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How do you let go of constant messes kids make?


grantmeawish
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I have 3 kids and it's like shoveling snow in an avalanche to keep things clean, but they are never clean. My kids have chores everyday but then make messes again. It really really bugs me and am having trouble enjoying them because I am always telling them to clean their messes and I am always cleaning to no avail. I want to rest and have fun but I feel like I should be working. How much do I let go? Is it ok to have the upstairs a disaster zone? Seriously! I feel like since I stay home my house should be in somewhat better order. I'm exhausted!

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Most of it is mental strength - teaching myself to not "see" chaos, or to view "stuff the kids have been playing with" as not "a disaster zone."

 

One thing that might help some, and that I sometimes do, is make them take a time-out from mess-making after you get things cleaned up.  For example, for one day nobody is allowed to pull out any toys in a specific room or area.  The nice thing about this is it forces them to try different things that can be just as fun.  They can play outside, read, have a game of ping-pong in the basement, or hey, how about clean out a cabinet!?  :P

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I agree that the ages matter.  Our house got a lot less messy when I only had one little one.  It also helped to get rid of a lot of stuff.  But I also firmly believe in having areas of the house that I don't have to keep clean all the time even if I'm home all day.  I get to choose what works for me.

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One thing that has always helped me is having one room where there is no roughhousing and no toys. When we lived in a tiny apartment in a rainy city, this was hard, but I basically split their room in half, to have a playroom on one half of the bedroom, so that the "sitting room" could remain tidy. Just knowing that I could have someone over without apologizing and we could talk in peace, was helpful. That, and I shine my sink.

 

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For the older two, maybe try giving them each a small, manageable area that is their responsibility to keep neat.  Instead of reminding them to do it, have some fun thing dependent on that being done.  For example, allowance or screen time or a fun read-aloud.

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I tell myself it's only for a season. My house will be much easier to keep clean when they've all moved out, but how much will I miss them? I know, probably depressing, but it does put the constant housework in perspective for me. :)

 

Also, I make them help. This year I've gotten much more organized. I still have a long way to go but I've gotten rid of tons of stuff.

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Messes and clutter make me twitchy, so when my kids were little there were only a few things they had constant access to. Most of the toys were organized by category and kept on shelves out of their reach. When they wanted something down, they had to ask for it. When they were done with that and wanted something else, they had to put away the first box before I would get something else out. If they wanted to have a little of this and a little of that, fine, but it was never everybody into the pool at once, so to speak, with every toy dragged out all over the house. This was our system from the time they were little. They are big now, can reach everything whenever they want, and know to put stuff away when they are through. Sometimes they still forget (so do I), so we all pick up after someone else once in awhile.

 

So the short answer is--a system of organization for the "stuff" and when it is accessible works wonders. So does getting rid of a lot of the stuff.

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I can only tell you what has worked for us.  We decluttered a lot of our toys since they had zero interest in cleaning up and that helped some.  I hate to be hard-nosed about it, but my 10 year old knows that mama does not pick up legos, she vacuums them up.  I've also had good luck with putting bins of them in storage and then rotating them out so there are not so many to mess up the house.

 

I try to provide proper homes for everything--all the outdoor toys go inside a storage bench on the patio, for example. If we don't have a home for it, then we need to find one or get rid of the items. Shoes go in the bins by the front door.  Toys are sorted into Rubbermaid tubs that go under the beds. 

 

Both of mine have little chores everyday that we work on, 6 year old has graduated from putting plastic dishes away, to drying dishes and putting them all away. It takes longer than if I do it myself, and is not done exactly like I would, but imperfect is ok. 10 year old learned to do laundry when he was 5, and the 2 kids can run all of it thru for me if I am sick. I don't sit on the couch and expect them to be slaves, but they need to learn life skills, so everyday they help with vacuuming, wiping down the bathroom counter, picking up toys, putting away their laundry. Kids can be much more capable than adults give them credit for. 

