Same Rules, Different Reactions

I am always amazed by the different reactions my daughters have to the rules at school and the rules at home. The rules are basically the same: clean up your mess, be nice to your siblings (or classmates), use your inside voices, etc. Following the rules at school is a piece of cake. At home? Not so much.
At school, my daughters will start cleaning up the minute the lights flicker (that's the sign for clean up time). They will even help their classmates clean up. At home I am regularly greeted with choruses of "I'm too tired to clean" or "I didn't make that mess."
I feel like I'm fighting a losing a battle when it comes to chores. I tried the chore chart. The novelty wore off in a few months. I've threatened to throw away any toys that aren't picked up. The other day Hubby and I did an intense cleaning and purging of the toys. We separated. We organized. We threw away broken toys, toys beyond repair. We made a pile of toys to donate and toys to sell at my next moms of multiples sale. This might actually work. Every toy has a place and so far, has been put back in that place at the end of the day. Yet, I have a feeling a week from now I'll once again be complaining that I'm not receiving any help when it comes to cleaning up.

The Magic Hat

I have found the solution to our chore time woes. It's simple, really. If I want my daughters to clean up, one of them needs to wear the "magic hat."
It all started a few nights ago. Cakes was a few stickers behind the others on the chore chart. The other three landed on the "star spot" and were able to pick a prize in the morning. By the end of the day Cakes was just one sticker away from picking a prize. I spent the day explaining to her that if she wanted a prize that day then she needed to do all her chores. When it was time for the final chore, cleaning up her toys, I was a little worried. Then I saw something magical. She was picking up each and every toy by herself. In fact, she told her sisters not to help her. She was wearing a beret that they have in their dress up clothes. She wore the beret throughout the clean up and took it off as soon as she finished. She happily picked a pair of Strawberry Shortcake socks for her prize. The next night Tortilla was the only one out of the four who cleaned up the toys. The common denominator? The beret.
I have no idea what it is about that hat, but for some reason, the girl who wears it is the girl who does the best job cleaning up. Hubby has joked that he's going to put the beret on one of the cats and see if any of them have a sudden desire to do housework. It's worth a try.

The Trouble With the Chore Chart

This week I finally implemented our chore chart. I decided to incorporate the beginning of chores with the beginning of school. If my daughters are expected to clean up at preschool, then surely they should be expected to clean up at home.
There are three chores they must complete each day: make their beds, pick up their toys and put their clothes in the hamper. With the completion of each task a sticker is placed on the chart. Certain spaces on the chart have a star. When a sticker covers the star they get to pick a prize.
Typically they'll be picking a prize once a week. In order to have them grasp the concept, their first "prize spot" came on the second day of the chore chart. I had already shown them the prizes they could pick so they were very excited to dig into the prize bag.
Ever since seeing the prizes Tortilla talked nonstop about the Hello Kitty hair clips in the bag. She couldn't wait to pick them. Cakes insisted she wanted a rainbow head band. Then the big day came. Roo picked first. She chose a blue Iron Man frisbee. Then Tortilla picked. I mentioned the hair clips, but she was adamant about picking an orange Iron Man frisbee. Cakes picked the rainbow head band. Sue Sue chose an Elmo book. Hubby, Roo and Tortilla had fun playing with the frisbees, but ten minutes later Tortilla decided she didn't like the frisbee. She wanted the hair clips. I explained several times that she'll have to wait until the next "star space" to pick a prize and then she can choose the hair clips. She was not happy. After awhile Roo wanted to give up her frisbee for an Elmo book.
I'm sure some parents would argue that I should simply stop giving my children prizes for doing chores. I look at it as a teaching tool. They don't receive prizes every day, but it's a way to get them excited about taking on responsibilities.
In some ways, I think the prize bag is helping them more than the actual act of doing their chores. They're learning how to make choices. They're also learning the consequences of choices. We're just a few days away from the next "prize space" and I will be encouraging each of them to think long and hard about which prize they'll choose.

Clean Up, Clean Up, Everybody Clean Up

My daughters are not always that great at cleaning up their messes. Some days they'll clean up without fuss, other days I feel like I'm going to spend all night cleaning up their toys by myself. The last few days I've been bribing them with stickers, which seems to work, to a degree, but now I'm ready to make a chore chart.
What chores are appropriate for nearly-4-year-olds? I would like to have three age appropriate chores on their chart. I know cleaning up their toys will be one of the chores. I'm hoping this will stop Cakes from standing by the "book corner," tossing all the books into the middle of the room and then walking away. But I would still like two more chores that they're expected to do. I thought about requiring them to make their beds in the morning, and I still may do that. My only concern is that we'll be on a tight schedule when preschool starts and I don't know if tardiness is excused because I spent the morning trying to cajole 4 toddlers to make their beds.
Either way, that still leaves a third chore. Taking dishes to the sink? Putting out food for the cats? Wiping off the table after meals? I don't know.
My idea is to create a chore chart and each time a task is completed, those who did the task receive a sticker on the chart. There will be certain "prize" spaces on the chart and once they earn enough stickers to cover the "prize" space they get to pick a treat (I'll stock up at the dollar store). Eventually I'll make it so the prize space pops up just once a week and they earn a dime or a quarter (hey, I have 4 so yes I'm going to be cheap) to put in their piggy banks.
So, for those of you who have successfully taught your children to do chores... what chores do they do, and what works best to get them to do it?

Too Much Stuff, Not Enough Time

You would think the weekends should be something to look forward to. Not in my house. I work every Saturday, unless I request it off. I'm not complaining about that. We need the money and I'm glad I found an employer willing to work around my hectic life. Sundays are the one day neither Hubby nor I work and it takes all the fun out of the weekend. We need to clean the house. We need to mow the yard. We need to do bills. But we still need to find time for our girls to have fun. It's hard when you're trying to cram in so much in one day.
Here's our plan for the day: chores, etc. in the morning, lunch and then hopefully the pool. It makes for an exhausting day but we're trying to find some balance. So if you'll excuse me, I need to get cracking on those aforementioned chores. Have a happy Sunday.