is that I HAVE to give the kids a break. It gives them something to look forward to when cleaning and they work harder during the 15 mins. I also make sure they have separate duties so they aren't fighting and they only get a reward if they do well during the 15 mins. That includes no whining and being respectful. I also work hard to compliment them and help them feel pride in their work. If they do well during the hour they get $3. Since we do this twice a week they can earn $6. So if you've been keeping track my boys can earn up to $20 a week if they did two chores a day and did well at helping during our cleaning sprees.

I keep track of what they earn in an excel sheet so they can use it to save up for stuff. Over the past few months they have both been able to purchase some items they wanted and they earned two $50 gift cards for our upcoming trip.

 

[MinnieForMe]

Check out the site: http://www.aslobcomesclean.com/

She has the daily and weekly lists already put together plus great advice on chores for kids.

 

[indimom]

We do the "Ten Minute Cleanup" several times a week. It's amazing what a quick tidy by four people can accomplish. And no one feels overworked because it's just ten minutes.
DS loads the dishwasher every morning.
DD helps with dinner at night.
Everyone works on laundry, as needed.
The kids do a lot of the mowing in the summer and snow removal (on snow days) because they are home during the day to get it done.
We clean on Saturday or Sunday. I wish we could spread this out through the week, but we have never come up with a routine that works out due to all the weekly activities.

I'm actually hoping to get us on a rotating schedule this summer when our lives quiet down a bit. (Maybe not everything, but at least vaccuming and dusting or breaking up laundry into certain days.) Maybe if we acclimate to the routine through the summer months, we can keep it up by fall when the crazy schedules start again.

One "punishment" I've used for kids who balk at helping out or who don't do their job during the week, is to make them official bathroom cleaner for our big clean on the weekend. Otherwise, I take this "hated" chore.

I like jenndisney's reward method. The all or nothing reward encourages everyone to push the others to get their job done. (But, if you've got one person who just doesn't care, that's gonna be an issue. )

 

[pocomom]

My kids 11, and 7 only clean their rooms and empty the dishwasher as far as a regular chore they do without me.(the 3 year old doesn't do much But we do a 15 minutes of general pickup every afternoon and 15 minutes in a specific room together. I try to have them do fun things, we make it a game, or we play music or something to keep the energy up. For us Monday is my room + bath (they use my tub, and hang out in my room alot so there are toys etc., not making them clean up after me ), Tuesday is the kid's rooms, baths +hallway, Wednesday is basement and garage, and so on, we leave one day as a make up day. The kitchen and first floor rooms are not on the list for us, because they tend to be part of the 15 min pickup, and I tend to stay on top of those rooms better. As far as their rooms they have to be done before they do anything for the weekend, we decide on no punishment and no reward for that, just the work needs to be done if you want to have the fun.
I've found for us doing it together means it gets done better, quicker and with less frustration. The make up day is critical to stay on track and when the week gets away from us we just start again on Monday.
I think when life is crazy you also need to let up on the pressure of feeling like the place needs to be spotless. When things are really bad I stick to keeping a clean kitchen, clean baths and a quick sweep of the floors, everything else can wait.

 

[DESKRoberts]

My kids are still pretty young, so other than making sure they pick up the toy room, they don't have set chores yet. But when I was growing up my parents gave us certain tasks that we had to do, clean our rooms, bathrooms, set and clear the dinner table, empty garbage. Then there were things that we could do to earn money. I always mowed the lawn and cooked dinner to earn money. That is what we will do with our kids when they get a little older.

 

[laurafergie]

I have a chore list that has to be done before you can do anything else after school. They come home, eat a snack, do their homework, then chores and then they can do something else for the rest of the night. It is not an option and they do not get rewarded since they are part of this household and everyone has to chip in. Both my 9 and 12 yr old are pretty good at vacuuming, 12 yr old is better at sweeping and really good at getting the bathrooms clean. They feed and water the dog, pooper scoop, and keep their rooms up. they also put away clean dishes and help set the table for dinner. Sometimes they will help cook too, mostly my 12 yr old since he wants to learn how to do it all. they both bring their laundry down and I wash and fold and they put it away and hang up all their shirts. They have to know when it needs doing since they need to wear it.

As I said, everyone helps because we all live in this house together. I don't get paid to do this stuff and neither do they.

This is very much what we do. I've had a chore chart for years. The kids get home from school, do homework, do the chore chart and then are free for the rest of the night. The only excuse for not completing the chart is illness, as all activities are taken in account. Enforcement would be that their life would end if the chart wasn't completed. Everyone has to contribute to the family unit, no exceptions.

 

[bigmamimia]

Are you planning a family trip to any time soon? Perhaps you could have a checklist for each person, every time they do their chore you put a checkmark. If x amount of checkmarks are achieved each week then you put X amount of dollars into a savings account for your next vacation. When you have enough money you take your trip. If their aren't enough checkmarks at the end of the week no money and the family has to wait longer for their vacation.

 

[LynnTH]

My kids are 12 and 14 and do not get paid for chores either. Somedays they have chores to do, somedays they do not. Depends on what needs to be done.

They are both responsible for putting their stuff away and keeping a clean room. They will also do dishes, laundry, clean bathrooms, dust, sweep, mop etc.

When they left for school this morning I told them they needed to empty the dishwasher and clean the bathrooms before playing with friends. They are very good about this (most days).

When we need to deep clean we will clean together one room at a time and it gets done pretty quick. They are not bad in the cleaning dept - they get paid to clean the office building where I work so they think that is pretty cool.

In the summer they get more chores to do as they are home all day long - during the school year not as much as they have school work and sports but they still do have to do chores.

 

[njcarita]

yep no one gets pd for chores here... just part of being a family........
my kids are 11..15 and 17............
and hubby and me.............. we are all incharge of our own laundry.......... older kids throw out the ktichen garbage.... youngest bathroom garbage
hubby does all the dishes.........i do all the bills and most of the cooking........
and the rest we divy up........ everyone knows how to clean bathrooms......windex....vaccum etc.... whatever needs to be done everyone chips in............

 

[Pesky]

I'd probably break down your chores, figure out days on which chores need to be done (like emptying all trash cans day before trash day) and let them choose. I also go by the theory that you do not get paid for chores specifically, you get an allowance for and chores are part of being a the family. However, if you do NOT do your chores (for other than good reasons like illness or pre-planned switching of chores), I take from the allowance of the slacker to pay another kid to do it. Or pay myself. Honestly, it's a real world consequence -- if you don't mow your yard or do your work, the work goes to another paid employee. Might as well learn that now and trust me, it's effective even at our kids' ages (though their allowance is in "gems" that let them buy things from our family store) and with our very stubborn 3YO.

 

[clh2]

My DD is now in college...but back in the day -

I needed DD to help out a certain amount of time per week. (It varied - summers a little bit more...around AP exam time... a whole lot less)

On average - I needed DD for about 1 hour per week. I did not care what DD did. Come to find out - she loved to wash the kitchen floor. That was great - because I handled the bathrooms while she did the floor. I also did not care when in the week she did the job.

There was no compensation for this.

If DD did anything more than the minimum - we paid for her help, as it was appreciated.

If DD didn't help out with the required minimum - we didn't feel the need to take her places (and we live way far out) i.e. to see her friends or go tot he movies etc.

The key - find out what works in your house!