 

Our house is not the cleanest house on the block, and I live with toys and books laying out.  Its not Pinterest worthy, but it is tidy enough that the landlord can come over unexpectedly, and not want to evict us. :-) I've learned to adjust my comfort level with the messiness. 

 

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there were parts of the house that were off limits to their "stuff".

 

re: my living room is grown up space. no. toys. allowed.   it was easy to keep picked up and clean, and I could have 'sane' space. 

 

I now have a coffee table with huge drawers.  dudeling was allowed to keep his stuff in there.  books, paper, etc.  if it doesn't fit, it's out. 

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Thank you for all the useful advice! I like the idea of putting toys up and them asking to play with it and then cleaning it up. This will take organization on my part at first and I'm not very organized which is part of the problem. Trust me I throw away stuff any chance I get (I get a little giddy throwing stuff out)Ă°Å¸Ëœâ€°. My dd is a trash collector. She can find a use for anything.

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We have a smallish house and our living room was also our play room/school room/music room/everything room.  Many days (the majority?) you literally could not walk across the room without planning every step very carefully.  We had big baskets in the living room and every night before dinner or bed they'd toss everything into the baskets and I'd vacuum (it would take 5-10 minutes).  So it was mostly just surface cleaning, but it felt good.  Then my husband and I could sit in our clean living room after the kids were in bed, knowing of course, that it would all begin again the next morning.   Otherwise, our bedroom was clean and the kitchen was at least picked up/dishes cleaned every day.  My kids' bedrooms were all very small, so they usually only played in the living room.

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I wish you luck. I left a couple kids playing quietly for an hour, and came back to a bed upended and the mattress removed to make a tent. My two biggest rules are snacks need to be cleaned up after and no dumping clean clothes on the floor where they get dirty again. And even those don't always get followed.

 

It sounds like part of your house is clean. I'd protect that as clean territory and stay there as much as possible so you don't have to see the rest. ;)

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Yes, blinders is pretty much the answer.  :)  That reminds me of something that often happened when I was a kid.  My younger sister used to get sleepy at the dinner table.  Frequently she would fall asleep right there, laying her face (and hair) in the comfy mashed potatoes on her plate.  Rather than disrupt the meal every night, my mom learned a trick where she placed her hand just so and couldn't see the small head in the plate of mashed potatoes.  :P  No, really, I am not kidding.

 

It's survival, fellow moms.  :P

 

My kids haven't slept in their potatoes, but there are many things I choose not to "see" because it isn't worth it.  It will get cleaned up eventually.

 

I would also say this applies to adults too - I live with people who don't realize they are messy.  I can either get upset about it or look the other way.  I used to choose the former; now I choose the latter.

 

Good luck!

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I decided to not care that much, lol. It really made my life easier. Yes there is clutter, but this is a small house. If everything isn't put away at all times it looks lived in. There is only so much I can do and I would rather do something other than clean and tidy up all the time.  I'm fine with a little clutter.

 

My friends with kids in public school seem to have spotless houses. Kids aren't home all day, both adults work, the house doesn't get that used. We have a different life and our house gets used in a different way. That is the life we have chosen and that's ok.

 

When my boys were that age I let them leave their block palaces up for days at a time and they made forts out of the living room. We stepped over a lot of stuff. That time is done now and it is much tidier. 

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I'm working on skill development, specifically 4 skills:

 

1. Playing with one "thing" (set of things, or things related to a specific goal) at a time, in a defined area (large area for large scale toys, tables, place-mats, or trays for small-scale)... basically being intentional and sensible about these selections, and not getting things too mixed up without a reason. (Mixing things is fine, if there's a reason.) Mixed up messes are the hardest to clean. Cleaning is easier to learn with 'put all that back in the one bin it came from, just when you started' as the foundation skill. Sorting is another, more advanced, skill. You should be doing guided sorting if any sorting is needed for now.

 

2. Learning the difference between "settling" their play (leaving it out, but tidy looking), and cleaning up (sorting out, putting away), and discerning the occasions for each.

