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freddieshoney 10-07-2011 03:05 AM

Cleaning
 
I am a mother of 4 amazing children they are ages 9,4,3,and 2 right now my niece and nephew are living here also, they are ages 5, and 9. Normally I only have the youngest 2 home thru the week and the cleaning is enough for a maid services and is never ending but today is the beginning of fall break and it runs thru the end of next week. We were all up by 6:00, oh there was no sleeping in for this momma hen and her chicks, and I have been non stop cleaning and laundry it is truly never ending... I have tried organizing everything and I have 2 very good little helper cleaners in the 9 year olds but there is just no end in sight to this mess and I have another week with all 6 of them home. It has only been 5 hours and I hate to say this I believe there is no floor in there rooms just never ending piles of toys, and I limit the amount of toys each of the children can have but there is still just so many not enough toy boxes for all the toys I just don't know what to do, my organizational skills just must not be good enough. I know this is mostly a rant but I don't know what to do with this house. Anyone got any good tips to help a mommy. I have took all the clothes out of there rooms and now there is a community closet in the laundry room, luckily I have a large laundry room. That took a lot of the mess away now just to figure out what to do with the rest of the toys and mess and the constant dragging everything including there shoes around the house nothing I do or say works.... Help:confused:

wildbeanerz 10-07-2011 07:05 AM

I don't know how limited your space is and [B]SIX/B] kids :eek: ... What I did when mine were young is to buy totes of varying sizes depending on the type of toy to go inside. Then I sorted all the toys in groups. Mine are both boys so my groups were like... blocks, lincoln logs, cars, guys (army guys) and their accessories, play food, etc. Then I got on the computer and made bold lettered labels for each box and printed them out. Taped the labels to the ends of the totes. Then they were only allowed one tote at a time out. Sounds harsh but we lived in a 12x65 trailer at the time and they shared a bedroom. No room for messiness. LOL This also made clean up days easier on me. Don't get me wrong. There were times I think every tote was dumped. And the toys did get mixed between totes too. Once in a while I dumped them and resorted and removed broken stuff etc. Also look into the totes that fit under the bed if space is an issue. I have to say now that mine are 13 & 14 they still have a few things they keep in totes and they are more organized than anyone elses kids I have ever seen except those whose mom does it all for them. I don't since they are old enough to do for themselves now that I taught them when they were young. Sorry for the rambling. Hope that helps some.

freddieshoney 10-07-2011 09:47 AM


Originally Posted by wildbeanerz (Post 58924)
I don't know how limited your space is and [B]SIX/B] kids :eek: ... What I did when mine were young is to buy totes of varying sizes depending on the type of toy to go inside. Then I sorted all the toys in groups. Mine are both boys so my groups were like... blocks, lincoln logs, cars, guys (army guys) and their accessories, play food, etc. Then I got on the computer and made bold lettered labels for each box and printed them out. Taped the labels to the ends of the totes. Then they were only allowed one tote at a time out. Sounds harsh but we lived in a 12x65 trailer at the time and they shared a bedroom. No room for messiness. LOL This also made clean up days easier on me. Don't get me wrong. There were times I think every tote was dumped. And the toys did get mixed between totes too. Once in a while I dumped them and resorted and removed broken stuff etc. Also look into the totes that fit under the bed if space is an issue. I have to say now that mine are 13 & 14 they still have a few things they keep in totes and they are more organized than anyone elses kids I have ever seen except those whose mom does it all for them. I don't since they are old enough to do for themselves now that I taught them when they were young. Sorry for the rambling. Hope that helps some.



I have really thought about doing that never thought of making the labels but I believe that will be really helpful, I am thinking that I could have my fiancee build me a wall unit of shelves in our family room that we could put all the totes and baskets in and maybe that would help and I could dress it up a little make it look as good as I can.. I recently moved from a 3 bedroom single wide to a 4 bedroom double wide so the room isn't really the problem just getting everything organized because right now there is not much organization anywhere but in the laundry room, Thanks for the suggestion, especially the labeling thing.
Thanks Britt:)

wildbeanerz 10-08-2011 12:59 AM

We had a wall unit built in the end of the boys' room at that time too. I wasn't going to suggest that though. Ours was built strong out of 2x4's and plywood. Because kids putting totes in and out we didn't want it to be flimsy. They had the floor plus two shelves above that and i think there were 3-4 totes wide. We used the mid sized totes. Not the big giant ones.

Kumochi 10-08-2011 02:30 AM

The totes is a great suggestion. Having the kids put stuff away before moving on to the next is also good. When my guys were little I had a toy closet where everyting was kept. Sometimes the kids just played in it on top of all the toys. Other times the toys were all sorted and organized.

Now that I'm a grandmother I don't bother to clean up the toys until the grandkids go home - or if I'm at their place I pick up the toys the night before the parents come home! This saves me from going insane trying to keep ahead of them.

Maybe this week you should wait till the end of the week and live with toy chaos for the week. The last day of the week you could make a game of sorting all the toys into the totes and labeling them with age or kids names. You would be already to maintain order when it's easier with school days.

Good luck and take time to enjoy the kids. This week will pass quickly. It seems like yesterday - not 35 years ago when my kids could be found in the toy closet. Mary

almeeker 10-08-2011 08:59 AM

We have 3 children and I watch 3-5 more depending on the day. We have disaster around here too, and I feel you on the "never ending" housework and laundry issues. I have that too. I swear the only way to catch up on the laundry is to strip the family naked and hog tie them in the basement until it's finished. It's really too bad we live in Michigan where nudism really isn't an option year round. We don't really have any sort of "tote" system, but we do have a "toy dresser" and various other containers for toys. A place for every thing and every thing in it's place and all that.

What I would suggest to you is some "delegating" aka "chores". I have a chore chart and no one can turn on the television until everyone is done with their chores, end of discussion. And if they break the rule the television is off for the rest of the day, we'll try again tomorrow. It would amaze you what my kids can accomplish when their favorite television show is on the line. They of course don't do everything like I would have, but it's a start and it also goes a long way toward making them aware of how much work is involved in keeping things nice and organized.

For the record they all have age appropriate chores, even the 2 year old, she has to feed the fish and she helps with veggie washing, she has to pick up toys on the floor that she's been playing with and she sorts socks (we're still working on that last one). I have found that instead of "telling" the kids that they have to do something, I actually take the time to "show" them how I want it done. Explain everything, show them where the stuff is kept, walk them through the process step by step. Then sometimes it takes me saying, "Did you do this? Did you do that?". It's still a daily battle, but I'm determined to keep after them until I can tolerate living in the same house with them.


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