Family cleaning day

Saturday was a day that I thought would be a horrible, no good, very bad day.

We were going to be cleaning.

Not just a little vacuuming and dusting, oh no. We were cleaning the “new house” the house under construction, the house that literally had inches of sawdust all over the floor, and everywhere else. The house that needed every single baseboard, swept, wiped, and vacuumed, so that it could be completely dust free and ready to paint. The house that still had scraps of wood and garbage all over that needed to be picked up. The house that was a total dusty mess had to be spotlessly clean, so that I would not have special sawdust style painted walls and baseboards.

We decided that the kids really needed to be there. (Well, Hallie and Eli. Evie got off easy. She played at grandma’s for the day. Talk about the baby of the family being spoiled).

We really want to try and teach the kids how to work hard. I figured this would be a step in the right direction.

I was actually really dreading it.

Eli is a hard worker, but he is still 7 and working hard usually gets boring pretty quick. (even when a vacuum is involved). And it gets boring even faster when he knows there is a huge pile of dirt to play on just past those dirty walls he is cleaning.

And Hallie, well she is Hallie. I wouldn’t describe her as a hard worker, or even much of a worker at all. She would rather do anything than pick up a broom and dustpan, including sleeping the whole day away. So needless to say, I was sure it was going to be a long day of whining, complaining, and lots of pushing and prodding to get them to do much.

Boy, was I in for quite the surprise.

Those two were the best darn 4 and 7 year old cleaners I could have asked for. They were champs!! I was SO proud of them! They showed such incredible work ethic, and in the 8.5 hours they were there I really think I only heard each of them complain once. ONCE!! Now those are some amazing kids. We did stop for lunch and every once in awhile they would take their allotted 15 minute breaks to run free and climb the mountain of dirt, but when it was time to come back in they did with no complaints!

I think our family cleaning day was a success! And it was even a little fun having the family together for 8 plus hours-that hasn’t happened in awhile.

By the end of the day, we were spent!