 

3. Learning to see the mess. This is important. I leave lots of things lots of places, and it's no wonder that my kids pay little attention when the do the same. I teach them to 'check with their mama eyes' with me (making funny binocular shaped hands), scanning the room and floor in an intentional pattern, making happy dinging sounds when areas are good, and beeps when the child needs to look again. If they don't see it, I give more and more specific cues until they are able to target the problem. The have become more and more capable at this.

 

4. Learning to "shoulder check" before walking away: to see that the room is acceptably tidy, lights are off, etc. A lot of what is left strewn around are tiny things set down a careless moment. This helps as a positive habit.

 

Also, I constantly remind myself to provide time for cleanup during transitions. If I expect them to come when I call them for lunch, I can't also expect them to clean up before they come. I also can't expect them to be fast workers at new, challenging or undesirable expectations. They need a solid amount of time to be able to tidy well. My other thing is that I (try to) not say yes to screen time unless "everything that pertaineth unto the children" is tidy. I'm still working on that 'check before yes' skill myself.

 

For you, with the youngest at 5 years, I'd start with 3 and 1, and provide lots of imaginative encouragement, and use the screen time rule. Then add 2, and wait a while until trying to do "shoulder checking" -- it's a tough habit to acquire and needs full attention. (Sorting can come last of all, because the other 4 skills will be of greater benefit in a visibly untidy home. Sorting skills will develop naturally in your 10yo if s/he is left alone to reorganize a shelf from time to time, and the others can be taught more intentionally, after the prior skills are well established.)

 

(What's imaginative encouragement?) It's inventing a game, fantasy, or play scheme that provides a built-in reason why the kids need to keep things tidy. All kids speak English as a 2nd language: Their first language is play. If you really need a lesson to sink in, speak their mother tongue: an imaginary reason to do something is often much more motivating than a real reason.

 

Examples: "Don't leave the litter in the campsite!" / "Careful, carpet gators love hair elastics!" / "You can't have the dragons and ponies all over the floor with the crazy forts! Those ponies are going to scare the poor dragons in the dark! Which toys are you really playing with?" / "If you don't put your underwear in the laundry, the Laundry Elves won't get paid their gold dust for washing them. Poor laundry elves!" (Real life examples, from the last 2 months of my life)

 

So, what I'm saying is that me, knowing that I have a strategy that is yielding some progress (not actually a clean house) helps me have the confidence to let go of the messes that exist in the mean time.

 

Because I know I'm working on it, I have confidence that I won't have this issue forever. I have a logical presumption that if I want to change X behaviour, I probably can, but I need to decide how important it is, and slot it into my skills-development plan in a reasonable way (with respect to what we are already working on, and all the rest of the things that I want to be working on). If I'm *not* going to prioritize teaching on skill X, my irritation that they don't yet have that skill (and my irritation at the results of living with people who lack that skill) goes down drastically. I know I'll get to "it" -- and in the meantime, I can treat "it" as a minor peeve, not cling to "it" as an (unreasonable) expectation.

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Young kids ARE messy.

 

The only way I found to help was to

1. Ban toys with 1,000,000 tiny pieces when kids are small. (apparently my older children were not damaged by not having legos, Barbies, or Polly Pockets ) And yes, I was a Scrooge, but I had 10 years between my oldest and youngest. I needed sanity.

 

2. Toys with lots of components are stored on a tall shelf out of their reach and only mom gets them out after the room is clean.

 

3. Reduce kids' toys DRASTICALLY

 

4. Reduce kids' clothing drastically.

 

5.. When mine were toddlers and preschoolers, I had a toy basket in each room to make my life easier. The living room toys were stashed there and at the end of the day I put them where they belonged.

 

6. Natural pickup times were before lunch. Before snack. Before supper. Before bed. This kept things at a manageable level.

 

7. Big "projects" had a deadline. Like big block fortresses or whatever had to be picked up after 3 days.

 

ETA: 8. My room, my bathroom are OFF LIMITS. I straighten in the morning and close the door. It's so nice to know that I can at least go to bed in a clean area.

