House Rules

SarahShattered

jm2926 xx_Jo_xx princessamy86 :T :T I couldn't agree more. The more conciliatory and accommodating I am with my children, the more they take advantage.

I remember watching a friend doing more and more and more stuff in an attempt to "show" her family how much she did. :rolleyes: Pointless. After seeing her 14yr old shove a radiator's worth of washing onto the floor in a heap, and leave it there so that she could put her jeans to dry!!!! :eek: :eek: was enough to show me that her way was WRONG!!!!!

My girls all have their daily jobs: making their beds, bringing all the laundry down to the washing machine, bringing the cups for bedtime water down + piano practise. And their weekly jobs: straightening the living room, cleaning the living room floor, cleaning the bathroom and scrubbing the floor in there.
My OH understands that I can get done what I can get done. When he comes home from work we get on with whatever needs doing together.
Previously I tried to do everything, shouted at everybody because I had to do it all. :mad: daft really.

In the short term it's horrible, you just have to stop doing stuff if they don't keep to their side of the bargain. You're a team. They bring the washing down, you'll wash it. They don't, it stays dirty. No negotiation. So if the uniforms don't come down Saturday am, they may well miss the dark wash. Tough. Should have brought it down quicker

But in the long run, it's better for everyone. I'm not saying it's perfect here, but I don't mind cracking the whip periodically to get them back on track.

Good Luck with the lists. And remember, you don't have to do everything, or be accused of being a nag when you tell the to do their jobs.

ETA : The children are not allowed to take plates or cups upstairs. It'll be interesting when they start drinking tea and coffee. I think I'll get them their own mug, and ban them from using anyone else's!!

Mojisola

It's not putting up a list of rules that will change things, it's making changes and sticking to them. Why aren't they doing the jobs you want them to do? Because they know if they don't them, you will.

None of your kids are really kids any more - even 12 year olds are old enough to be responsible for themselves. Get some rules down in writing so you remember the changes you want to make, have a family meeting and lay down the law and then stick to it.

SailorSam

I get so annoyed when things are left around and not put away, dishes; clothes; the top off the toothpaste, i want to scream sometimes.
But it would'nt help.................i live alone !

Spendless

I once wrote on the cardboard tube of a empty toilet roll

'can you wipe your a$$ on this? No? Neither can I! Please change roll when empty.
love mum

My husband is worse than the kids though, fed up of telling him to move his shoes to the shoe cupboard, I knotted his shoe-laces again and again and left a note on them saying 'these shouldn't have been left here'.

They are better since I did these things, but not perfect!

cobbingstones

Please tell me where I can get the plaque from?????

doelani

thanks for your replies everyone.

Everyone is here tomorrow for dinner ( soem are stepchildren so not here everyday ) so going to have a chat with them after dinner. Well try to before they each scurry off to their rooms.

No one is allowed plates or cups in bedrooms, one rule noone has every tried to break as I always told them it was in case of mice lol

I have done the " I am going to lift everything and put it in the bin" and ended up in a row and tears, usually me lol

barnaby-bear

SailorSam wrote: »

I get so annoyed when things are left around and not put away, dishes; clothes; the top off the toothpaste, i want to scream sometimes.
But it would'nt help.................i live alone !

See now I have piles of papers/post carefully stacked in various places and a heap of half-dirty clothes (ones to be worn again); these are carefully organised and there is a system I know where everything is. Mrs B-B on the other hand leaves rubbish and junk all over the place and disorganises the order - junk mail gets added to my important piles, heaps of tat appears on all surfaces and my half-dirty clothes disappear at random often getting mixed into the dirty stuff in the laundry basket. It's very annoying and her possessions sprinkled around the house look so much messier than mine for some reason. Really I'd like a pair of semi-detacted houses with an interlinking door or two....

barnaby-bear

Spendless wrote: »

I once wrote on the cardboard tube of a empty toilet roll

'can you wipe your a$$ on this? No? Neither can I! Please change roll when empty.
love mum

See now that sounds like a CHALLENGE to me

rach

Good luck with this. When I was growing up we had to help, there was no choice about it - mum worked full time once we were at secondary school and brought us up on her own. She used to leave a list of jobs to be done, esp in the school hols. Fair enough, we would quickly rush around and do them just before she got home but we had to do them! I think it must've been either no pocket money or emotional blackmail if not lol.

I'm glad now that we did have to, I'm much more domestically organised than my DH, I had to teach him a lot of basic stuff that I think his mum should've shown him!

Errata

There's nearly enough of you for a corporate awayday for teambuilding exercises

As that's not a very MSE idea, perhaps a weekly family business meeting might work to review progress, or lack of.

If that doesn't work, I'm afraid you're going to have to pop into the tattoo parlour and have the words House Slave tattooed on your forehead.