Category: Chores With Kids

routines & free time.

8/19/2017

Well, here we are.

I have been in school for 3 days now and the girls start this Tuesday.

Things are about to get crazy.

The last few years, we have figured out that it works really well for the girls to have a morning, afternoon, and bedtime routine.

They don't always stick to the evening routines, 100%, depending on what activities we have going on after school...practices, piano lessons, games.

However, the morning routine has really become a natural way of life during the school year for us.

And as long as the girls get out of bed when they're asked to (that's a whole other situation), it really helps our mornings to run smoothly.

To the right, you'll see what Harlee's Monday routine looks like. We went through together and came up with a list of the things that must get done every morning before school to keep the house under control during the school year.

The two older girls switch back and forth between putting clean dishes away each morning and sweeping the kitchen & dining room (a new chore with all hardwood floors in the farmhouse!).

I've laminated these lists and the girls use a dry-erase marker to mark them every morning. They like the satisfaction of checking off items in a list, just like their mama.

We have done a list like this for every day of the week, including Saturdays. Saturdays also includes what we call a "quick clean" list that we all work on together for an hour or so to get the house spiffied up for a new week.

Sunday has become our "stop day" here at the farmhouse.

I am trying really hard to just have our family enjoy each other through the whole day and just take an hour or so in the evenings to prepare for the next week.

In our world of busy, busy, busy...it's nice to just breathe, breathe, breathe every once in a while.

Just a few years ago, I was trying to squeeze in photography sessions every extra minute I had (including Sunday afternoons) to help pay off debt and to make sure I wasn't disappointing people.

I've learned that no matter how many sessions I squeeze into whatever extra time I have left, people will still be disappointed when I run out of sessions.

And they will still love me.

So it's really okay!

And because I'm choosing to make Sunday afternoons our "stop days", we will spend time watching Harlee play volleyball and then we will have time for fun board games or projects together.

My mom gave me her old Cricut a few years ago for Christmas and I had literally cut ONE project on it since then.

Until the other night, when I needed some letters cut for the focus wall in my classroom.

When I finished this (completely simple and totally amateur) project, I decided to try something a little more complicated.

I found a purple cup in the cabinet that I've been wanting to buy some sort of vinyl decal for and I decided to try it myself to start.

I decided I could always peel it off if it didn't work out.

I found a free SVG image online (I never even would have know what an SVG image was, if it wouldn't have been for my crafting sister-in-law, Tiffany!) and had to do a little modifying to since a few of the letters were way too small and tedious for my novice, fat fingers to navigate just yet.

I also added a little piece of free sunshine clip art I found online.

I set the Cricut to cut and off we went. I switched the vinyl colors when it told me to and I am happy to report that this is what I ended up with!

Can you even believe it?

Yeah, me either.

It looks kind of bumpy because of the light in the picture, but I assure you...it is not.

It looks like a real professional did it.

Thanks for the help, Cricut!

So here is the point of this whole blog post...I'm praying that with our routines in place through the week, we can keep on top of our busy schedule, laundry, dishes, & keeping the rest of the house manageable.

Used my #cricutexplore to cut out some bulletin board letters for my classroom tonight. Had so much fun that I also decorated my #backtoschool cup that sits on my desk each day. #crafting #cricut #vinyldecal #teacher #education #farmhouse654

A post shared by Hannah Newkirk (@farmhouse654) on Aug 10, 2017 at 10:19pm PDT

That way, we'll be free to enjoy each other in the evenings and on the weekends...crafting, and playing outside, and making slime.

Just kidding.
We tried that once.
I am not the "slime-making" kind of mom.

I've realized that I spent too many years in the old house trying to manage the home, keep up with my small business, and being a teacher...without spending enough of my time and energy making memories with my babies.

It's time.

Happy Weekend, friends! Make it a good one! ❤️?❤️

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preparing for the week.

8/3/2017

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At our old house, I had created a hallway space to help the girls stay somewhat organized.

(Sidenote: I can't believe how grainy my cell phone pictures were three years ago!)

ANYWAY, so the hallway organization area had a top hook for bags, a bottom hook for coats, an open cubby for clothes laid out for the next day, and a drawer for anything extra the girls might need for the week.

On Sunday nights, we would start making piles of what they were going to wear on each day.

We would start with special days (tennis shoes & athletic shorts on PE days, dance shoes laid out for dance nights, a dressy outfit if school pictures were that week).

We picked clothes first, added shoes & accessories, and then thought about any evening activities.

After our piles were made, we would transfer them to the closet and the girls would bring them out and put them into our hallway landing spot each night to prepare for the next day.

One thing I liked about doing it this way is that we had the big "discussion" about specific outfits that either I didn't really agree with or they didn't really agree with on Sunday night. We compromised.

And eventually, we had five full days worth of outfits and items needed ready for the week.

It's awesome to have this discussion on Sunday evening, instead of throughout the week, each morning, in a panic!

The system has always worked pretty well.

In fact, I was kind of sad to see it go when we moved, as the farmhouse is just set up differently.

And let's be honest...the girls are older now.

They can handle getting up in the morning and getting dressed and ready for school in their bedrooms without much intervention from me.

We ended up using our hallway cubbies in the playroom here at the farmhouse, so I have been on the lookout for a new option that the girls could use to prepare for the week.

At Target, I found some Sterlite containers with lids. I decided we would give this a try this year.

My friend Melissa cut the days of the week out of vinyl for me (you can see that the girls helped me put them on...I'm trying not to be OCD about the first "Monday").

Can you guess which girl has the Duke blue and white letters? And which one has the teal and pink letters?

They are so different and yet exactly the same in some ways.

