Skip to main content

My BRIGHT idea!

Our poor daughter is blessed with the messy gene. She comes by it naturally, I am a messy child myself and my husband comes from a line of hoarders too long to list. It's tough stuff for little people. The mess becomes so large in their room so quickly that it's near impossible for them to tackle it by themselves and don't even start to factor in emotional attachment that prevents the complete removal of stuff from their life.

Well, my beloved husband, Joel, did a thorough cleaning of Hannah's room this past Christmas break while he was off from work.  It was beautiful.  He did a great job.

I went back in there today and it was you guessed it, not safe for human habitation. Stuff everywhere! So as a Valentine's present, I decided to clean her room. We also rearranged, but that's not nearly as important as my bright idea. I was done picking out all the trash and toys that were beyond broken or had no reason to be with us other than the fact that we can point to them and mention that they come free with the artery busters when the doctor tells us about our cholesterol levels being out of control. At that point the light bulb went off.

Me: "Hannah, you have two minutes to pick up the toys you want to play with in the next month."

H: "How long?"

Me: "Two minutes, no one minute and put them in that corner right over there"

H: "No, two minutes"

Me: "Okay, start....NOW"

Insert:
Flurry of little person tripping over still enormous amount of play material searching for what she wants. with occasional questions of how much time left and helpful toy suggestions from me.

Me:"Great JOB! Times up. Now I'm going to put the rest of these toys away for a month. I'm not giving them away, just putting them away for a month. And here's the best part, now you know you can clean your room in two minutes!"

H: "BUT I WANT MY PRINCESS SHOES!"

As she walked out, I threw them into the two minute pile and stuffed the rest in a huge mess bag and cleared the room.

That's my bright idea. She can manage cleaning for two minutes and I can deal with the stuff in a bag in some room in my house. If at the end of two months she doesn't ask for anything in there, it goes into deep storage and then I find it when we move one day and think "Why do I have this random bag of old toys?"

And I would suggest if you have older children, to lengthen the time, but I wouldn't go much over ten minutes, because really who wants to clean up their toys that long?


PS She loves her clean room and is in there right now dancing and jumping around, talking about how she can't wait to show her Papi how clean it is.

Comments

  1. That's a bright idea, indeed. How I love your sense of humour!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Stories from the Kitchen: Taste and See

I celebrated my birthday last weekend. It was wonderful and the leftovers left me with a question or two. Find out what they are and how I'm currently answering them in this week's podcast. Stories from the Kitchen Season 2, Episode 2: Taste and See Notes from the episode: Taste and See by Margaret Feinberg Dad’s New York Cheesecake (from the back of a Philidelphia Cream Cheese package) 1 ⅞ cups graham cracker crumbs ¼ to ½ cup butter, melted 1 cup sugar, divided 2 lbs cream cheese (4 packs) 2 large eggs (lightly beaten) 1 tsp vanilla 2 tbsp cornstarch 1 cup sour cream Preheat oven to 450F Mix well graham crackers, 2 tbsp sugar, and enough butter that the mixture holds together. Reserve 2 tbsp for garnish. Press mixture onto bottom and sides of a greased 9-inch springform pan. Chill in the freezer while preparing the filling. Mix cream cheese and sugar until smooth and light. Beat in eggs, vanilla, and cornstarch until just blended. S

Tasty Tuesday: Roasted Broccoli

I ran across this recipe on Pinterest the other day that was labeled " The Best Broccoli Of Your Life. " I normally either steam our broccoli in the microwave or saute it with olive oil and red pepper flakes on the stove top. I decided this would be something to try. I did the salt, pepper and olive oil part of the recipe. I didn't have the majority of the other ingredients. In fact, all I had was a little bit of Parmesan  It was wonderful. Not the best broccoli of my life, but honestly, it was pretty close. And if I had the lemon juice and all that jazz, it may very well be the best. What have you been eating lately?

Sweet Caroline by Kelda Poynot

  First off, my copy of Sweet Caroline  (aff link) is not a gifted review book, I spent my well earned Amazon No-Rush Rewards money on this book. Second of all, this is not my standard close door kind of romance. Third of all, this is a really fun read. Caroline is a hard working young lady that is doing all that she can to make ends meet and to get her graduate degree. Part of that work is renting out the room above her garage. When she answers the phone of an unknown number, believing it's a future tenant, she has no idea how much her life is about to change.  The young man on the other end of that call, Hashim, is tall, dark, and mysterious in all the right ways. The story quickly moves from the girl next door falling for a stranger to a fight for their lives. And in true real life fashion, those fights aren't just with external enemies but the ones we carry within.  It's an entertaining story of Caroline and Hashim, discovering their love for each other and fighting to