Ok- First the high moment before I share my low moment.
I have a new trick for clean up time around the house. Our basic 5 o'clock clean up that I have shared about in the past was getting kind of old and routine, still working, but just not as motivating. I used to give them each 2 rooms to clean in their entirety (yes everyday at 5 p.m.) If they did a great job without 3 strikes they won dessert for the night. Strikes came from getting off track, constant reminding and a poor job in the end. Anyhoo, I got this latest twist from a genius teacher who knows how to get little kids to clean up a kindergarten room. I now tell my boys that there is a secret item laying around somewhere that needs to be cleaned up. I set the timer for 15 minutes and whoever happens to clean up the secret item I am thinking of, they get the prize. (Candy out of the halloween bag) It has worked great. They scurry around quickly (which was one way the old way was getting old, they were taking forever and lost their scurrying drive) trying to pick up more than the other in hopes that they cleaned up the secret item. One day it was a spoon lying in the middle of the toy room, another day it was a picture album under the art table. Now unfortunately Parker has picked the item up every time. But he is my wonderful boy who then always chooses a candy with multiple pieces so he can share with the very sad Cooper and mooch Sophie. But tonight I am going to have to stack the deck in favor of my little redheaded sweetpea. I'll just say the secret item is something that I saw him specifically pick up- cuz that is true motherhood love. yay for my clean house!
Ok, for my low. So I got totally shot down today by a teacher in my efforts to be a stellar party planning room mom. I'm not really the room mom, there isn't one. And for many reasons too long to go into here, Parker's class has been a bit discombobulated (I'm sure I nailed the spelling of that!) and has kind of gotten the raw end of the deal in a lot of areas. But that is life. So when the teacher asked me if I could help plan their thanksgiving party, I did what comes naturally, kinda waivered and wanted to bail. But Ritchey reminded me that this is why I am a stay at home mom, so I can do all these wonderful stay at home, kid supportive things. Ok, does this mean I have to get off my bum, put the bon bons away and turn off Oprah. Just kidding of course. So with Ritchey's little pep talk I embraced the idea and got planning. I was going to plan the best party ever for them. I placed phone calls, got prices, made lists. Then I called the sort of teacher (long story) and gave her my ideas. And can I say they were all completely shot down! Yes! She has her mind set on a certain event type and venue, and mine were definetely not along those lines. So God bless her for feeling the freedom to say no thank you. But man, I must admit I was pretty taken a back, bummed and a little frustrated. So there ya go. My first time trying to be all miss room mom, didn't go so well. Their day will be fine, and I"ll still help out where needed, but guess I won't get to do what I do best, plan and organize the whole shebang.
So there ya go, the day in the life of a stay at home mom.
No comments:
Post a Comment