Parenting Tips: Neater Clothes pt 2

OK, so last week I blogged about ideas for helping kids keep their folded clothes folded.  Today, how can they get them folded  in the first place.  NO, not by you folding them.  By them folding their own shirts. Shirts seem scary to fold, but their are two really simple ways to fold shirts that you can teach children easily.

#1- Buy a Flip and Fold.
I know, most "As seen on TV" things are pretty useless, but this is actually really helpful.  Even developmentally challenged kids can learn by using a flip n fold.  After a while they will no longer need the tool, but can do it on their own in just a few simple steps.  Yes, it's $19 but wouldn't you pay $19 to get your kids to fold their own shirts????

#2- Make Your Own Folding Machine!
If you want to save the $19 and get the kids involved, check out this kids' video for how to make your own Flip n Fold! It's easy and kid-doable as demonstrated by these students and set to the Mission Impossible theme music! [There are also other youTube videos for making your own. ]

#2- Learn the Japanese system for folding t-shirts. 
In just three quick and easy steps a shirt becomes neatly folded.  I don't find it any better than my system BUT...My kiddos are usually awestruck when they first see it done.  "How did you DO that?" etc. Teach them so they can amaze their friends at camp of sleepovers.  They will be a hit! Best of all, they will be so intrigued that, like practicing a "magic" trick, they will soon be able to fold [or Re-fold] their own clothes!

#3- Teach them your favorite way.
I have my own 3 step system that I find just as easy as either of the above, but that's because I have had so much practice! [:-)   The advantage of the two systems above is that neither is "Mom's system" and... anyone with adolescents or teens knows that any system will be preferred to "Mom's" system!

Video thanks and credits to youTube

Parenting Tips: Neater Clothes pt 1

Here's an idea [actually two!] to try to help your kids keep their drawers looking and functioning better.

Stacking things horizontally in the drawer [the traditional way] inevitably means the kids will paw through the pile repeatedly until it looks like a sorting pile in the back of a Goodwill store.  Avoid that by stacking the clothes items vertically so they can see at a glance the item they are looking for. They may still paw, but usually only the adjacent clothes may be displaced, not the whole drawer!

My Alternative:
For several key years I went one step farther.  I removed the dressers from the rooms and replaced them with bookcase shelves. When we folded clothes we stacked them into like-item piles. When they put them away, the whole stack went to the photo-labeled spot on the shelves. One step process, no baskets of folded clothes waiting to be hung up or put in drawers.  [Underwear and socks went on the shelf into see-thru plastic baskets.] Wasn't a perfect system, but it sure beat others we tried. When they were able to keep the shelves straight I was pretty sure we could "graduate" to the vertical drawer system.

NEXT THURSDAY:  Two amazing ways to teach kids to fold their t-shirts!

Image thanks and credit to: dailybuzz.com

Parenting Tips: Charity Yard Sale

As the summer winds down is often a great time to plan a special kids event that [hint, hint] helps get them motivated to clean up and clean out their bedrooms.

Talk to your kids and let them pick a charity that means something to them... 

      If they love animals, maybe a local animal rescue league or shelter.
      If the horrifying images from the Horn of Africa have moved them maybe they could raise money for water or famine relief.
      Local homelessness, shelters for abused women, victims of fires or floods, there is no end to the list of places struggling and needing help. 

Use 3 labeled boxes to sort things. 

Sort through their toys, books, outgrown clothes etc.  Most of us have far more than we truly need.  This is an opportunity to talk with kids about the difference between need and want. Make a box labeled "No Good" for broken or ruined items.  Label another box "Sell/Give Away" for items they are willing to give away and that still have life in them.  Here is my secret box: Label the 3rd box: "Probation" or "Wait List."  This is the box for things they haven't used in ages, but "I was just thinking of using that!" Don't argue with them that you've heard that before, or that no they won't. Just put the item on probation... The deal is that if they use the item more than twice in the next month it moves out of the box and into a regular place.  If not, it gets given away at the end of the month.  Through out the first box quickly.


Use the sell/give boxes from each child for the yard sale. Divide into cheap boxes of similar prices and individually priced items. If you don't have enough invited other kids to join in on the project.  Make posters to draw attention to the different categories of items. Agree that ALL things left at the sale's end go directly to Goodwill or Salvation Army.