 

9. Nothing wrong with limiting toys to bedrooms.

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I have 3 kids and it's like shoveling snow in an avalanche to keep things clean, but they are never clean. My kids have chores everyday but then make messes again. It really really bugs me and am having trouble enjoying them because I am always telling them to clean their messes and I am always cleaning to no avail. I want to rest and have fun but I feel like I should be working. How much do I let go? Is it ok to have the upstairs a disaster zone? Seriously! I feel like since I stay home my house should be in somewhat better order. I'm exhausted!

 

There is a limit. No one in the family gets to make messes and leave them for other family members to walk around and step over and all that.

 

Children do not need to have free reign on scattering their stuff all over the house. You can have rules, and you can enforce those rules. That is part of your (and by "your," I mean "our," because this applies to all of us  :001_smile: ) job as a mother: to teach your children how to behave properly, to have self control, to be orderly, and so on.

 

When you are "always telling them to clean their messes" and "[you] are always cleaning to no avail," it might mean that you are not stopping and requiring them to clean their messes before they move on to another mess. It might mean they have too many things to mess with. It might mean that it would be better to limit the places where they can make messes, and limit the times when they are able to make messes.

 

No, it isn't ok to have the upstairs a disaster zone.

 

:grouphug:

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I used to make my son watch Hoarders whenever he didn't want to help clean.  Now I just remind him of the show and of the bugs that will start climbing all over him as he sleeps if the house is messy like those people's, and he groans but gets his butt up and starts cleaning.

 

I do not recommend this for certain kids who may end up traumatized, though.  Some of those houses were SCARY.

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Young kids ARE messy.

 

The only way I found to help was to

1. Ban toys with 1,000,000 tiny pieces when kids are small. (apparently my older children were not damaged by not having legos, Barbies, or Polly Pockets ) And yes, I was a Scrooge, but I had 10 years between my oldest and youngest. I needed sanity.

 

 

This is a rule I agree with wholeheartedly, but I can't figure out how to limit birthdays. I've been to no-gift parties and I think that's great for little ones but for older ones whose friends get gifts? 100% of our tiny-pieces toys other than Lego, which stay in the Lego area, were gifts giving lovingly by some six-year-old who would have happily kept them for herself if her mom didn't force her to wrap it up for the birthday party. :)

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This is a rule I agree with wholeheartedly, but I can't figure out how to limit birthdays. I've been to no-gift parties and I think that's great for little ones but for older ones whose friends get gifts? 100% of our tiny-pieces toys other than Lego, which stay in the Lego area, were gifts giving lovingly by some six-year-old who would have happily kept them for herself if her mom didn't force her to wrap it up for the birthday party. :)

 

For us it's the uncles, who are either re-living their childhood or punishing me for buying their kids too much stuff back when I was childless.  :P

 

Luckily for me, my kids tend to forget about the existence of many of those zillion-piece toys.  And I don't go out of my way to remind them.  ;)

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This is a rule I agree with wholeheartedly, but I can't figure out how to limit birthdays. I've been to no-gift parties and I think that's great for little ones but for older ones whose friends get gifts? 100% of our tiny-pieces toys other than Lego, which stay in the Lego area, were gifts giving lovingly by some six-year-old who would have happily kept them for herself if her mom didn't force her to wrap it up for the birthday party. :)

 

Probably for us it was because we didn't really do kid birthday parties (mostly family nights with a friend or two sleeping over) and when others asked what my dds would like, I would steer them toward books, art supplies or a larger toy.

 

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I tell myself it's only for a season. My house will be much easier to keep clean when they've all moved out, but how much will I miss them? I know, probably depressing, but it does put the constant housework in perspective for me. :)

 

 

 

This. Except it only works when it's true, lol.

By year 15, I stopped seeing 20+ years as "a season".  :willy_nilly:

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5, 8, 10 ages

I wish someone would do something without me asking Ă°Å¸Ëœâ€œ

 

1. They are too young.

 

2. You don't ask. You tell. And it's ok to tell. They are not doing you a favor. They are taking responsibility for their own activities, and learning how to do the things that are required for people to live together in one place.

