Muffins with Mom – How do you get your child to complete chores?

Photo Credit: Daily Parent

Have you ever struggled with getting your child to complete household chores? You are not alone…and it does not seem to end as they grow into young adulthood. I called my son one day and asked, “Are you going to surprise me and have the house clean when I get home?”

His response was, “I don’t want to shock you. I care about your mental health.”

True to his word, my son did not shock me. The house was still in disarray when I arrived home.

How do you get your child (or young adult) to complete chores?

The other day my son said to me, “Ma, I need gas money.”

“You can mow the lawn and pull weeds for me and I’ll give you gas money.”

“I don’t know about that, you like to pay slave wages.”

It appears to have become a barter system to get any work done around my house. With both my sons’ home for the summer and working, we only occasionally cross paths. I had to call a family meeting.

Here is how we get chores done:

·       Assign tasks and consequences – each son has a set of tasks, if they want to trade with each other, I leave that up to them. However, if a task is not completed, they don’t receive their gas money or whatever we have agreed upon.

·       Set deadlines for task completion – have you ever told your child clean their room or put away the dishes, and a day later the task is not complete? I have walked around the same t-shirt my son left in the living room for two days. I had to issue an ultimatum, set a deadline and up the stakes for him.

·       Double team them – I call Granny. You call replace “Granny” with another family member. My mother likes to give my sons gas money when they ask or have them do chores for her. She will have them work 30 minutes, then take them to lunch AND pay them! I tell them that I will tell Granny not pay them. Sometimes this works, sometimes my sons just laugh.

What are your suggestions for getting your child to complete chores?

Muffins with Mom – The language barrier

photo credit: Australian Catholic University

My teen son speaks a second language fluently, it’s called gibberish, or nonsense. It has occurred to me that whenever my son is asked to do something that he doesn’t want to do, he launches into his created language.

The other day after dinner, I told me son I needed him to wash the dishes. His response was, “I don’t understand your language.”

Fortunately for my son, when I reminded him that he would need gas money, the language barrier momentarily subsided. He said, “I need to study for my final exam first.” I think my son is studying to be a negotiator.

“Okay, go ahead and study first, but then I need you to take out the trash, fold your clothes and work on college plans.”

The language barrier returned, “Idon’tunderstandyourlanguage.”

Teens understand and hear what they want, at a time that is convenient for them. My son eventually completed the things that were asked of him, then returned to me saying, “Ma, can I have that gas money now?”

I looked at him with a glazed look in my eyes and said, “I don’t understand your language.”

Have you ever experienced a language barrier with your child?

Muffins with Mom – Independence Day

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Boom, crackle, hiss, it’s the sound of Independence Day in the United States. Time to enjoy the July 4^th celebration with family and friends. There will be plenty of parades, picnics and people that weave together lasting memories.

As I prepare to attend our local Independence Day Parade, a thought occurred to me about how we prepare our children to become independent. Perhaps an Independence Day celebration would be appropriate as a child transitions into adulthood. This is still a work in progress with my teens.

I told my teen son more than once to get his chores done. After much prodding, my son dragged himself from the bedroom to the kitchen, where his task awaited. He stood motionless for a moment then talked into his phone. I heard him say, “Siri, how can I get out of doing chores?”

I shook my head as my son chuckled at Siri’s answers. When he showed me some of the responses, I said, “You know that’s going to be a blog post, right?”

As a result of this episode with my son, I did a Google search of my own about excuses kids give for not doing their chores. Below are a few things from a list I discovered from the online list as well as a few of my own.

1.      I need to eat first.

2.      I didn’t know you wanted me to do that right away.

3.      I just remembered a homework assignment that I have to finish.

4.      I had a long day at school.

5.      You don’t understand how tired I am from football practice.

6.      I need to relax for a while first.

All of these ideas stimulated a discussion about the significance of doing chores and how this can help later in life. It wasn’t easy for my son to see the big picture, but I think he understood a few points

When things finally click and my teens mature into adult hood, rockets will blast, fireworks will pop and bursts of color will explode…if only in my mind.

What have been your Independence Day experiences related to your children?

Happy Independence Day!

Fun Friday – Mission Impossible-What happens when teens fail to report for duty?

"Are you kidding me?" The look of finding your house in disarray.
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Most days when I awake, I greet my day as a mom on a mission, ready to conquer the world. Then there are days where I feel as though I am on an impossible mission. My most recent mission was to ease into my morning sipping a cup of Hazelnut coffee, listening to smooth jazz and working on my latest writing project.

It was an early Saturday morning, darkness still enveloped the sky as I slid from bed and put on my fleece housecoat. Not wanting to wake my sleeping cherubs (teen boys), I tiptoed from my bedroom into my writing space. After organizing my space, I decided to look in on the boys before making my coffee.

I checked bedroom number one…no boys. I checked bedroom number two…only crumpled covers. My next thought was that the boys must have decided to sleep in the living room again, after playing their game station. But they weren’t there either.

Upon further investigation, I found a hand scribbled note that read, “Ma, we went to early morning workouts.” I dropped the note back onto the table and headed to the kitchen to make coffee.  As I made the first step into the kitchen, I thought I was in the middle of a war zone. The boys had left the kitchen in a disaster from the night before.

My options were to leave the mess until my sons returned or clean it and fuss at when they returned. I tried to wait for their return, but after a couple of hours, I couldn’t take the site anymore. So I cleaned.

Not only did I clean the kitchen, but my rampage drifted into the living room where I picked up blankets, game controllers and empty microwave popcorn bags. Once I was done cleaning the boys dragged in as though they had worked a full day. I began talking right away, “You should have checked with me before you left the house. There were things for you to do.”

The family spokesman, my fifteen-year-old, said, “You were asleep, we didn’t want to wake you.”

Before I could respond, my older son looked around the house and said, “You did a good job Mama. The house looks good.” That was his attempt to distract me from the fact that neither of them helped me clean.

My impossible mission was twofold – to relax and write; to have a clean house (at least on the surface). The mission was accomplished, but not without compromise. The next time I have a mission that involves my teens, I’ll be sure to spell out the ground rules.

How do you turn a Mission Impossible into a mission accomplished?