Good Morning from beautiful Montana:
When it is a beautiful day outside, who wants to be inside cleaning cupboards? No One! So let’s work together to get organized and then go outside and have a water fight, or play catch with a ball or curl up under a tree and read a book out loud.
Organizing Tip number 9: Organize your kitchen for efficiency for the entire family. If your 8 year old is expected to unload the dishwasher, work together to make a place and a plan for storing the dishes in the most efficient places.
Our daughter Bethany’s family stores their dishes in the lower cupboards and the pots and pans up in the higher ones. Her children begin unloading the dishwasher and putting the dishes away when they are three. They store the silverware in a special container on a lower shelf.
The cookbooks are stored way back behind the dishes, because let’s be realistic, how often are they really used? We get in habits of fixing favorite meals and only look for inspiration occasionally.
Her five year old sets the table each meal as one of his chores. The place mats and napkins are in a lower drawer so he can reach them easily.
They also store the Cereal on a lower shelf. And the fruit and cut up vegetables in a bottom drawer fo the fridge.
I can hear you sighing (hey, I am a mother- I have eyes in the back of my head and can pick up on an “attitude” at ten thousand miles) “But my kids would still break a dish or eat all the cereal or that is a lot of work.”
My answer is that if you want your children to grow up to be responsible, contributing adults, then you need to assist them to assume personal responsibility at a young age. So what if an occasional dish gets broken. They can be replaced at Goodwill.
I will talk some more in the next few posts about efficiency in the kitchen. Do you have some ideas to share of what has worked for you? Send me an email at Judy@ArtichokePress.com or leave a comment.
If you are eager to read an entire book of tips, techniques and ideas to Get Your Kids to Work at Home- go to http://www.KidsChoresAndMore.com You will find my popular book, plus lots of free bonuses you get only when you order online.
Also, mark your calender for Thursday, when I offer a free teleclass on some aspect of family relationships. You can check the schedule at http://www.ArtichokePress.com and sign up for those you are interested in. This is my gift to you for doing such important work with your family.
Judy H. Wright aka Auntie Artichoke, family relationship coach and author