For a really great set of guidelines  and hints for actually holding the yard sale check out this website. They have good ideas and some particular hints on making a kids' yard sale a success.


Image credits: thriftyfun.com

Parenting Tips: the Laundry Monster

Is anybody else out there sick of doing laundry???
As a parent of up to seven kids at one time I don't compete with the Duggars or many other super-large families. BUT, for too many years I did live a life of two-three loads of laundry per day just to stay caught up. [When I got behind let's just say... it wasn't pretty!]. Some of you regular readers will remember that I gained a second family of four after my first crew was pretty much grown.  The chance to "do things over, wiser" meant some changes.  One was in laundry.  I do not have a family laundry basket except in the bathroom for towels and washcloths.  Each person has their own laundry basket.

The youngest ones help fold the bathroom laundry [towels and washcloths are an easy place to start and it makes a nice, tall, satisfying pile quickly enough to satisfy a child.

By 8 [or 3rd grade] they are responsible for helping put away their folded clothes.

By 10 [or 5th grade] they are responsible for bringing their laundry to the washer, switching their load to the drier, and must help me fold their clothes as well as put them away.

By 12 [or 7th grade] they are responsible for helping me sort, soap, and load the washer also. If they are not around when I need to do laundry for my convenience, I don't mind doing it as long as generally they are helping. [I also start teaching them to iron so that if they ever need to, they can.]

By 15 [or 10th grade] I no longer do anything about their laundry unless there is a special circumstance.

I am sure many of you do the same, probably at even earlier ages. But, I have found this works pretty well for me.  Do I ever pitch in and help them out? Yes.  I want them to learn that families pitch in when one of them needs help. That means me pitching in to help them with their stuff just as I expect them to pitch in to help me on occasion.  But, the primary responsibility for laundry shifts gradually and consciously from me to them. And... none of my boys deal with pink underwear late in youth... they've gotten past those mistakes earlier on. By the time they need to be independent, laundry is one thing that is a cinch for them, that is not a concern.

PS. On Saturday's Quick Take I will tell my results with the info commercial's  FlipnFold.

Image credits: theordinaryhousewife.blogspot.com,  thenorthpoledaily.blogspot.com, bestnannynewsletter.blogspot.com

Parenting Tips: Room Rescues

With a large family it takes very little to quickly clutter up a room, any room.  If there are six in the household and each person leaves out one book, one coat, 2 shoes, a half-empty glass, a pile of school papers or mail, then scattered around the living room, front hall, etc. are at least 6 books, 6 coats, 12 shoes, 6 glasses, and 6 piles of papers and mail.... anyway.  You get the picture.  I found the picture example online, where I had literally hundreds of choices.

Two strategies I used periodically with my kiddos to help stem the encroaching lava-flow of clutter:

Five-Finger Pick-Up:
Each [and every] person in the house is responsible for picking up and putting away properly any 5 items that are where they don't belong. The items do NOT have to be theirs.  They can be anyone's.  [If the person left them where the items don't belong, the person loses the right to complain if someone puts them away.] This does not thoroughly clean a room, but it has three benefits: 1-It is a fast route to improving the clutter. 2-People quickly learn which things are easiest to put away quickly. 3-The family sees that working together they can clean up what working together they messed up. A possible benefit: The person/s that are the worst offenders quickly see that.

Five-Minute Room Rescue:

We set a timer for five minutes. [Anyone can spare five minutes!]  Everyone [adults included of course] runs around picking up and straightening up as much as they can until the timer dings, when they can stop no matter what is still left. Again, ownership of the mess is not a part of the discussion. I should note that this is the one time that careful running is allowed in my house [an unusual and coveted treat for my kids.] It is a wonderful way to teach how little time it takes to make a really big difference when everyone is working.  Yes, some do more than others, yes some do it better than others, but the rule is just that everyone is doing it for five minutes.  [When I first started this we used a timer set to only THREE minutes until they got older and better.] We even pitch in to work together and do a room rescue in a child's bedroom if it gets ahead of them and they feel overwhelmed.  It usually gets them going and gets it well started.

Favorite times to call a Five-Minute Room Rescue:  Before Dinner, Before we head out for a Saturday Adventure, and best of all..... when the phone rings and someone we didn't expect says they are on their way to the house!