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Decluttering did not help here. It made the problem worse. Instead of playing with a bunch of toys and leaving them all over, they now have space to:

 

-Build robots and hinged-top storage boxes out of cardboard scraps

-Make signs and tape them all over the house

-Recreate different types of spider webs across doorways with scotch tape

-Wrap kitchen utensils up in scrap paper as gifts

-Put up the ubiquitous pillow-and-blanket forts

-Make a "car wash" out of deck table chairs

-Use all the mason jars to store various insects and vegetation

-Disassemble things to build other things, that usually involve projectiles or superhuman powers

 

Toys were easier. I seriously hope that all this creative free play leads to happy, productive, well-adjusted adults who travel the world sending me exotic chocolate to make up for turning my house into a mad science lab/art studio/recycling plant FOR YEARS.

 

If I see another sliver of cardboard today I'm going to scream.

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5, 8, 10 ages

I wish someone would do something without me asking Ă°Å¸Ëœâ€œ

Oh my gosh, yes, this! Without my asking 3x. I stayed home from a family trip to the people

This evening because I was tired to having them talk to me and tired of talking to them. Lol.

 

The 10yo is so distractable, yet when you ask her to do something right away, it's a shock as to why you're making her do it NOW!

 

I have realize, though, that they do way more than I did at their age and I could not "see" the things that needed being done and picked up until much, much later.

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For me, I could deal with the mess throughout the day if I knew each day the house would be clean each evening and, in turn, when I woke up each morning (I find mess first thing in the morning extremely overwhelming and tend to shut down and be far less productive). So, They can play whatever during the day, and I can happily ignore it, knowing it will be sorted out at a set time later. Before baby wakes up from her nap around 3:00, they need to clean the loungeroom (and we're going to add the playroom to this daily routine I think, it was getting done weekly but now it's just becoming an overwhelming chore each week). This means daddy, who also arrives home at 3, comes home to a relatively clean house. After the baby wakes up it's outside time for an hour or more, after that usually a structured activity with dad or some TV time, then dinner and bed routines, so cleaning the play areas at the end of our primary playtime each day works well. The baby still pulls things out but they're easily overlooked and picked up after bedtime. My kids are much younger than yours, but they are fully capable of doing the lounge room by themselves, and the playroom with some help. They also clean their bedrooms each morning before school. When they make messes in other rooms, I simply observe them, and when I notice they've finished their game, ask them to clean it up. But since they clean bedrooms in the morning and lounge/playrooms in the afternoon, messes in other rooms are rarely an issue. 

 

That's what works for us at least. For older children it might take some persistence to get them to accept a new chore routine of cleaning those spaces daily, but once you do that, the amount of mess made in a day is usually not too overwhelming, it's having it build on itself until the weekend which causes chaos for me. 

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We are not perfect and my kids are beyond the "toys everywhere" phase, but they still can make messes.  Here are some things that helped us.

 

1.  Organizing the toys in covered bins put out of reach.  That way I could enforce the "clean up what you have before I anything else" rule. 

2.  Setting several times of day that were "tidy up times."  Before lunch, before dinner and before bed were typical ones.  I would set a timer and we would race the clock.  Also, there was no screen time until the tidy-ups had been done.

3. All small type toys like Lego must be played with on a large sheet.  Anything that was not on the sheet was mine.  Since we had a young one in the house, the only way we could allow toys like that was to confine it to one area of the house (their room) and enforce the sheet rule.  They had a small table where they could leave a project in progress.

4.  Toy Jail.  If they did not participate in the scheduled tidy-up times or did not do a good job, whatever I picked up went into toy jail.  A small fish-tank is ideal because they could see the object.  They had to do extra chores or to spring the toys from jail.  At the end of the month, I pitched items still in jail. 

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I have a bunch of little kids (8, 7, 4, 2, 7 months). We live in a small house, only about 700 sq feet of which we spend our days in (the rest is sleeping area and bathrooms).

 

There are messes. Constantly.

