my children clean my house…

January 24, 2010 · Filed under Uncategorized · Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Ah yes, thought that would get your attention! It certainly did mine.

I met a woman yesterday who had 7 children. After the inital shock (and comparison of other large families in the room) somebody very sensibly got her talking about how she manages at home and works part time as well.

Turns out, her children, aged between 3 and 11, do the housework.

Shock and awe in the room.

Now I know you are probably desperate to know her secret. Does she have a magic wand? Has she been blessed with magically clean and tidy children? Does she run some sort of slave-labour camp?  Does she bribe them outrageously?

No. She was very matter of fact. Basically the children do chores in 15 minutes lots, so no task seems too large. She teaches each child how to do certain tasks and how to do it properly. Children who enjoy (yes, strange word) certain tasks get that as their task – she has a child who likes doing bathrooms (!!)  And then they have morning tasks, afternoon tasks and weekend tasks, all written up in lists.

Some of the tasks are as simple as put your lunchbox, clean and empty, in the kitchen. The weekend tasks are larger – they strip the beds, put the sheets in the washing machine and start it, hang out the washing when it is done, and make their beds with clean sheets.

And no she does not bribe them. She is clear that this is their contribution to the household. Any child who refuses gets told that if they have decided tnot to be part of the family and the family effort, that is fine, the parents are very sad about that, and there will be consequences such as missing out on treats.

If a child goes away on a sleepover or camp, when they returne they are told how much they were missed, and how much the family relies on their efforts and contributions.  Each child knows they are an important part of the family unit and that they all work together, paretns and children, to keep the family unit functional.

The children do not get paid for their contributions to the family. If they want to earn money their are extra tasks they can choose to do.

Now this may not be your cup of tea – but there are certain elements in here that are priceless. Teaching the child the job (and unfortunately that doesn’t mean you can walk away and leave them to it). Seeing the tasks as part of their efforts to helping the family unit. And the 15 minute time blocks.

I tried it this morning. Now don’t get me wrong, the house is still messy. But in fifteen minutes the boys cleaned the kitchen. Unpacked and packed the dishwasher. Washed the counters and the sink and mopped the floor.   I supervised and told them what needed to be done and allocated tasks – and did chores at the same time – but they did the kitchen, and they did a good job of it.

A miracle has occurred! My life may never be the same again!

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Mummybrain

January 13, 2010 · Filed under Uncategorized · Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

I seem to have developed a particularly severe version of Mummybrain. Perhaps it is a combination of Mummybrain and Holidaybrain.  Either way, my memory is shot.

I walk into rooms and can’t remember why I am there. I forget words halfway through sentences. Sometimes I even forget what the sentence was about.

I forget names. I forget to listen when people tell me their names and then a minute later I realise its too late to ask them their name again. They would know I wasn’t listening.  Sometimes I am even a little vague about my own name when I look in the mirror.

I organise playdates and appointments for my children, completely forgetting that we are already busy at that time.  I also seem to have forgotten that I have a diary to remind me of dates so I can’t double-book.

In fact I forget all my memory-aid tricks.  I shop without my shopping list, my to-do-list remains unchecked, and my “bills to pay” pile is….somewhere.  I forget to turn my computer on in the morning so my electronic reminder-system can’t do its thing.

Mummybrain is an extended version of pregnancy brain, that vagueness that is supposed to come on in pregnancy (although it can be argued that it is a combination of lots of things to organise). My boys are now ten.  Is there any hope for me? 

Of course it is possible that my vagueness may be caused by sheer exhaustion. Or by trying to do too much at once.  They say that your short-term memory can only hold seven thoughts at once, and if you add the eighth though, one of them will have to drop out. I am definitely doing more than seven things at a time but it doesn’t explain forgetting children’s names, which I would have thought would be in long term memory by now. If such a thing still exists.

Meanwhile I need to develop some sort of memory aid for all my memory aids.  Perhaps a knotted handkerchief?

Does anyone else have severe Mummy-brain?  Does anyone have the cure?

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Summer holidays….

January 8, 2010 · Filed under Holidays · Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , ,

It won’t surprise you to know that summer in Australia is hot and dry – make that hot, hot, hot.

Each year we try to take the boys somewhere around Australia to show them a bit of the country and give them an idea about where they live. This year our family decided to take a holiday to Port Augusta, aka “The Gateway to the Outback”. We live a long way from the iconic outback and the boys had only ever flown over it.  This time they got up close and personal with a small portion.

We stayed in the fabulous Oasis Apartments, next to a white sandy beach at the apex of the sparkling Spencer Gulf.  If only I didn’t have red hair and fair skin, even I would have been tempted by the glorious beach. There is also the small matter of my current boycott of all revealing clothes due to Christmas weight gain.  Perhaps I should have packed a wetsuit.  Alert to Greenpeace – I am not a beached whale, I do not need to be pushed out to sea!

  (left – outback art, corrugated iron sheep)

If anywhere is guaranteed to be hotter and drier than the outback, I am not sure where it is (Mercury or Venus perhaps). We also managed to time our visit for a week-long heatwave.  We definitely wanted the REAL experience.

