Image credit: sindesign

What if you confiscated these items and allowed your children to retrieve them only on a particular day? Call it your “Monday Turnover Box.” The rule: Any item that isn’t picked up or put away after dinner will be placed in the box. Kids (maybe even Dad) can only retrieve these items only on Monday mornings. Pick a day that works for you.

This can help teach kids to help clean up the house and be more responsible with their belongings. Maybe when they find that they can’t live without their favorite toy or jacket, they’d pick up after themselves more. And a video game’s no fun if there aren’t any controllers to use, is it?

Post from: Blisstree

The Monday Turnover Box

Image by: Sean Dreilinger

How do you make cleaning less of a chore, and more of a fun activity? Here are some ideas.

Put on some music. Wipe that kitchen counter to the beat of the songs on the radio. Throw in some workout moves by wiping that window up, down, up, down. Let the rhythm energize you!

Divide the chore into small tasks. Do you really need to clean the whole living room today? Why not try this — give yourself 15 minutes per room. Set a timer and clean what you can in the given time. When the 15 minutes are up, rest. Then move on to the next room. It makes cleaning time more manageable, and you may want to get more done given that you only have a small amount of time given.

Share the load. Ask a family member or a friend for help. Have a conversation while cleaning a room together. The task is divided in two, getting it over with in half the time. Plus, you spend quality time with them.

Catch up on your reading. Put those audio books to good use! While you’re dusting the furniture, listen to that romance novel you’ve been wanting to catch up on or that fantasy novel about wizards and warlocks. Who knows? You may be so caught up in listening to the stories you clean the room twice!

Anticipate a reward. When you’ve got something great to look forward to, it makes the task at hand easier to bear. If your reward is a foot spa and a pedicure, envision yourself being pampered at the salon. Imagine soaking your tired feet into that bubbling foot bath. All those clutter will be cleared in no time!

Now grab that broom and have some fun!

Post from: Blisstree

How Do You Make Cleaning Fun?

Image credit: mylocationscouts

Relax. Enjoy the clutter.

Sometimes the little cluttered things is what makes a house a home. For as long as the clutter isn’t a danger to others, relax for awhile. There’s a difference between a stuffed toy thrown on the floor versus a stuffed toy nestled beside your Grandma’s antique lamp in the hallway. There’s a difference between the book your teenager has left on top of the kitchen table versus an empty tub of yogurt left on the counter.

Sure, there’s a fine line. It’s really up to you whether it’s classified as homey or clutter. Just remember that you aren’t perfect. Your kids aren’t perfect. Your home isn’t perfect. Sometimes it’s the little things here and there that give our homes personality and warmth.

Post from: Blisstree

Enjoy the Clutter

My daughter is going through her supplies, as well as quilting and arts books, trying to determine which she should keep.  Our multigenerational house (home for six of us plus dog and guinea pig) is overflowing.  So all of us are culling “stuff” for our yard sales that will start as soon as the dirt road leading to our house is past “mud season.”

Alyson B. Stanfield, author of I’d Rather Be in the Studio! The Artist’s No-Excuse Guide to Self-Promotion. and blogger at ArtBizBlog.com mentions in her newsletter, “Spring cleaning makes room for better things.”

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Spring Cleaning Your Art and Ideas

Susie Homemaker (My Mom) is Coming To-Do-List:

* Steam clean the couches

* Mop floors

* Dust and lemon oil shelves and furniture

* Rake leaves

* Vacuum

* Make a Birthday gift

* Laundry

* Caulk shower

* Clean bathrooms

* OxyClean Zack’s floors

* Kid’s rooms

* Magic Erasure door jams and walls

* 5 Blog Posts (so I can spend time with my parents).

Is anyone going to do the 6 month Oprah and Peter Walsh Clutter-free Challenge?

I’ve been conciencious about working on the clutter. After the show I put 3 pair of shoes in a donation bag I keep perpetually going.
I’ve gone from this:

To This:

Post from: Blisstree

Clean Up Your Messy House!

Go shopping
Watch Food Network for 12 hours straight
You must get a manicure
You really must get a pedicure
Change your hairstyle or find a new salon
Endure/enjoy a department store make-over
Learn how to cook something you’ve never cooked before; better yet, start a cooking club
Buy a really expensive bottle of wine
Go to a 4 star restaurant or stay in a 5 star hotel for the week-end, just to get away
Send flowers to yourself
Overhaul your make-up case
Overhaul your work wardrobe
Toss any and all sweat pants
Learn a new language
Clean out your closet; if you haven’t worn something in a year, toss it
Find the music you like, not your husband’s
Find a book that’s not on Oprah’s list
Ride your bike
Volunteer in your community
Get a complete medical check-up
Teach your dog to hug you
Visit a spa and get a facial; better yet a massage.

Go shopping!
Tops2Bottoms
Blogdorf Goodman
DailyCandy
eBeautyDaily

Have a fabulous Easter or Passover! (or any other holiday that you celebrate at this time of year.)

Post from: Blisstree

Spring Cleaning

I will start by acknowledging that my hubby does much of the laundry on the weekends. However, it may very well be my imagination, but since I started working from home to manage my business, The Pet Set , I get the distinct feeling that there has been a reversal of roles without my knowledge. For years I commuted to and worked in Manhattan and so did/does hubby; therefore household chores seemed to have been shared equitably.

This Sunday’s New York Times Style Section , covers the issue of the rift in who does more house cleaning with the deft of a Swiffer (the greatest invention ever!)–pointing out that “…women spend twice as much time on housework than their husbands…”

I certainly recognize that since I’m home all day, I may as well do some cleaning…but there is a level of expectation on his part that kills me. He has always been a neat freak and would never leave a dirty cup in the sink. Lately, I feel like the “little woman” or “the Mrs” character from the “I Love Lucy” era. Or maybe I’ve just never noticed what little boys men really are.

I believe there has always been a silent double standard about the person who works from home. I can remember from my corporate days, women calling in for meetings from their home office and those physically present, kind of rolling their eyes at the other person as if to say, “she’s got the life.” I’ve often witnessed a sarcastic undertone…co-workers would use the international symbol of using fingers to illustrate quotation marks: “She’s working from home today.” As if noone really believes you are truly working.

If it were a normal Tuesday at the office or (I love this one) a person’s “real” job…you wouldn’t have to excuse yourself from a meeting to make sure the recycling stuff is put outside, would you? Nor would you have to stop what you are doing because you can’t stand looking at the dirty windows for another second.

And here’s my favorite laps in memory on the part of hubby. He happens to work lower Manhattan, where I once commuted to and from every day. He tells me the “horrors” of his commute…but this is how it sounds to me: “there are these big trains that take you to this place called the train station, where they have these big boats…and then the boats go on the icy water of the Hudson…and you’re not going to believe it…they take you from New Jersey..aaaall the way across to that big city New York…you know, New York?”

But even if you don’t work from home, you can be sure that when push comes to shove, it is the wife who will be the one to make the bed.

Swifers are on sale this week at our grocery store.

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Who Washes The Pants In Your Family?