The Clean Up Games

When I was a younger mom, I had loads of time to clean up my children's toys. I wanted to have a beautifully decorated, clean and organized home. So each night when I put my little ones to bed, I would sit and organize all their toy bins by toys. Girls toys, boys toys, all in their own colored bins. Each morning my little ones would get up to a perfectly clean toy room with everything in its perfectly placed spot. I wanted my home to be in order, but I was becoming slave to my housekeeping routines.

After my third child was born, the chaos started to set into my beautifully decorated, clean and organized home. I just could not see where the days were going. They got away from me. As days got away from me, so did the perfectly organized toy bins. There were even days that I simply could not even pick up toys.

Over the years, I have learned to live with the chaos. I have given the children to chore of pickin up their toys. The day of perfectly organized color toy bins are long since gone. There are Legos in bins with long lost shoes of Polly Pockets. There are no longer any boys or girls toy bins. We have GoGos and Pet Shops and American Girl clothes and shoes in with foam darts and laser guns. Locating toys in this house is not any easy task.

I'm too embarrassed to take a photo of what the children's toy room looks like because it is completely demolished. I won't even allow visitors to go into the basement when they come to my home. Last year we moved to toy room from upstairs to downstairs and converted the 'old' toy room into our school classroom. {We are a homeschooling family} So not only am I dealing with an absurd amount of toys in my home, I also have loads and loads of educational toys that are left out on a daily basis.

Getting my children to pick up their toys and belongings doesn't have to be a daily struggle any longer. With good role modeling, structure, and a little fun we can create more motivated little cleaner in your home.

 We have now made a game with clean up time . We see who can pick up the most toys in each room. Each child is designated a room to clean up and whoever picks up the most toys in the least amount of time gets to pick the free play game the next day in school. The children have learned on their own to pick up their toys in groups. The doll house furniture goes together, the puzzles go together, the boys toys go in boy toy bins and the girl toys go in girl toy bins.

My floors are clean and clean of toys. My children think cleaning up is the most fun game now. I couldn't be more pleased.