So our Sunday night routine will now be spreading all five tubs out in the girls rooms and filling them up with clothes, shoes, accessories, evening activity items, and whatever else we might need to remember on a specific day.

Then the tubs will go into the girls' closets and they will pull everything they need from them out each morning to get ready.

All by themselves.

Because they are so old.

(insert tears here)

Sorry. Just having a moment at the thought of my oldest child being in FIFTH GRADE this year.

I can't even handle the thought of it.

Hopefully the buckets will work as well as the cubbies did when we get rolling into the school year.

I'll keep you posted.

Happy Friday Eve, friends. ❤️?❤️

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chores with kids.

7/21/2017

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Let's be honest.

It's not always a big fun event to get the kids to do chores or help out around the house.

However, I really feel like it's necessary. I can't always get everything done that needs to be done without help.

Mr. Farmhouse is a great help-mate and helps inside and outside of the house, but sometimes (during hay season...or calving season...or bean-planting season...or...), we need to have a big marathon cleaning day and I need help from the girls.

Over the years, I've realized that the more fun we can make this process, the quicker it gets done and the less likely I am to scream like a crazy person by the end of the day.

A few winters ago, over Christmas break, when I was trying to get the house back in order to get ready for third quarter at school, I had a breakthrough.

I started to make cleaning a game...for all of us.

I started to think about ways we could make our mundane housekeeping tasks a competition, a team event, a game.

Over the last few years, I've come up with several of these "cleaning games".

I usually let the girls decide which one we do for the day.

I thought today I would share them with you so maybe those cleaning days can be a little more enjoyable for everyone involved!

1. Disappearing Post-it Notes

Every once in a while, I divide my "to do list" into small tasks and put each task on a post-it note. I stick them all up on the refrigerator, in no particular order.

The girls choose five and get them done as quickly as possible. When those five are complete, they set the timer on the microwave and have a ten-minute break.

(Sidenote: cleaning the front of the refrigerator is definitely on the list today...as you can see, it needs it!)

The Disappearing Post-it Notes is one that the girls really like because you can watch the amount of post-it notes dwindle down to those last few tasks and then BOOM...the fridge is empty!

The rule is that the right side of notes has to be empty before they start on the left door.

The left door includes what I call "finishing" tasks. They are all somehow dependent on the ones on the other door. For example, on the right door is "clean out refrigerator" and "load dirty dishes from sink". So on the left door is "run dishwasher". In other words, they need to gather up all the dirty dishes from anywhere in the house before we run the dishwasher. Other "finishing" tasks would include dusting the flat surfaces in the house, sweeping the floors, putting all the clean clothes away that they have folded on some of the other post-it notes.

2. Note Card Flip

Another task-oriented game that we play sometimes is what I have called "Note Card Flip".

Again, I put all of the tasks on note cards. I have a whole set of these that I created a few summers ago that include basically every task that it would take to do a quick deep-clean of the house.

I add anything that needs to be done that day specifically and then I make some bonus "fun" cards.

I always end with a "last card" that is something fun. Almost always, it involves a slush or shake Sonic.Some of the fun cards might be:

30-second dance party
10-minute reading break
Run around the house
Sit on the porch and talk for 5 minutes
15 jumping jacks
15 minutes of free time
Find a worship song on YouTube and sing along

Obviously the sky is the limit on what you could add to the cards.

I always end with a "last card" that is something fun.

Almost always, it involves a slush or shake Sonic.

Basically for me.

Because Sonic's unsweetened raspberry tea is my favorite beverage EVER.

3. 30/30

There is an iPad and iPhone app called 30/30 created by Binary Hammer.

I cannot believe how much it helps our productivity level by keeping us on task and focused when we need to get some serious work done.

I use it in my classroom, when I am working on photography edits, and the girls and I use it when we clean.

30/30 is a task management app that basically takes your to do lists and times it.

You can add as many tasks as you want and assign the tasks a specific amount of time.

For example, "make bed" might be a 5-minute task.

When the five minutes is up, the app starts the timer for the next task.

We take our list of things we have to get done and add them to the app.

After every 30-40 minutes, we add a 10-minute break right into the app.

So our whole cleaning spree is timed there.

Sometimes, to keep us on task, we add our "lunch break" and anything else that we know will be taking our time that day.

Here is a screenshot of what the app looks like while we are working.

The task at hand is the same color as the timer and the background.

When the timer goes off (in this case...in two minutes and 54 seconds), the screen goes to the next task's color (in this case...green).

The girls like it because we are racing the clock.

I like it because as long as we estimate the right amount of time for each task, we know exactly what we are going to have time to get accomplished that day.

It helps us to prioritize and to stay on task.

The girls also like the technological component to it. Something about using an iPad is motivating for kids!

4. Task Competition

The last one we use at our house is one I've never really named until just now.

And "Task Competition" is probably a boring name...you can rename it at your house if you so desire!

I make a list of tasks in black pen.

There is always an uneven number of tasks.

Beside each task, I draw a box.

Each of the older girls picks her own color of marker and I say "go".

They work until the list is completely done.

Every task they get finished with gets the task's box colored in using their individual color.

When all the boxes get colored, the girl with the most boxes colored gets some silly little prize.

Maybe a popsicle, a piece of candy, or a medium drink instead of a small at Sonic (I told you...I have a problem).

These are all ideas of how we try to make cleaning fun at the Newkirk house.

I hope you've gotten some ideas to use in your own homes!

I'd love to hear any other ideas you have for getting kids involved in the home management process!

Feel free to comment below so others can learn from your knowledge!

Thanks for reading, friends! Happy Friday! ❤️

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routines & free time.

preparing for the week.

chores with kids.

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