Image credits: faqs.com

Banishing the school paper monster

Yesterday was the first day of school and already my three remaining cherubs have attempted to rebuid the piles of paper clutter that seem to be an inevitable part of opening the backpack after school. It only took a bit to remind them of our system of papers. For those of you new to this blog you can find my solution detailed in the November 2, 2009 and Nov 4, 09 entries. This has worked for almost 7 years straight now so I feel confident in it. You do need a file cabinet drawer or file box for each child, but you can start any time with just a single folderkept in a safe, available place for each child. My system will get you from kindergarten or day care all the way through high school with a single folder for each year of school with key papers that you and your child have chosen and a simple way to locate items from any given year. The oldest of my second group of kiddos recently moved into her own apartment and is preparing to take her file [condensed one last [?] time] with her as she transitions to independent living.

We sorted through the paper flood of the first two days of school and chose a few to keep either for reference purposes [school field trip rules etc.] or for fun... the 'Welcome to x grade' letters from their teacher. Into the folders they went. I did not take a first day of school picture this year so the photo for the front of the folder will wait a bit, but the teacher's name and class schedule have already been attached. We are ready to go... The school paper monster has met its match!

Scheduling down time?

     Yesterday I begin the race to see what miracles I can accomplish while I am one child down for a little over a week. Being me, I have a list of things I hope to get done. Being me, it is a list long enough to fill several weeks, and impossible to complete in just over one. Trying to be better, it does include some relaxation "jobs" to be done... eat lunch on the deck, read a magazine article, phone a friend for a movie, take the boys to breakfast. I suspect that people who encourage more relaxation time probably would disapprove of it being an item to be checked off on a list of tasks. I suspect it is supposed to flow naturally, rather than scheduled like an obligation. Me? I think that whatever works, works. I am counting on the premise that even a "scheduled" alone time or relaxation time still provides a respite, a rejuvenation. If nothing else, it is an attempt, a start, a recognition that it IS important. Hey, it was important enough to get on my list, right?!

Time to Let Go

       I am tired of letting go.  For the last year [or years] I have had to let go of pieces of me.  For the last two months I have been frantically cleaning and sorting the piles [ok, some of the piles] in my house and getting rid of stuff. [Not for the first time, more like revisiting a frequent resolution.] Box after box went to Goodwill, bag upon bag of trash to the dump, --donating, recycling, and throwing away the debris of my life.  Don't misunderstand, it feels good ---most of the time.  I feel rewarded by clear spaces in my house, by orderly bookcases that were once double and triple shelved.  Clear desk tops that used to look like they were oozing a constant lava stream of paperwork, notes, half-written notes, and un-mailed cards. I love the way it looks. I am proud of the progress.  But sometimes I almost physically ache with the process of letting go of pieces of the past, of ticket stubs and programs that spark memories, of baby clothes that remind me of a time when my life was so simple, so "normal" ... so different than it is now. 

       I think part of why I hang on to those things is an inner longing that life could be that simple, that clear again.  I sometimes would like to be that younger me again.  Not just to be the 120 pounds I used to be [though that would be wonderful!].  Not just to be younger and more energetic [also a nice thought].  More to be the person that had not yet learned how cruel life can be, how much people can hurt one another, how quickly love can become abandonment or cruelty, how completely life can change in a moment. 

     But I need to let go.  I need to get rid of the debris, the piles, the boxes, the bags.  So, I am resolving to not simply remove things from my house, but to really and truly let go.  To release the pain.  To release the anger.  To move past the hurt.  To celebrate the lessons learned, the skills gained, the flexibility developed. Perhaps I will be rewarded not only with a cleaner, more organized home, but a clearer, calmer, more peaceful existence.  We'll see. 

Tame the Schol Paper Pile.... some refinements

In my last entry I gave the basics of my solution to staying dry in the deluge of papers and creations pouring out of backpacks each day  after school.  here are some little details that I have added along the way when I can.

1- Handprints: As each child gets a drawer I have them paint their hand and make a painted hand print on the front of the drawer.  As years pass the hands look smaller and smaller making it fun for them to see.  They also try fitting their hands into the prints of older siblings.  [They have asked if they could add a new print each year.  I decided that putting a hand print each year on paper and adding it to their file was the compromise.]

2. School pictures:  The inevitable leftover photos go in that year's folder.  I now try to put a photo of each child on [or near] the first day of school on the file folder for that grade. Sometimes I add another one on the last day of school as well. These are not necessarily the school pictures, more often snapshots I have taken, but school pictures could be used instead if that were simpler. [You could keep a separate folder just for the annual school pictures if you preferred.]