The Pt Augusta is serviced by smaller regional air services, which close for the Christmas / New Year break, so we drove instead.  Parents of young children will be able to conjure for themselves a family of five jammed in a car for hours at a time over a three day period.  (Are we there yet?  And that was just me…)  Thank the god of electrical appliances for portable DVD players and Nintendo DS.  I never thought I would plug my children into electrical appliances to get some peace and quiet, but frankly, I can’t imagine how my parents did this drive with us in the 1970’s.  Their car wasn’t even air-conditioned.

And then, because we weren’t sure if total heat exhaustion was inevitable yet, we took them to Whyalla (Where the Outback meets the Sea) to the ship museum and did the tour of “HMAS Whyalla”, a WWII ship in dry-dock. (http://www.whyalla.com/site/page.cfm?u=32  )

Picture a very large metal can sitting in the blazing sun. Then picture climbing inside the can and walking around a bit, climbing ladders, inspecting engines and tiny airless galleys, and the like. Then go out the top of the can and stand in the blazing sun to inspect the metal fittings and guns. Yep, you got it. A marvellous opportunity for complaining times three small boys, was magnified by the heat.

Despite all this, the tour was very interesting – and I am certainly glad we did it at 11am, not 3 in the afternoon by which time I am sure it would have more closely resembled a blast furnace.  My admiration goes to the tour guide who conducts the tours on an hourly basis.  She surely has more stamina than I. The boys loved the guns and the engines and I loved the old wooden furniture built to fit on board.  Then we went and found an air-conditioned shopping centre to shelter in – for several hours and many $$.

Next time we’ll go in winter.

All of which gave me flashbacks to my own childhood.  As English immigrants, my parents were keen to see more of their new country so every school holidays we would pack up the car and the entire family, dog included would drive somewhere.  Some of these holidays involved 3 to 5 day drives, which didn’t leave much time for holidaying in a 2 week school holiday.  

And then we camped.  We had a family sized tent, canvas stretcher-beds and a gas camp stove.   I have memories of insects (flies, mozzies and ants primarily), lying protected only by canvas from strange noises in the dark, waking in the middle of the night knowing that the only toilet was outside the tent somewhere across a darkened camping ground – and of course the heat of day and the freezing desert cold of night. I also learned to appreciate a lockable door, a bed with a mattress and a flush toilet just down the hall. 

I saw a lot of Australia as a child, learned to be bored by kangaroo and emu sightings, and to entertain myself and my brother  for the long drives in the car.  I learned to fish (and to hate fishing), went hiking, climbing mountains (well large hills really but they were called mountains). 

I would love to pass all of this on to my children – except perhaps the camping bit.  I am over camping!

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It’s just a phase…

January 8, 2010 · Filed under Uncategorized · Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

My babies came home from hospital about 3 weeks after they were born. The hospital kindly had them on a very strict 4-hourly feeding routine so that there was some vague possibility I might get a small period of sleep in between the feeds. For the first few weeks this worked wonderfully. I started to get the hang of when and how to do everything, the babies and I all worked to the clock nicely…..and then they went and changed the rules. And then they did it again.

I am sure every mother finds that their entire life is ruled by the needs and wants of their new baby. That was certainly my experience, triply so. I rapidly began to learn the meaning of “it’s a phase they go through” – and to realise that in fact there was always a phase – just one phase after another after another. Just when I though I had this Mummy thing down pat – they’d grow and change, and I’d have to work it out all over again.

They are ten now, and they still just have one phase after another after another. Their phases now are less likely to involve sleep deprivation (I believe that kicks in again a bit later on) but they do seem to involve opportunities to spend more money and that incessant feeling that once again I am playing catch-up. How is it that ten-year olds seem to know what they need to do and I, decades older and a former child myself, don’t?

And of course now, we have the double edged sword of communication. Unlike babies who scream and make Mummy guess what might be wrong, they are perfectly able to communicate their needs – repeatedly and in very high volume. Almost makes me long for the teenage years when communication resumes its guesswork and “grunt” can mean anything from “yes”, “I’m hungry”, “I love you”, “I haven’t done my homework” to “My teacher is going to phone you – and I’m going out before they do”. And so much more.

If anyone knows at what age this stops, please let me know.

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Hello world!

January 6, 2010 · Filed under Uncategorized · Tagged , , , , , , ,

As the mother of triplets, I often get called supermum.  This is usually as I stand in the middle of a whirlwind of misbehaving boys. I can only imagine they are commenting on the quantity of my parenting rather than necessarily the quality…  I hope they aren’t being sarcastic!

There is a reason that humans usually have children one at a time (rather than a “litter” as my BIL referred to my brood).  Raising a little gang (zero to three in three minutes) is a different experience to “normal” parenting.  It is very much a production line where survival of all – including parents – is the priority.  And from then on it is almost my own social experiment – nature v nurture. Three children with similar genetic heritage and similar upbringing but markedly different personalities.

In a world where we are surrounded by parenting experts making money out of telling us what we are doing wrong, I aim only to share and amuse.  I don’t profess to be an expert – this is more a posting from the frontline (aka edge) but we have all survived and my boys are thriving.

That’s gotta count for something!

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