Tidy version
Here are a couple of comments with questions from Maddy and Carol a little while back.
"Benita, I am wondering if Wille has always been a tidy child? His bedroom looks so neat! I remember you blogged once about tidying his Expedit shelves... but does he always pick up his clothing, etc?" -Maddy
" My daughter is 13 and she has begun the try on and discard thing. Everything ends up on the floor, even clean clothes. How are you able to motivate Willie to be tidy? I am afraid I am not teaching both kids in way that they respond to. Any teaching tips? What do you do if Willie simply refuses to do household chores? I'm not sure what works over at our house." - Carol
Not so tidy version Exhibit #1
Well the truth to Maddy's question is that yes, Wille is a fairly tidy teenager and once his room is organized so everything has it's place he's really good at putting stuff back and takes good care of his belongings. Not all days are tidy days though. With Wille's permission I'm showing you what his room can look like on a Sunday afternoon.
Not so tidy version Exhibit #2
I'm ok with it as long as the door is closed. As soon as the door is open I tidy up a bit because I just don't do messy. Wille doesn't mind and it's not like earth quake zone in there or anything so it's not a major undertaking. And besides he can live with his little mess, I can't, so I tidy. I make the bed, close his closet door (why is it ALWAYS open?) and shove odd papers into the drawer of his desk. The dirty clothes I ask him to pick up himself and he does. His room is also included in my weekly cleaning routine when I dust, vacuum, change bedding and mop the floors. I honestly don't mind.
Not so tidy version Exhibit #3
To answer Carol question how I get Wille to do his chores. Well, the truth is that Wille doesn't have any... Is that a terrible thing? I keep hearing of families with chore charts and to-do lists for even very young kids and I can understand that it's necessary in a larger family than ours but Wille is such a great kid in all respects and works really hard at school and is a joy to be around so this works for us. The fact that he's fifteen and still enjoys his mom and dad's company is worth so much more to us than if he takes out the trash (which btw he does do if asked and lots of other things too).
Oh, and I too was an only child and didn't need to do any chores when I grew up and look at me now! :)
Today's Swedish words:
teenager = tonåring
earth quake = jordbävning
vacuuming = dammsugning
~
Mini Update:
Mini had her last vet appointment yesterday and everything is healing really well and her teeth don't need doing at all! We had hoped that she would be able to go outside on her own and eat dry cat food as of today but that will have to wait for another two weeks until her bones have hardened a little bit more. We have waited more than seven weeks now so another couple of weeks is nothing. We'll keep taking her outside on the leash every day so I think Mini will also be ok with two more weeks.
