Friday, July 18, 2014

Pinterest Projects And Continuing Cycles

This week is our only completely free week of the summer. We didn't have swimming and tennis lessons, we weren't on vacation, we didn't have VBS, and I wasn't babysitting any other kids, so we were preparing for a quiet week. I completely rested and relaxed on Sunday, and then Sunday night I made this list:
At the point I took the picture on Monday morning, I'd already cleaned the kids' rooms, our room, and the bathroom which is why there's an empty space. Oh, and I'd done one "reading time" with the kids. We read to our kids at night but I wanted to incorporate more reading into our days so I've been trying to sit down with them after lunch and read a book or two. Usually, Sam reads one to Rachel and me during this time as well.

It's been a week. And yes, our entire house was in desperate need of cleaning :) The only thing left is the basement which has been a continuing cycle of it not getting clean. Basically, Dave cleans up the kids' mess the night before, I intend to vacuum it in the morning, something more interesting comes up, and by the time I want to vacuum, the kids have already been down there and it's a disaster zone. I'm going to work on that today. I promise :)

I've also accomplished a fair number of things not on the list like reading a chapter book out loud to Sam every night (we just started our third one last night), cooking supper every night, getting a massage, having a couple of play dates, watching too much Gilmore Girls (are you surprised?!?!), and generally catching up on life. I also made the following chore chart (from Pinterest, of course!) for Sam, which has been a big hit. Mostly.
He is great about doing four out of the five chores. I have to admit though, it's been super-hard to not "re-make" his bed behind him! However, the "clean up 5 toys" has been a challenge and he usually just flips it up to "done" at some point during the day without actually doing it. At which point, I open it up again. At which point he'll flip it up again, and the cycle continues. We'll get there.

I made a list for our summer called, "Sam and Rachel's Summer of Fun 2014" (not a bucket list! Ha!) and I used different fonts and printed it off all official like. Some of the ideas were mine from Pinterest and some were Sam's ideas. One of the pins I wanted to try was frozen ice chalk. It is a two step process so on Wednesday night we mixed up the chalk to freeze. Dave took pictures and I told him he could not take a video because there was quite a bit of yelling involved. Two excited kids, small containers, and food colouring does not make for a calm experience. Sigh.
We didn't have an empty ice cube tray so I just froze it in small Tupperware containers.Sadly it wasn't quite warm enough yesterday to want to use this so I'm hoping we'll get to try it out in the next day or two.
And that's been our "free" week. This weekend is a mix of some busyness and some freer time so I'm hoping I'll be nice and relaxed heading into VBS next week. It will be the first VBS in three years where I'm not getting back from vacation on Sunday sometime and being thrown into VBS the next morning. I'm hoping that will help with my sense of calm and my energy levels next week. Of course, I'm also watching my friends' son in the afternoons and heading off for a weekend of Family Camp right after VBS ends so my sense of calm will likely be put to the test :) Wish me luck...

4 comments:

  1. I want to make myself a chore chart like that just for the satisfaction of flipping everything up. :)

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  2. I love your to do list and all that you got accomplished. It feels so good to me to have a week where I can get a ton of stuff done. This week was not it for me though. Sigh. I also love Sam's chore chart. I made one for Evan this summer too and printed it and put it in a picture frame so that I can "check" off his chores with a dry erase marker. I am the same as you on his bed making but in his defense, he is trying to make his bed on the top bunk of a bunk bed. Their chores look pretty similar. I think I need to change his clean up room/play room one to "pick up 5 toys" because that seems more manageable and maybe he will actually do it one of these days without complaining. Haha!

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  3. Trying to keep a house picked up with kids is so hard. We've been going through room by room trying to organize and deep clean. The kids have been helpful for the most part, but there are days when I'll be doing one room while the kids destroy another. Sigh! I love the chore chart. I have to admit, I make my girls' beds. They have bunk beds and are very hard to make.

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  4. I cant imagine why there was yelling with that project! Hahaha!!!!! I shampooed all the upstairs carpets this week so far, which meant picking everything off the floors and putting it back....so we've both been on a cleaning spree :)

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