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Thursday, August 7, 2008

Abigail and Her Chores


Since I started this blog to journal our family, I am going to try & talk about them individually as well.  Today it is all about Abigail.

In a prior blog I shared a bit about my clean house (or lack thereof) frustration.  Trying to be a creative mommy I decided to borrow/steal an idea that countless other moms & Super Nanny have used - the Chore Chart.  I decided to include Abi as much as possible in helping me 'create' this chart in the hopes that she would be more inspired to follow it.  Also, Abi has NOT wanted to go to bed at the normal bed time with her sisters.  She wants to be a 'grown up', and stay up later.  Ironic that I would LOVE to sleep & not have any grown up responsibilities.  So besides a 'special snack' as an incentive for winning stars on her Chore Chart - there is the stay up later incentive.  I would be thrilled if she won this incentive - b/c that would mean she is actually helping out during the day.  
#1 - Guira is our dog & I will be thrilled to cross getting her food off my list.
#2 - What mother doesn't want her kids to clean their room - I think this is a chore list staple, right?  The C looks a bit like Pac-Man b/c she began to write Klean - and then I corrected her.
#3 - The first time is the important part of this rule that I am trying to enforce - Dream the impossible dream, eh?
#4 - This was her desire - heck, I only started to make my bed in my 20's - it's a bit overrated - but she put it there!
#5 - I almost stopped her from writing this b/c I don't have high hopes that I will ever see any stars after this rule - we'll see.
#6 - Speak Spanish - Since they are also Dominican, Arturo & I feel it is VERY important for them to speak Spanish.  They completely understand it - we try to speak Spanish always in the house, but they are lazy about speaking it - sooo . . .  here is some extra incentive.
I know some of you are looking at her chores & thinking that mom has coaxed her into adding a few, like #3 or #5 - but NO - Abi thought of her chores on her on.  Actually she wanted to add a few others, but I told her that 6 was enough & let's focus on those first.  The last thing I need is a chore chart made by my daughter to show me all of the things she is NOT doing.  Jillian made a chore chart as well - we'll highlight that another day, and I made one for Stella - which she promptly ripped down within seconds of me taping it up.  Classic.

9 comments:

girlytwins said...

Good luck Abigail. I hope we read a post soon telling us she has ben staying up later :)

Debra said...

That is an awesome idea!!! We are doing this with Family Rules that we are making. We all pick them ... one a week... and work on it. Every Monday night we add another one. But we ALL agree on it.

Making your bed daily is SO seriously overrated! I never understood the reasoning behind that and pillows and fluff? Just give me my pillow, body pillow and a comforter and I am snoozing! No need to mess with all that other stuff! LOL

I hope she gets a later bedtime!

Connie said...

Good for her...funny Alexa made herself a list that never gets done, and Travis pitched a HUGE fit when I gave him ONE chore....

Claremont First Ward said...

Really great idea. Abigail sounds like a hard worker!

Lala said...

I absolutely love the last one! She is a doll! I miss ya.. and as soon as this teething business slows down I will email I promise.. for now.. a post will have to do WINK

I miss ya!

Mrs.Naz@BecomingMe said...

Very cute and this is a great idea...I love how she wrote it herself...oh ya'll so need to come for a visit...

Shannon said...

What a great idea to have her pick her own chores. It sounds like she did a really good job! I love that you are making sure your kids are bi-lingual. So smart!

Kim said...

That's great. Good luck to Abigail. I need to make some chore charts!!

jenni anne said...

what a great list!

my husband is filipino, but his parents never made his speak tagalog. so even though he understands it pretty well, he can't speak it at all. it annoys me, because i don't think his parents realized how amazing it is to be fluent in multiple languages, and just how jealous us 6th generation americans are of their heritage.