Over the last eight years, I’ve asked many wise (and clean) moms for their advice on managing a home, and found what works for them and for my family.  Our family still has busy times where chaos takes over, but things are much better. We are trending upward.

For me, part of getting ready to go “back to school” is getting the house in order. This summer has been a whirlwind of trips and houseguests, so this past Friday afternoon, when the kids went over to their grandparents’ house for the day, I knew I wanted to use that time to clean. Here are some tricks that help me, a reformed Messie:

1.  Have a Plan – I took ten minutes to think through my list and prioritize what I needed to do. I tend to get distracted, so working from a list really keeps me on track. My top four items on the list were: 1) Put away all clutter from trips 2) clean living and dining room 3) clean laundry room and 4) clean out my disgusting SUV.

2.  Make it fun – I listened to a DVD while I sorted books in the living room and picked up living and dining rooms. I often listen to Dave Ramsey or a homeschooling CD, but then, I’m a nerd. Music would work well too. It just makes the whole thing kind of fun instead of tedious.

 3. One room at a time- This makes the whole process much faster because I’m not running all over the house. It keeps me focused on the task. Also, it gives such a sense of accomplishment. I can see all my hard work has paid off in that one lovely space, even if the rest of the house is a pit of despair. Seeing that beauty and calm inspires me to keep going.

4b. When I  get to putting away the clutter, I work biggest to smallest.  Backpacks (big) were put away first. LEGOs (tiny) waited until the end. Getting rid of the big things meant the room was cleaner faster, and I didn’t get bogged down in sorting tiny junk.

5. Make the kids help – I put away some of the clutter, but saved some for them. This is because a) it’s only fair b) teaches them to have responsibility for their own stuff and c) they keep the room cleaner when they know they’ll have to help clean it up.

6.   Have a reward for myself at the end- I had
more on my list, but I took a break and ran errands (bank, library and Starbucks) after I finished task #4: cleaning out my revolting car.

I think that promise of an iced latte was the only thing that kept me going.

1. 7. Enjoy it.
   That evening, I sat in the clean living room and watched a movie (very rare). I try to always take a deep breath and enjoy the peace. When the kids help me, I have them look around and take a deep breath and exclaim over how nice it is. It helps us all  recognize that the effort is worth it and we really do feel calmer and happier in a clean room.

The biggest single factor that helps my rooms stay clean is  decluttering. But that’s another topic for another day. Let me just say that as I’ve given away (or thrown away) vast quantities of stuff this summer during my Organizing Extravaganza, it has gotten easier to keep things neat. The kids’ rooms stay MUCH cleaner when they have less junk. It really inspires me to keep it up.

What cleaning tips do you use to motivate yourself? Do share!

Plan to take thirteen children’s books back to the library.
Put them in your handy dandy library bag in your car.

Lose the bag.

There you go!

The whole story is a bit more complicated. We had the bag in
the car. We went to church. At church someone tried to break into our car (note
to self: don’t “hide” purse under front seat. Thieves can still see it!). (Also, as I read this over, I wanted to point out–it wasn’t a fellow church-goer who tried to break in to the car! Our church actually has security for the parking lot on Sunday mornings because thieves make the rounds of church parking lots on Sundays.)

A great friend chased off the villain before he nabbed my
purse, and I’m so thankful, but we were still left with two broken windows. My dear
husband took the car the next evening to the car wash to vacuum out all the
tiny shards of glass. Two weeks later, after we unpacked the car from our trip to Colorado, we realized we were still missing that library bag.

We checked with all the libraries we had visited recently,
but nothing. My theory is that my husband took the bag out when he was vacuuming
the car and forgot to put it back in (it was night time and the bag is dark
so it would blend in). I kept thinking if the books were left at the carwash,
someone would surely turn them in, right? Nope, apparently not.

My husband’s new theory is that the thief broke into our car, wrested the door open (no one reports this fact), decided to leave my purse, and make off with the bag of library books. (No one reports the perpetrator staggering to his van with an overflowing bag of library books either.)

I’ll let you decide which seems the more logical theory.

In any case, the books are gone. Thirteen books, with an average replacement cost of $20 each. The librarian I talked to about it wouldn’t even give me a set fine he just said I
had to talk to the manager and beg for mercy.

I plan to do that today.

In one of the later Laura Ingalls Wilder books, she mentions that the town gathers and the entire Declaration of Independence is read. I decided to try it. Don’t be scared. It wasn’t that bad. The whole thing only took us 10-15 minutes.

Here’s what we did: after dinner we put a Burger King crown on the toddler and made him King George. He had a spatula for the scepter. (He kept banging it on the table and roaring, “I the PWINCESS! I THE KING!!!”) Then we (mostly I) read/summarized the Declaration. I read a paragraph, my husband read one, then the kids and my mom each read one bullet point and I’d summarize. We had to pretend to be really angry at the king. We made angry faces and tried to bellow. (Not too, too mean though, we didn’t want to scare our little dictator.)

Then, about point #5 my natives were getting restless, so I started summarizing first, then they’d repeat. For #12 for example, I said, “He makes us feed and house his soldiers! It’s not fair!” You know, grossly simplified, but that’s fine. I just want them to get a) the Declaration of Independence is something we read, and it’s important, and it has to do with America’s birthday on July 4th b)The king was mean and we were mad at him and c)this is something they can understand (sort of). That’s it for now.

Now, a few interesting phrases we read word for word because they were cool. For example, the first and last paragraphs/sentences, the phrase “free and independent,” and “He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people,” because isn’t that awesome? It sounds so evil! (If I totally didn’t understand what the thing was saying, I just skipped over that part or guessed. It’s not like they’re gonna know.)

I’d have to advise this for kids 6 and older though, otherwise it might be needlessly exhausting. So, feel free to print this out and have fun!

The Declaration of Independence

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to
dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to
assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which
the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the
opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel
them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that
they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among
these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these
rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from
the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes
destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish
it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles
and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to
effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that
Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient
causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more
disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by
abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of
abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to
reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to
throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future
security.–Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is
now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of
Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of
repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment
of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted
to a candid world.

1. He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the  public good.
2. He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
3. He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large
   districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of
   Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
4. He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual,
   uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
5. He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
   He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers
   of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
6. He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
7. He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his
   Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.
8. He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
9. He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their
   substance.
10. He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without
    the Consent of our legislatures.
11. He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.
12. He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
    For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:  For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
    For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
    For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
    For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:
    For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences
    For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government,
    and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:
    For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
    For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
13. He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us
    out of his Protection and waging War against us.
14. He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
15. He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to  compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous  ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
16.  He has constrained  our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall
    themselves by their Hands.
17.  He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the
most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated
injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a
Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have
warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an
unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances
of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice
and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to
disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and
correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of
consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces
our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War,
in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in
General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the
rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good
People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United
Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they
are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political
connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be
totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power
to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do
all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the
support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine
Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our
sacred Honor.