Chores and Perspective
I hated chores when I was growing up, and I wouldn’t say we had a lot of them. I mean, there were chores and they had to be done daily. And sometimes my parents would go bowling on Sundays and my mom would leave a list of things to do. I complained and moped and hated it. So did my brother. It did not matter how many times my mom told us that if we wanted her to work so we had extra money for extras, then we had to help out around the house. She told us that so many times and yet my teenage mind did not care or get it.
Well, now I get it. I don’t even work outside the home at the moment, but there is still no way that I can keep this house clean. And when I say clean, I just mean reasonably picked up. I want to relax about things being messy. I wish I could just enjoy and embrace the chaos, but I really can’t. Or I can, but only for a while and then it gets to me. I get overwhelmed by the stuff being everywhere. I get tired of having to watch where I walk so I don’t break something or trip over something. I get tired of not being able to find things. And then I yell and withdraw and don’t want to play with the kids because every room in the house is such a mess.
And yet, I am not really in favor of "chores" as they are usually done, where the child has a list and has to do them and there is no flexibility. I don’t want slave children, I don’t want children who help out because they are scared or will be punished for not doing chores. I don’t want chores to be rewarded either. Ideally, I want the kids to help out around the house because they want to and they want to because they are a part of this household. The thing is, I’ve been waiting for either of them to show just a tiny bit of desire for cleaning and picking up. I suppose it is happening, just not as quickly as I would like.
So I thought I’d make a chart with pictures of all the chores that have to be done every day. Maybe I’ll call them something other than chores, something like "important jobs" or "opportunities to have some fun family bonding time AND get the house picked up." Or maybe just chores. Either way, I need some help. I won’t make them do things if they don’t want, but I will keep asking and telling them that I need their help if I really need it. If I just want it, I will just ask and let it go if they do not want to help. I will not ask them to do things they would hate doing, like getting the cats soft food (which they think is stinky) or scooping cat boxes.
The chore chart idea was a few days ago. When I brought it up to Chico Habib, he was quite resistant and spent the rest of that day saying no to any little request. But anyway, I realized since then all the little things they do around the house. So, here’s a list, just so I can gain some perspective.
- Every day or every other day, the children collect eggs from the chickens since the chickens lay in a place that no adult can get to
- There are many times that the kids have thrown out scratch grains for the chickens or helped get them into the coop at night
- Most days the children put garbage in the garbage can or hand it to me - this is way better than putting it on the floor!
- Most days the kids don’t even wear clothes, thus cutting down on the amount of laundry needing to be done
- Sometimes the kids put their own clothes away
- They will often take their dishes to the kitchen after dinner if I remember to ask them
- Just the other night, Mo was helping to set the table for dinner and Chico Habib was guarding the food from the cats
- They will occasionally help pick up the couch so that they can jump on it
- When we worked on the garden, the kids helped quite a bit. Chico Habib helped with getting the soil ready and Mo liked to help gather veggies. Both liked planting seeds.
- They will occasionally use the dustbuster to clean things up off the floor.
- Just the other night they cleaned the kitchen floor. They got it really wet and skated around on it, making it lots of fun.
- They are really enjoying cooking and baking more and more every day.
