And Now It Can Officially Start

Meg's birthday was a bunch of fun.
Honey and I got to have lunch with her at work because she only gets 30 min. And it reminds me of when elementary kids have their mommies and daddies come to their school and eat lunch in the cafeteria with them and their friends. I know from my Awana peeps that it's the Big Deal.  We got to meet her friends and see her office and even see a real Super Bowl ticket from 2 years ago. It was all kinds of fun and I wish I could do it every single week.

Then Haley came for dinner and our sweet R family was here. It was loud and busy and much fun-ness. We just love our girl.

But now that her bday is over its time to get back to living our normal joyful life and put away all the cookies and maybe even pull out the carrots again.

I woke up feeling like we all needed to reset. Since none of my kids came with a real reset button we did the next best thing. CLEAN HOUSE. Nothing says new beginnings like a sparkling potty.

But first we needed to do a bit of chore re-org. Our old chore system was tired and not working effectively and soooo 2014.  A change was in order.

Except for some weekend/evening kitchen work, our teenagers are not doing chores. They are gone too much and too busy to be able to help much right now. So I gave them a good momma speech about making their beds and cleaning up after themselves. Leaving no mess no matter how small. If you do it now you won't have to do it later.... Blah blah blah.

Then I moved to the youngers. And for the first time in a while I reassigned buddies. Jes (12) and Nate (10) are buddies. And Josh (13), Mally (9), and Z (7) are a 3 buddy team.

Everyone starts with their own chores then moves along to help their buddy and have their buddy check their work.

Here's the new chore schedule...

Josh - chickens, back porch, vacuum every afternoon, project room and bar
Jess - Parlor, dining room with Nate
Nate - Dining room with Jess, boys' bath, dog poop with Zeke
Mally - living room, yard pick up, girls wing
Zeke - bathroom trashes, sweep hall, laundry room and laundry bathroom, dog poop

Everyone makes their beds and cleans their own rooms.  They fold their own laundry and put it away. COW has kitchen work.

I also took away music and talking privileges during chore times.  At least until we are moving along quickly and diligently with good work ethic.

The day was a success.  We ended with a clean house, a happy momma, and a trip to the library.
I'm thinking this new system is going to work nicely.