Creative Consequences

If your house is anything like mine, you find a random collection of items scattered throughout the house at any given moment.  I'm sure for our family, part of it is that we are home together every day..... but how is it that no one can seem to pick up after him/herself?

I take the blame.

Clearly, I haven't trained my kids well in the area of picking up after themselves but I'm telling you - it's going to stop.  I'm drawing a line in the sand and these kids are either going to pick up after themselves or.... or..... well, lets just say mama can't take it any longer.  

I came upon a blog of another mom who was also exasperated with the junk laying everywhere so she decided to create a 'ransom box".  The basic idea is this: if after one request of "Please put your stuff away", the 'stuff' is left out, the mom gathers the items and places them in a 'ransom box'.  For a child to get his things back, he needs to draw from a bag the 'ransom' to pay in order to get the item back. Her ideas were a variety of creative tasks ranging from scrubbing the bathtub to telling your sibling three reasons you love her.

I can't tell you how this plan will work long term, but I can say that after my son had to do 25 jumping jacks while shouting, "My mom is da bomb!" I don't think he will leave his favorite sweatshirt on the living room floor again.  :)

If you'd like to check out her blog and see her list, check it out here.