Homemaking 911

Final rule

Go around your house and thank our incredible God for each and every item out of place, from the orange running shoes dropped carelessly on the living room floor, to the stacks of cd’s and math papers strewn out on the coffee table. Thank Him for every sign of life! No showroom house looks like that because no one lives there. Don’t live in a mess; don’t put up with it. You, your husband, and your children deserve a well-kept place to live. They deserve to learn to keep one. You can conquer the mess! But don’t take it for granted either. It’s what’s left in the wake of all major blessings. Remember that the best parties leave behind the most exuberant debris.

Some Motivation

At some point along my journey of learning to keep house, I realized that I was being very much like my creative heavenly Father when I was cleaning up. Creating order out of chaos—what could be more like Him? He had to sort and classify and organize, and that’s what managing a household requires. Laying down a foundation of order is a highly creative act in itself, and get this, the order that is created produces more creativity. After all, it is the presence of order in a home that provides the clear table top to work on for the next project. It is order that allows you to find those scalloped paper scissors when you need them, or not waste 10 minutes looking for the fabric glue.

A continuation of My House Is Never A Mess, Kindly see here if you have missed part 1 and Part 2.

5. Divvy up responsibilities (divide and conquer). Have a chore list and allow each child the privilege of having responsibility for a particular area of public use (not his room) for the week, along with taking care of his own room, of course. I never had to clean a bathroom once the children were old enough (6 or 7) to do them. Then they began graduating from high school and I found myself asking, what is this brush for? What do you clean the toilet with? How did you keep hard water minerals off the sink? Well, it was almost like that. It sort of shocked me when I realized how unfamiliar it felt to scrub a toilet!

A Continuation of My House Is Never A Mess, Kindly see here if you have missed Part 1

2. If your house is already out of control, clean it one room at a time. And don’t just clean up, figure out where everything should go, and where it can be most easily accessed. Teach the plan to the children—in fact, allow them to be part of the process of figuring it out. Finding a place for everything can be a highly challenging and creative endeavor in itself, especially in a small house with limited cabinets and shelves. Treat it like a riddle, and be determined to find a spot for all items. Make a trip to Goodwill or sell stuff if you have to. Be ruthless. And remember that all of this is worth at least one homeschooling unit in systems analysis.
Master that room, and then move to the next. Keep rooms so that if everyone gathers at one time, they can clean it up completely in less than 10 minutes without stuffing anything under a sofa. We got our house down to where it could be company presentable (downstairs only) in 10 minutes. The one exception was the dining room table which was a table for ongoing projects and things to be sorted. I never quite conquered the table, and I admit it, I’m still trying.

The Clean House

My house stays clean now. Well, relatively speaking. A few papers get left out now and then. My desk is still a jumble. But the kids’ rooms are perfect. Everything stays put away. There are no clothes or shoes on the floor anymore, no books and papers topping off the beds and desks, and the living room—oh, my—what a change! A scattering of to-do lists and a book or two and the rest is put away in drawers or shelves or cabinets. What blessed organization, you might say.

This is a guest post by Laurie Neumann Consider a Home Business To Make Ends Meet As homemakers, your first priority is taking care of your family and keeping your house up. You may also be homeschooling, and trying to find frugal ways to meet your family’s needs. The washer breaks down, the kids need [...]

To celebrate Homemaking 911′s 4th Anniversary  Kim Kautzer of Writeshop.com has generously donate 11 (yes, 11!) door prizes.  Here is a little something about their company. In the fall of 1997, when Kim Kautzer and Debbie Oldar began teaching their first WriteShop class to a small group of homeschoolers, they planned to use one or two established [...]

To celebrate Homemaking 911’s 4th Anniversary Party, Hillview Farm donated some wonderful gifts.  Here is a little something about their company. “We are a farm loving, God honoring, homeschooling,  family of 5 with another on the way through the amazing gift of adoption. We enjoy a life of rural living complete with goats in which we [...]

To celebrate Homemaking 911′s 4th Anniversary Party,  Jojo Tabaras of Art of Eloquence has donated some wonderful door prizes! Here is a little something about her company. In 2002 another homeschool mom and I were talking about her daughter who was painfully shy. She discovered that I had a  degree in Speech Communication so she [...]

We were driving home last night and Sarah (13) wanted permission to go to a friend’s house.  I told her she could go the next day as soon as her chores were complete. “Which chores do you want complete, mother?” I quickly rattled off: “Your bedroom, the laundry, the kitchen, and I want all your [...]

TOS had some great door prizes to share with us for our facebook party. I also had the fun of asking them a couple of questions during the course of the party! Sharra Badgley and Cindy Horton joined us! Sharra lives in the Indianapolis along with her husband and their two daughters. She is blessed [...]

Atlanta – Four, Six, or Eight Microdermabrasion Sessions at The Vanity Center in Dunwoody
Austin – $60 for Four-Course Irish Dinner for Two at The Emerald Restaurant ($175.50 Value)
Baltimore – Bikram Yoga Five-Class or 10-Class Pass at Bikram Yoga Baltimore
Birmingham – Exterior Car Wash and More at Anthony’s Car Wash and Detail Centers. Three Locations Available.

Here is a link to the newscast where 3 local moms were interviewed for our “Extreme Couponing” on WHAS 11.  I was worried they would make me look like more of a nut than I really am- but I think the report was very favorable. http://www.whas11.com/community/Local-moms-lean-towards-extreme-couponing-to-save-big-buck-and-you-can-too-126139453.html

September is for beginnings. I know most people think that the new year begins in January, but when you are a home educator the new year is really whenever you start your new school year.  This year, it is September.  Our family was very blessed to be able to spend a week off of work [...]

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I have a confession.  I love to read.  I love to have books everywhere and have at least 10 going at any one time.  That is a conservative estimate.  As we left for a week-long family trip to the mountains, I grabbed a tote and filled it with all kinds of books. I did not [...]

Pillsbury Cinnamon or Crescent Rolls (4-5 ct.), $1 $0.50/2 Pillsbury Sweet Rolls or Grands! Sweet Rolls printable $0.40/2 Pillsbury Sweet Rolls or Grands! Sweet Rolls printable $0.50/2 Pillsbury Sweet Rolls or Grands Sweet Rolls, exp. 10/29/11 (GM 08/07/11) $0.40/2 Pillsbury Crescent Dinner Rolls, exp. 10/20/11 (GM 08/07/11) $0.50/2 Pillsbury Crescent Dinner Rolls via Cellfire As [...]

Do the Next Thing “At an old English parsonage down by the sea, there came in the twilight a message to me. Its quaint Saxon legend deeply engraven that, as it seems to me, teaching from heaven. And all through the hours the quiet words ring, like a low inspiration, ‘Do the next thing.’ Many [...]