Bored of Chores? Make a choreboard or play a game !!

choreboard2
Originally uploaded by arrika_arrachne

There are only so many hours in a given day, a fact that becomes more evident as clutter grows up around us and threatens to overtake our home. While we sleep, dishes dirty themselves and dust mites throw a party.

A quick search online for "chores" finds a wealth of free activities and motivators for teaching kids how to manage their chores - yet lacks options for those adults amongst us who might not have developed our innate cleaning abilities as successfully as we would like.

Lists are not enough, scheduled dates for chores are too hard to maintain with an active schedule and busy life... heaven forbid we ask family to pitch in and do a specific task as this request is seen as punishment for some unseen offense.

It is difficult to teach our families that household tasks are a natural element of life, a fact of nature. It is a challenge to teach that washing dishes after dinner is a necessity so that the next meal can be just as enjoyable an experience; that our personal habits affect more than our own person; that caring for our surroundings creates a happier home for us to live within.

I have a choice. Persist in perpetual debates with family in a vain attempt to get things done or try the unknown. Anyone accustomed to the selective hearing abilities of an eleven year old can see where this is going. I know when I am fighting a losing battle and house "work" is an Achilles heel if ever there was one.

My own natural habits are less than Martha Stewartian in execution, yet I have not given up on teaching myself new tricks. I believe that I must first improve my own habits and then rely on the trickle down effect to motivate the rest of the clan. Luckily this seems to be working. Within the past six weeks we have all noticed a vast improvement on how the house looks and feels. Still cluttered and sometimes chaotic, as any family home is likely known - but it is getting easier since i decided to begin with myself first.

Chore charts just make no sense to me. This is a fact. I tossed that idea out the window and leave it for families with a 4 yr old they are teaching to brush teeth and make his own bed. Gold Star Stickers are no longer coveted in this house. I wish that they were!

Instead, my solution is off the beaten path. - I located templates to print out chores onto business cards then arranged them on a Magnetic Board in my kitchen. Rather than try to appoint tasks to each family member or allocate a day and time for items to be ticked off a list - I faced my reality head on.

Everything I could think of that needed to be done, I wrote out on the Chore card.
The Post Office, Washing Dishes, Folding Laundry, Picking up Soda Cans throughout the house and taking out the recycling, Groceries, sweeping floors, combating clutter (I made three of these cards as it seems to be the biggest mountain I climb each week).

I stopped myself once I had 2 dozen cards printed off and cut out in front of me. I counted them. I poured myself a drink then sat down again to reflect on what I saw in front of me.

I breathed in, I breathed out - then I let myself stop feeling so panicked and guilt ridden. I acknowledged the fact that there were more tasks laid out than there were hours in my day - and that there was in fact absolutely no way possible for me to do everything. Some things, yes - but most definitely not all.

I laid the cards out on the magnetic board, determining which items held the greatest impact on our lives and on our home. I thought about what tasks caused unhappiness or stress if not completed with the greatest timeliness and success. I removed a few after determining that they had the least impact or were seasonal. I brought it down to 22, very nearly enough hours in the day - a number that seemed a bit more sane.

Each morning as I sit and sip my coffee I peruse the board and rearrange priorities. Items that are urgent make their way to the top right - the lesser items I move on over to the bottom left and the mid range needs hover somewhere in between. Success is a day when i get to move many items further down without having to drag more chores up to take their place.

I explained to everyone that these were the tasks that needed to be done, the reason I wasn't available more often to participate in family time. I explained how the jobs were organized by priority based on what I thought needed to be done and suggested that anyone in the family could take a look and make suggestions if they felt something had become more important and should be moved up the Que.

I also agreed with them when they said that they could take on tasks for us. That all help would be valued and appreciated and make it easier for me to spend time having fun without worry about all the chores left undone.

Within a week of making the board, our home became a whirlwind of activity. Simple needs of reorganizing our cluttered bookshelves motivated Dad to move furniture, pack up old video games and clean out garage shelves to make room for my art supplies. Not what I had expected at all :)

I haven't asked anyone to do more than what they do already, but the kids have broached the subject over dinner on a few occasions - and the entire family has been picking up the slack on their own now. There is more appreciation going around now that they have a more specific visual aid available and I don't feel like such a failure when i cant find time to get every last thing around the house done.

I have taken to closing off both kitchen doors from time to time and insisting no one leaves until all traces of dinner have been washed, dried and put away. While we are trying to teach them to wash dishes themselves Ive discovered I have to wash them twice if they aren't kept company :P


Another strategy I am working on is to make this all more fun. Competition is big in our family and Games are very nearly a way of life. I have been looking for a way to make home life more fun and successful in regards to chores. I have never been a Suzy homemaker. I am not quite housewife material - but the game Chorewars is helping to make chores more fun for the whole family.

We have been experimenting with playing Dungeons and Dragons, but as I am not in control as the Dungeon Master I tend to get bored too easily. This is a rather relevant method of incorporating a quest based game with the reality of housework without taking away the fun. I'm looking at Chorewars as a way to experiment and explore the options before the dust bunnies get too big to fend off.



Come Join my Party as we attack the evil clutter and reap the rewards gained by cleanliness - it has to be better facing these demons together than it is to attack fall cleaning alone. To join just cut and paste the following link into a browser window - we can attack the chaos together!

http://www.chorewars.com/invite.php?id=ca263b8c9b75