 

Things are never clean enough for me and never stay that way, but I maintain sanity a few ways. Namely, regular chores for myself and the kids, and a policy of cleaning up before leaving any area.

 

The latter, especially, is so crucial. They can destroy the living room or a bedroom, but they are not allowed to leave the space before cleanup. With some of the kids this requires my supervision and direction so they don't get off task. That's okay and normal! But we probably clean up the house and yard four or five times a day. It takes five minutes, max, each time. And it makes the house a more pleasant, restful, and functional environment.

 

Messes are part of childhood, but they need not be total chaos. Accepting that the mess will happen and having a system in place for you and the kids dealing with it peaceably is very, very important :)

 

You don't need to be able to rub your fingers on my shelves and come away with zero dust. But you do need to be able to walk through the space without foot injuries :rofl:

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1. They are too young.

 

2. You don't ask. You tell. And it's ok to tell. They are not doing you a favor. They are taking responsibility for their own activities, and learning how to do the things that are required for people to live together in one place.

Now I wanna cry... Mine are even younger and I thought we'd have to be getting there soon

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I agree that the ages matter. Our house got a lot less messy when I only had one little one. It also helped to get rid of a lot of stuff. But I also firmly believe in having areas of the house that I don't have to keep clean all the time even if I'm home all day. I get to choose what works for me.

 

Yes! Don't overlook this - if you cannot get an area back under control or at least straightened in 10-15 minutes there is too much stuff. My kids get overwhelmed with too much out so controlling some of it with bins and boxes helps immensely. You don't need to be a rigid minimalist, but regular toy culling is good for them AND us :)

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When my kids were younger, the unused dining room was the designated disaster zone area. Now that they are older, the dining table in the living room is the designated disaster area. They will clean up before dinnertime.

 

I like contained mess. Clutter everywhere is what drives me up the wall.

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5, 8, 10 ages

I wish someone would do something without me asking Ă°Å¸Ëœâ€œ

 

:grouphug:

 

Yeah, you've got a ways to go.

 

You've gotten some good advice about setting them (and yourself) up for success. But honestly, they're too young and you're outnumbered. They won't do it without being told for a while yet, but they will eventually. Hang in there, hon.

 

ETA: And when I say "Hang in there," I don't mean give up in despair right now, I really mean keep on teaching as patiently as you can. Eventually it sinks in. :P

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I agree with the tips others have offered. I happen to have messy kids who leave a trail behind them wherever they go, so unless I stay on top of things constantly, the clutter does get out of hand. I am also not naturally neat myself, so it takes mental and physical energy to keep things neat.

 

I was able to keep a perfectly clean house all of last school year while our home was on the market, but it took a tremendous amount of time, and I just can't keep that up continuously. As we head into the fall, I do plan to establish some new chore routines for all of us.

 

We have a large toy closet and labeled bins, but my kids still have trouble keeping things organized. They tend to just throw things on the closet shelf instead of putting them in the proper bins, so even though the room may look clean, I know there is a disaster hidden in there. Every so often we do a giant clean out of the closet and start over, and I closely supervise the way they put things away for awhile, but it gradually gets worse again. I know that to really keep things in order I have to oversee it more rigorously, but I can't seem to sustain that level of supervision over the long haul. I know that this part is my fault, and not the kids'.

 

We do one thing we do that I haven't seen mentioned. Each of my children has a clear plastic box with a lid (maybe twice the size of a shoe box) that they keep on a shelf in our toy closet. In this box, they get to keep all of the little things that they love that don't otherwise have a home. McDonald's toys, little superhero figures, yo-yos, and other knickknacks live in this box. When it is too full to close the lid, we clear them out and get rid of things they don't love any more. I got tired of having lots of little things with no real home, and this system has worked fairly well for years. I'm not saying that it keeps them from making a mess, but at least there is a place to keep these things now.

 

 

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I nag!

I realize that this is the way life is.

I nag!

I clean it up myself.

I don't let DD make glittery pictures every day.

I secretly throw away toys with lots of tiny pieces.

I nag.

Me too! All of these.

