Family Rules

While Lyndsey was here we started talking about my children's lack of obedience...specifically the first time they were asked (unfortunately she noticed). So knowing Lyndsey had been studying these very things and what works I picked her brain a little. While picking her brain this book kept flashing in my head:

We've read this one on numerous occasions to our children, but when the older two were much smaller. In it the children and Dad (he always seems to be on the same level as the kids and I find it quite humorous, Andy on the other hand does NOT appreciate that about these books!) are often behaving poorly and seem to be out of control. So the mother puts her foot down and writes some rules and consequences along with those rules.

Combining Lyndsey's counsel and and the idea from the BB book I felt it was time to have an FHE on these very things. We decided to create our own rules and discuss possible consequences for them. We came up with 4 rules and 4 consequences...and only after texting with Lynds as to how things were going with them did I realize how humorous they actually were. They are as follows:

1. Obey the first time OR take out a trash

2. No Arguing OR clean up one pile of dog poop

3. No back talking OR clean a toilet

4. Put your shoes away OR organize the shoe holder (all shoes)

If this isn't a direct reflection on our family I don't know what is. I mean is there any other family in the world that would have 'put shoes away' in their TOP FOUR rules? I'm not so sure.

We also incorporated a warm fuzzies jar (which we've done before), but this time added prizes to it. To focus on the positive things they do they get a little fuzzy pompom aka warm fuzzy and put it in a jar. We are doing it as a group effort simply because we have competition issues when done individually. Once they get to certain levels they get to pick from the treasure box and that has kicked them into HIGH gear to be super helpful and kind. I've always struggled with giving tangible rewards for things like this, but we need an intervention! We trained our dog this way and she doesn't get treats anymore, but still obeys...hopefully it works on children too!

All trash cans have been empty all week :) It's wonderful! The dog poop and toilet consequence must be a goods one because we haven't needed them yet.

This will be a fun to look back on.