In an effort to curb the piles of stuff on the floor, I have instituted a lost and found. Anything found by me after asking for it to be removed is placed in a basket and sorted at the end of each week. Currently in the basket are various shoes, including wellies, books, clothes, toys, musical instruments, pencils, jewelery, bike helmets and place mats.
My kids are 2.5 and 3.5, and between them the floors can get piled with stuff within seconds of them getting through the front door. Stuff on the floor is annoying, it makes the place look messy and hinders regular cleaning, making the floors disgusting.
I try and get the floors vacuumed and mopped at least once a week, and by rights it should be more often. It is just too hard with stuff on the floor which I have no idea what it is, who it belongs to and where it's come from. And when I go through the entire house and pick up everything off the floor, once a week, my back is so sore at the end of it I need to lie down for 30 minutes before vacuuming.
It seems though, that the prospect of losing toys, shoes and various costumes, is motivating for my children, so I think this idea has merit. Although, if they ever found the basket, I think I'd be in big trouble.
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I once took a broom and swept all the mess into my eldest childs bedroom. Naturally she complained. "hey, not all of this stuff is mine you know" So I handed her the broom and said "keep what's yours and sweep the rest into M's room" which she did and the message got passed on with each child happily sweeping from one bedroom to another. The left over unclaimed mess went into the rubbish bin. They actually enjoyed this "game".
September 1, 2007 at 10:24 PM