I threw away a huge bag of stuff today and went through closets and donated clothes. All the toys were put in the playroom where they now have to stay. I'm going to hang in there and keep nagging/telling them to get their chores done and try to keep some sanity!

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1. They are too young.

 

2. You don't ask. You tell. And it's ok to tell. They are not doing you a favor. They are taking responsibility for their own activities, and learning how to do the things that are required for people to live together in one place.

This.

 

Also I recently set up a big play yard in the living room so my 4 and 6 year old could play without the 1 year old destroying their stuff every 5 seconds. The bigger boys and their Legos, blocks, etc. go in and the baby stays out. The room looks so.much.cleaner!

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I have too many little kids to expect things to stay neat. I work really hard most days and if I take a day off, it means even more work for the next few days. I tell myself that I am working on making memories and building relationships. Do I want my kids to remember Mom always cleaning or Mom getting down and playing with them? Quality time TYPICALLY wins out over cleaning. And I'm okay with that.

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I used to make my son watch Hoarders whenever he didn't want to help clean.  Now I just remind him of the show and of the bugs that will start climbing all over him as he sleeps if the house is messy like those people's, and he groans but gets his butt up and starts cleaning.

 

I do not recommend this for certain kids who may end up traumatized, though.  Some of those houses were SCARY.

 

ROTFL!

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We don't allow toys downstairs. They keep them upstairs in their rooms. Your children can learn which rooms are to remain toy free. Sure, I felt a little guilty at first telling them,"no toys in here!" (Everyone says toys spread about make sweet memories - I disagree.) but now that they know, it's less stuff to clutter my living room.

Teach easy everyday things as you go. Even our 4 year old knows to clear his plate and utensils after a meal. I provide a cup for them to rinse the toothpaste from the sink when they brush. My son knows if he "misses" in the bathroom that he (not me) cleans it up. Responsibility is a gift for them and you.

I know (trust me) the temptation is there to do it for them since you can do it faster (and better), but in the end if you don't teach them you'll get teens who expect your maid services.

If they have so many toys they can't somewhat easily clean up, it may benefit everyone to reduce the amount (even just put away in a bin out of sight and reach for rotation).

It would be a rare sweet gift for littles to clean without being asked.

If your home feels unkempt to you because people make a mess and won't help you clean it, I wouldn't overlook that. The family that makes messes together should willingly clean together. And at the end of the day, focus on what you did do rather than what still needs to be done.

A place for everything and everything in its place. Repeat after me in a loving, firm voice - "that's not where that goes." :-)

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I have too many little kids to expect things to stay neat. I work really hard most days and if I take a day off, it means even more work for the next few days. I tell myself that I am working on making memories and building relationships. Do I want my kids to remember Mom always cleaning or Mom getting down and playing with them? Quality time TYPICALLY wins out over cleaning. And I'm okay with that.

See, I wish I could do that. I just can't function in a mess and it makes me agitated and snappy, I think it triggers anxiety and feeling really out of control. Before I had kids I wanted to be the mom making memories instead of always cleaning. I try to do both now, because I can't have the fun if I have chaos.

 

Keeping the clean ups frequent keeps the time short, which helps. But I think I have had to accept I'm just never going to be a play-on-the-floor mom. I am, however, a superb eater of imaginary recipes from the play kitchen :D

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Thank you for all the useful advice! I like the idea of putting toys up and them asking to play with it and then cleaning it up. This will take organization on my part at first and I'm not very organized which is part of the problem. Trust me I throw away stuff any chance I get (I get a little giddy throwing stuff out)Ă°Å¸Ëœâ€°. My dd is a trash collector. She can find a use for anything.

 

I have a trash collector too!

 

What I try to emphasize to her is that while she can make it useful, right now there are a lot of things that we NEED recyclables and once we put tape all over it, it's no longer recyclable so unless you are going to use it RIGHT NOW, the responsible thing is to let it go.

 

Amazingly, this appeals to her sense of conservation and has really helped a lot. I mean she still kind of hoards... but I can get trash piles that she is "going to do a craft" with out of her room.

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