Works for Me Wednesday: Large-Scale Laundry

With a growing family, comes a growing mountain of laundry! One tool that helps me so much in the War of the Wash is my laundry sorter. Our old one recently bit the dust (i.e. succombed to the terror of the three year old), so I decided to see how we could get along without it for a little while. You know, in the name of saving money.

That didn't last long.

Without my trusty sorter, there were constantly piles of laundry all over the floor. I'd get one day's laundry all sorted, but maybe wouldn't get it finished that day. Then the next day, the kids would come and dump all their mixed-up dirty clothes on top of my 'piles' and......well. It drove me crazy.

My kids all have chores, and one of the kids brings down the dirty laundry from upstairs (The Kid Zone) each morning. Another kid has the chore of sorting the clothes into the 3-slot hamper. Then when I'm ready to start a load, I only need 2 minutes to turn on the washer and grab the duds from the fullest compartment.

It works for me!

Media Cards (or--how to get the kids to not play video games every waking minute)

When we bought our Wii 2 years ago, we had never owned any kind of gaming system before (well, not since having kids, anyway). We quickly realized that we needed to do something to prevent our kids from having a serious gaming addiction and/or let their grades slip down the drain.

Thus, the Media Card was born.

It's basically a grade-based reward system. I've never liked the idea of paying kids money for good grades, but this was a way to make them feel rewarded while at the same time keeping them accountable for the amount of time they spend on computer/video games/tv/movies. Yep, the 'media' in Media Card applies to all electronic forms of entertainment in our home. They can read books, play board games, puzzles, cards, etc. etc. for 'free', but they have to 'pay' to play Lego Indiana Jones or visit their Webkinz online.

We set the payment levels for the grades we knew our kids were capable of. We use a software-based curriculum for a couple of the kids, which gives a quiz and/or test in every subject at least once a week. Therefore, we thought this would give the kids enough opportunities to earn media cards to keep them supplied to the tune of about 1 card per day, if they did well on those quizzes/tests.

We didn't want them to earn so many cards that they could spend every free minute on electronic time wasters, but enough to keep them motivated to put forth some effort in school. That's why we decided not to 'pay' for their daily work. You can decide what you reward them for and what they need to pay for. Just set up the rules to start with, communicating to your child(ren) that for the first month or so the system may need a bit of 'tweaking'.

We also had two 'tiers' of earning opportunity--1 card earned for an A or B on the quiz/test, 2 cards for a 100% on one. Each media card is good for 30 minutes of 'play' time, and we used a timer to keep them accountable on this. I've gotten away from that recently and have noticed the kids taking advantage and going a bit over their time limit if I'm not paying attention. Going to have to bring back the timer. :)

Oh, and I actually made up the cards on the computer, using a label template of some sort. They're just made out of cardstock, but have lasted 2 years so far with no problems.

I now have a couple of kiddos using non-software-based curriculum, so it's a little more work for me to keep up with this system for them. They don't have tests or quizzes in a couple of the subjects, so I just average their weekly grades in each subject and if it falls within the acceptable range, they get their card.

Several of my friends have commented on how much they liked our system, so just thought I'd put it out here to share.

Creative recipe

What to do when you're out of bread for sandwiches at lunchtime:

Bean and cheese quesadillas

1 can refried beans
12-16 oz cheese (cheddar or colby jack for us)
some chopped onion (from freezer)
chopped green pepper (from freezer)
1/2 cup (more or less) salsa

Mix all together. Spread about 1/3 c. on flour tortilla. Top with another tortilla. Microwave or grill/fry until melty. Yum.

Piano Day

Today is piano lesson day. So since A is a procrastinator like her mama, she is practicing now before starting her schoolwork. Classic. F just brought me a couple of trains (Edward and James to be exact) that need new batteries. G is walking around with his thumb in his mouth and the other hand down the back of his big boy underwear, even though this particular pair doesn't have a 'silky tag', it's become a habit now. I"m sitting on the computer when I should be showering/cleaning up breakfast, but at least I've got the twins' schoolwork checked and media cards distributed.

The in-laws dropped off a hanging basket grow kit with strawberry seeds, last night while I was catching up on sleep. I've got a black thumb, though I'd love to be able to grow stuff. I'm pretty sure that if I have one of the girls actually deposit the seeds into the soil, they will grow. So that's the plan.

Gotta go clean up pee off the bathroom floor. Apparently G is holding something against me.