Further Ponderings

I believe I've done a full circle with my floor-cleaning musings. I had a very interesting conversation with a homeschooling, hobby farm owner friend. She's paying her eldest (same age as Miss Sunshine) to do some extra chores at home. Ahhh, I thought...perhaps that could work for us too. Pay the kids to do that one job.

And then I thought about what that would look like in our school-attending family. It would mean washing & vacuuming while everyone else is home. I'm seeing visions of Mr Busy skidding his way through the house adding mud to the wet & clean-for-a-moment floors. I'm also envisaging the reality of my children's personalities. It all sounds fine to pay them and they'd be excited about the prospect of earning money they'll only ever spend on the once-a-fortnight tuck shop at school. But the rubber will hit the road when they realise it takes a long time to clean those dastardly floors and that they'll have another thing to fit in to their homework time. It would also add another "I asked you to....." situation where in the end I would end up doing it because no one has gotten there yet. There may be some compromise in there though and I'm thinking through that now. Having someone come in once a fortnight and offering the task to the children on the alternate week would give them opportunity to do the task and earn some money. If it didn't happen I could live with just a quick sweep through instead. I think for as long as I'm studying this might just be how it works for us.

I am working on a new Kids Jobs list though. They already do things like:

• set the table
• help with dinner
• the girls empty the dishwasher
• clean their bathroom & toilet
• keep their rooms tidy

The things I am in the process of adding are:

• hang out and bring in the washing (Miss Sunshine)
• dry and put away the handwashed dishes (girls)
• Mr Busy will empty the bottom rack of the dishwasher

I've mentioned all of this in passing to Dh and he's not balked at the idea. I'd like us both to be on the same page with how things will work best for us all. I don't want to end up so stressed out that I can't cope and I don't want him feeling reluctant to come home because we're all in an uproar. A peaceful home is such a blessing at the end of a busy day.