3. Special Education:  Since I have kids who are in special education [now called instructional support in my state] I have also added a folder for all the annual or triennial testing and another folder for the annual plans and reports. I find this is easier when I need to locate them rather than trying to remember which year's folder to search. 

4. Report Cards:  I keep the report cards in the grade level folder, but a friend who has adopted this system keeps the report cards all together in a separate folder from the papers. Whatever works is fine!

5. Testing/Assessment Reports: With so many states requiring standardized testing on a regular basis, the use of a separate folder for standardized assessments, similar to the folder I use for special education testing might be helpful.

6. Transitions: I use these folders to help the transition from year to year.  Part of the end of the school year tradition is emptying the current year folder. The only thing that stays in it over the summer is any "next year" paperwork [summer reading lists, supply lists for the following year etc.]. Part of getting ready in August is one last look through the previous year's papers, talking about the successes and progress of the last year and goals for the next year. [Sometimes the process even leads to more winnowing of the papers!] Depending on the age [and personality] of the child, school shopping may lead to a modeling of the "first day" outfit and a snapshot for the new grade start of school year photo. 

7. Independence:  At some point I start gradually turning over responsibility for the school file to the child. When varied greatly from child to child. Some ended up managing it almost by themselves, others needed my help straight through.  It is really fun if a year or so after graduation you can sit down with your 19 or 20 year old and go through their school years grade by grade, reminiscing. The end result can be a small file that is theirs to keep to perhaps show their children one day.  [Side note: For those of you with stacks of notes etc. from special education meetings or interventions over the years, it can be very healing to be able to pick just a few to show the challenges and the growth and then to let all the rest go.... maybe even have a small bonfire to celebrate!]
turn over at some point

I hope these ideas help some of you and spark more ideas you can share in return!

Tame the school Paper Pile ! ... the basic system

As I sort and purge things that somehow never got organized in my room it seemed logical to take today's blog to talk an organizing success. I have a super successful system for taming the avalanche of papers that come home from school with children. As the mom of five at a time, the paper seemed to spew out of backpacks like the constantly threatening stream of lava in the movie "Volcano." Given the previous discussion about the advantages of hindsight with repeated parenting cycles, I have finally hit on a solution that works... at least for us.

I use a four-drawer file cabinet [since I am currently raising a sib group of four. ] If you are starting with a new kindergartener you could even start with a single file drawer. Each child has their own drawer. In each drawer there are a series of file folders.... one for each grade of school plus an expandable pocket bottom file marked CURRENT YEAR which stays in the front.

Since I have kids involved in special ed [or instructional support as my school system now calls it] I also have a folder marked "Testing" and a folder marked "IEPs" [Individual Educational Plan]. I'm sure each state has their own acronyms and alphabet soup so adapt it to fit your family.

Whenever papers come home they are celebrated with the requisite enthuiasm, oohed and ahhed over, and then go one of two places: the refrigerator [generally only one is chosen for this honor] or the "current year" folder in their file drawer. When the next refrigerator worthy page goes up, the old exhibit goes in the "current year" folder as well. When the "current year" folder begins to bulge the child and I sit down together and sort through the papers, choosing usually 5-10 to keep in the folder and tossing the rest. [OK, I confess, sometimes I do a presort myself.] This process repeats throughout the year as needed. [Younger children generally need more frequent sorts because they bring home far more "treasures" than middle or high schoolers.]

Part of the end of the school year celebration is the last sort through.... choosing some of the best work, some of the favorite work, and sometimes a silly piece or two. The final [much smaller!] collection is put in a regular folder, marked with the grade, the calendar years, the school and the teacher. The "Current Year" stands empty and waiting for the fall. [It will need occasional replacing as it tends to get worn and beaten.]

That's it. Nothing elaborate. Nothing complicated. Nothing high-maintenance. But it works. And it has continued to work for close to a decade now. [Boy do I wish I could say that for all my attempts at organizing the house!] The kids enjoy the sorting and selecting and seem perfectly fine tossing most papers of their own accord when they revisit the file through the year. Give the school file a try and let me know how it works. Next entry I will share some of the little extras I have found helpful with this file system.

Renovation and reorganizing... update

Hello again.  My name is Gail [still] and I am a packrat [still]. I have struggled to stay in recovery [this time] for 2 weeks.  

