saying yes, setting up for success

 

I don't welcome mess.  With five young-ish children and two absent-minded parents inhabiting our house, there are projects, pieces of projects, snacks, and other items scattered everywhere.  When it's hard for everyone to fight that uphill battle of the daily tidy, it's challenging for me to sanction additional mess.  I see myself saying "no" to so much, and I am trying to change that knee-jerk reaction to a "yes, with conditions."  Like, "Yes, you may make your own breakfast, but you need to clean up your space when you're finished." Or "Yes, we can play a game.*. Please tidy your project from the school room table first." Or "Yes, we can do that craft.  Let's work together to clear the school room table so you have a tidy place to work."

A well-meaning friend gave us a tie-dye kit a few weeks ago, and rather than give a firm "no," I chose the where and when of the mess, scheduling tie-dye for a particular day and time.  We waited for M to have a day off of work (because he wanted to join in the fun) and we set about to make some delightful, colorful things: shirts for the Little M, Big M, and T, and a pillowcase for G.  We worked outside (the breeze added a piquant note to our work), and still got dye just about everywhere in addition to the chosen projects.  I had a hank of bare yarn that I thought would be fun to experiment with--I thought I could try out speckles?  I used some powdered Rit dye, but went a little overboard with it, so I just let the kids go to town with the tie-dye bottles.  They had such fun!  The yarn was a horrible, horrible muddy rainbow gray, and then I decided to rinse it until the water ran clear.  I'm so glad I followed that impulse!  I was left with a beautiful forget-me-not blue.  It's not something I would have chosen at the yarn shop, but I love that we all worked together to squirt dye on it.  This yarn is meant to be sock cuffs, heels, and toes and repair for the same. I'll remember the fun we had making it when I knit with it.

In addition to trying to say "yes" more frequently, I've been thinking about setting my kids up for success with the habits I'm trying to help them build.  The most recent habit building project is getting Little M to brush her hair every morning.  We've made it a before breakfast task, but she was really struggling.  Her hair is very fine and tangles easily, and she dreaded this step in her morning routine.  After a couple of weeks, I realized that two things could help her: having her own brush, and choosing a brush that didn't pull through her hair.  She now brushes her hair with joy and without being reminded!

I'm still working through how to teach some other habits on which I've chosen to focus this year.  The habit of attention, for one.  I'll let you know if I come up with something earth-shattering!

*Our latest game-of-choice is Golf.  It's fun, easy to learn the rules, and even our youngest can play it (with math help at the end of the round).