With all this home cooking from scratch has come MORE MESS. And yet our house is cleaner than its been in years. Why? First off because I have more energy than I've had in years. I'm sleeping better, waking up ready to GO, and that hasn't happened in... as long as I can remember! Healthy food makes such a huge difference!!
We've also changed the way we do chores for the younger girls (10 & 12) They have the dishes job this month. Three or four times a day, we set the timer for ten minutes and they have to work. For some reason I can't begin to fathom, this makes everything tolerable for them. They work faster than they do normally, and the entire kitchen is staying clean. Even with all the extra baking/cooking going on every day. I think it REALLY helped for them to realize HOW MUCH GETS DONE in ONLY ten minutes. The first time the timer went off and they looked around to see just how many dishes they'd washed and rinsed... it was amazing. AND OUR DISHWASHER IS BROKEN!!! Amazing. I love it. Good attitudes abound, because even they don't get grouchy over a measly ten minutes!
It doesn't work as well with the boys because Jaedin moves at the speed of SMELL. He is the slowest person I've ever seen. Seriously, the boy moves in slow motion. Doing pretty much anything. And Kainan... just isn't that motivated.