A few posts ago I stated my intentions to make some changes and keep you posted.  Since then I have made three trips to the dump [in my town you take your own trash... no automatic scheduled pickups].  In total I have removed 23 bags of stuff from my house.  Some has gone into the hopper, some to the recycling bins, and some to swap shops, Goodwill, Salvation Army, etc.  Before sending me cheers I must confess that for my rather large family 3-4 bags of trash per week is the base line before my new sorting resolve. So at least 6-8 of those bags are predictable.

I wish I could say that my house looked substantially better, but the truth is that I could probably remove 16 extra  bags  every two weeks for months and still not have reached the end state.  Mind you, the "public" rooms are looking better, but even they progress slowly.  For example.  I took four large grocery bags of books to my library's book sale from the upstairs book shelves. You would think I now have empty shelves.  

Au contraire!  The shelves don't look substantially different to the untrained eye.  How is this you ask?  The secret is that almost every bookshelf in my house [and I have more than most small libraries possess] is double shelved, with two layers of books on every available inch.  So now I have several shelves that are now merely single shelved.  Maybe not the end goal, but a good start.  I managed to release my old college textbooks [except for one written by a favorite professor]. I even freed two shelves of books on tape... my latest car has only a CD player and my walkman cassette player is dying. [Oh, all right... I kept the Katherine Hepburn and Christopher Reeve autobiographies.]  Progress is the key.   

Hello. My name is Gail. I am a packrat.... but I am still trying. 

Renovations and reorganizing

Everybody's living space needs renovations after a while.  The newly fresh becomes the comfortingly familiar and then degenerates into the tired , closely followed by the dingy. Usually it happens slowly. There are the repeated incidents of spilled juice, the accidental marks from markers that turned out to be permanent rather than washable. A grape slips into a crease or crack unnoticed and slowly oozes into a raisin. It's a process.  

When you decide to renovate it always means sorting, cleaning, throwing out, and waging battle with piles.  I've also realized that inevitably when you clean, sort, and put everything back in place there is always a pile [hopefully smallish] of things that no longer have a logical place in the newly organized space, but need a place somewhere.  The challenge is to refuse to let those things become a stack or pile in a different room, on a different dresser, etc.  

Only rarely is someone born with the skills needed for cleaning and organizing. All parents have watched with horror the results of a young child deciding to rearrange their bedroom. Children tackle the project with great enthusiasm and energy, pulling everything out from corners, cubbies, closets, and more.. eager to reorganize their living space into their image of perfection. Unfortunately it is no surprise when the effort is larger than the energy supply, that the enthusiasm is gone long before the piles in the center of the room are gone. What often results is one or two small newly neat areas sounded like islands in the middle of an ocean of chaos and mess.  

There are tricks and strategies to cleaning efficiently and successfully. [One drawer, one area at a time... Match time and energy to task, etc.] Parents must teach children how to clean just as you teach them how to brush their teeth. The process is slower than dental hygiene, probably even toilet training, but faster than study skills. Much harder is the task of teaching them how to choose what to value, what to toss, what to keep.  How can we do that when it is so hard for us to do ourselves?  I sometimes think I was genetically coded, environmentally groomed, and encouraged by life events to be a packrat.  I hate the label of packrat.  But... I admit the truth. It is an inescapable conclusion for anyone walking through my home, especially beyond the "public spaces" most guests are limited to. 

I was taught the steps of cleaning.  I was taught the strategies of efficiency and success.   What I did not learn was a more practical sense of what to value, how to choose what to toss and what to keep.  Clearly.  I have saved baby clothes and toys for my children to show their children. But they now have children and don't really care about showing them.  I have saved toys and books to hand down, but it turns out rarely does anyone want the handed down.  So why am I saving things still for my current cherubs. Artifacts from kindergarten and middle school and high school fill box after  box.  For what? Why is it so hard to just toss them? There are lots and lots of justifiable reasons why I am/ my house is where I am/ it is.  But if that is not what I want, then renovations are in order.  So where does that leave me, other than in a house that I find overwhelming and often discouraging?  I have tried the one drawer, one spot approach and never get far enough to move ahead, only barely to keep the tide at bay.  So I will try something new today.  I will try beginning by admitting/ accepting the responsibility.  

Hello.  My name is Gail.  I am a packrat.  

[I'll keep you posted.]