Don't Do That

When I thought of homeschooling my children, I saw only the benefits of me being with them 24/7. I did not even think about the downfalls of THEM being with ME 24/7. They see everything I do that is wrong. When you are a homeschooling mom, you cannot say "do as I say, not as I do" because truly more is caught than taught!

Cleaning up is NOT one of my favorite things to do. Unfortunately, my girls are now old enough that they are starting to pick up on my dislike of cleaning and developing a dislike of it themselves!

So what to do? It is so easy to say that I prayed and my attitude was changed overnight and now my children blissfully clean the house along with me. But my attitude about cleaning the house has been bad for years now and only by the grace of God could it go away overnight. So I pray, but I still hang onto this attitude. Why? I really don't know.

BUT I do know that I am working on it. I have confessed this sin (yes, I do believe a lazy and unthankful attitude about cleaning the house is my sin) to my girls and told them that the Bible tells us to be thankful in ALL things and to do all things as unto the Lord. I have not been doing that, and I want to change.

So EE suggested that maybe if we sing while we work, that would help us to be glad while we are working. (Kind of like the whistle while you work theme.) :D So now, we are all singing and working, and honestly, it does make it go by a little better.

But there are those jobs that are just so huge to tackle, that even singing won't help. :D So I have taken the FlyLady approach and have decided that on those jobs that are too big to tackle (and 15 minutes seems too long to spend on it when you are already spending 15 minutes cleaning your zone --- each of the children have a zone - a part of the house they are responsible for keeping clean and orderly), they have a 15 item pick up. Before they are allowed to play, they have to clean up at least 15 items in that area. It could be a toy, a game, or a piece of trash, but they each have 15 items to pick up. It is working well. Even Momma has to pick up 15 items in the area! LOL!

I want so desperately to do as I say so that my children can do as I do. :)