Care to bet on that, kids?

Today was not the best day in the world around here.

I haven't talked much about how I discipline my kids, mainly because I don't feel like being criticized by those who don't agree with me and because unless you know my specific situation I can promise you that you don't know the best way to deal with my kids. Being a single mother with this many kids and fathers with different levels of involvement in their lives makes it harder to use one form of discipline with all of the kids. There are times when I have to handle each kid differently, even within the same situation.

I am one person and I am not a perfect parent by any stretch of the imagination. I know that, and I admit that. But at the same time, I do the best that I can at any moment in time. So if you want to trash me for my parenting skills, I'm opening myself up for it tonight.

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I have not been in the best mood today, and that was made worse by the way that the kids acted for about 95% of the day. They would play nicely for about a minute, and then the next thing I knew they were screaming at each other or beating the crap out of each other or taking each others' toys or whatever. I mean, I know we all have bad days, but holy wow this one was ugly.

Just a small portion of the mess.

And when they get into moods like this, they do NOT listen to me. At all. The boys had gotten out a ton of toys and had them spread all over the living room. I told them numerous times to put them away and they literally just laughed at me. I tried a couple of different tactics, but none of them worked.

Finally I told them that if they didn't pick up the toys, I would do it for them, and the toys would be gone. They looked at me like "whatever!" and continued playing. So I just let it go....

After they were given a final chance to clean up before bedtime and refused, I made up my mind. I got a hold of The Dude to see if he had any big trash bags that he could bring over (plus it gave me an excuse to see him) - so he came over after they were asleep and helped me bag up every. single. toy. in the living room. All of them.

And then we stashed the bag deep in the garage.

Whenever I've gone on a garbage bag rampage before, I've always just left the bag somewhere around the house where they could see it, and then eventually when they straightened up they could get the stuff back. This time, it's not visible. As far as they're concerned, the crap is gone, never to be seen again.

They're going to be mad at me when they realize it in the morning. And at this point, after the way that they acted all day today - I don't really care.

Maybe it's a bit harsh. But then again maybe it's what they need to realize that I expect more of them. I expect them to pick their crap up when they're told to do it. I expect them to listen and to follow directions. I expect them to respect each other, their toys, and me. And if they can't do that, they lose their stuff. Period.

I'm quite sure that we can find any number of places to donate the toys to if they don't figure out how to behave.

The bazaar...

So today was the bazaar at my church. I set most of my stuff up last night, tweaked it and added a few things this morning, then settled in with the hand sewing that needed to be done on the quilt to finish it.

The crowd was steady and sales were good all day long. I brought home considerably less than what I took in, which made me happy because those boxes of jars are HEAVY! My arms are sore from carrying them around - I am totally out of practice for these shows.

While I didn't bring home quite as much money as I would have liked to, I still did very well. I'm happy with it, and it already enabled me to  pick up a few little extra things that I wanted (hello, flash drives for digital picture storage) as well as a few things that we needed (hello, toilet paper).

The Dude was a huge help. He kept Daniel all day while I worked the show, and he came and got Emily from me (she was helping) and took her to Ex1's church for me so that she could attend a wedding over there. He took Daniel back over to his place while I packed everything up and brought it home - and I literally just dumped it in the middle of the living room floor before I went back over there for a while. I want to go through and sort some of it out a bit better before I actually put it away - but I'm planning on doing that tomorrow after church (if my sore muscles will let me go).

Alex won't be home until tomorrow evening, so it's just going to be me and Daniel during the day tomorrow - I foresee lots of cleaning and organizing, and maybe a nap thrown in just for good measure - and because he's the only kid who will still take a nap with me. The boys don't have school on Monday, so I'm looking forward to maybe sleeping in a little bit that day.

We'll see if that happens or not.

Tired of the mess

It is a constant battle with the girls. I want them to clean their room, and they don't want to do it. Should be easy to deal with, shouldn't it?

Yeah. It should be. But it's not.

I hear it all the time from so many people - "You just need to make them do it."

Yeah, right. How?

If I tell them to do it, they'll start, get distracted, and quit.
If I stand over them and supervise, the boys will get into trouble behind my back - I'm only one person and I can't be everywhere in the house at the same time.
If I try to force the issue, it gets ugly, and drama ensues - not just normal drama, but custody-jeopardizing drama (yes, I'm serious).

They are only here half of the time. And realistically, they're not even here that much because of church (with their father) and basketball. Do I want to spend the little bit of time that I have with them trying to get them to clean their room? No. I want to spend time as a family.

Quite frankly, the bedroom situation sucks. I try to get them to do it, and they don't. There are many other reasons other than the ones listed above, but those are the basics. The Dude has tried to help, but he's not here all of the time and even if he was - it's not his responsibility to make sure that the kids clean their rooms. I appreciate that he helps, but I don't expect him to do it.

I warned the girls for the past week or so - I told them that if they didn't clean it up, I was going to do it for them. They know that when I say "do it for them" that it means that things will disappear. I don't clean to be nice - I clean to get rid of crap.

This is what I started out with today.

I also wanted to strip their beds, and when I did, I was disgusted by the amount of bedding that they had. Their room is not cold at night - there is no excuse for this. I found blankets that I know that I've washed lately, but they were balled up on the floor or on the bed and I couldn't tell if they were still clean or not, so guess what? Yep. I had to wash it all.

And the laundry. I just did their laundry, but this is what I found in various places around their room - but none of it was actually IN their laundry basket to start with.

So. The laundry is being done. The bedding is being washed. All of the crap that was on the floor has been sorted - the trash is in a trash bag and the rest of it is going out into the garage. It's going to disappear. They may or may not get it back at some point in time. I didn't get rid of anything important, like library books or things for school. But all of the random crap - markers, pencils, notebooks, journals, magazines, beading kits...things like that are all going away. The extra blankets are being put away. If they don't have a bunch of crap to spread out all over the place, then they can't make that much of a mess again, right?

The beds aren't completely made yet, but this is what I ended up with (I still have to finish laundry).

Now, I get to wait until Wednesday to see just how mad they are when they see that I did it.

They'll get over it.