The Mediocre Mom's Guide to Greatness

Monday November 22nd, 2009

Today’s Activity:

Donate to a Charity.

Note:

This can be anything from dropping some change into the charity box placed near the register at your local grocery store to cutting a big check to your favorite charity.  Also, if you need a suggestion my friend is trying to get 100 coats for 100 refugee children.  Here are the details.

FREE:

Go through you and your kids clothes and give ones that no longer fit to a second hand store, shelter, or even a friend that could use them.  This is the prefect time of year to do this because you will likely be putting the summer clothes away anyway.

Evaluate:

After going through the kids things on Saturday I added to my pile of things to take to the DI.  I always get a pile going and never take it.  Lucky for me last week I got a call from the friends of MS and they were looking for donations.  All I have to do is put it on my porch and they will pick it up.  As my pile was getting bigger I had to continue to remind my kids that some children don’t have the money to buy shoes or toys and that their old toys may be the only thing they will get for Christmas.  I think this creates a great opportunity to help your children be grateful for the things they do have rather than just focusing on the things they want.

Tags: charity, children, clothing, coats
Posted in Average Length Activities | No Comments »

Saturday Noveber 21st, 2009

Today’s Activity:

Have your children help you clean up their rooms.

Note:

Before long your little ones will have a plethora of new toys so today is the day to make room for them.  Help them get rid of broken toys and either give away or store toys they have grown out of.

Evaluate:

This is always a pretty disastrous thing to do.  First there is the crying, “I don’t want to give that away!”, then there’s the kids undoing everything you just did, and of course whenever you attempt to organize and sort you really are just making a bigger mess.  Today we didn’t get rid of too many toys, just the broken ones and we returned Grandmas toys that had wondered down to our house.  There were several that I would love to put up for another baby (someday) but I watch a little boy a couple times a week and they are the perfect toys for him.  Max was SUPER  helpful!  He even took it upon him to make my bed!  Whenever he was upset he would almost cry but then he would just say, “OK, mommy, your right, I have WAY too many pieces of paper in here.”  That usually earned him the chance to keep one more of his gazillion drawings.  Elese on the other hand just walked around rearranging my garbage/keep/grandma piles and DEMANDING milk.  So she just walked around crying while Max and I were productive.  I’m trying to be better about not giving into her or giving her multiple chances to ask for things rather than demand (ie “May I please have my milk” VS. “Where’s my milk!  I want my milk!”).  Also, I am very proud of myself because I really wanted to yell at her a lot!  I did…but only once and trust me I wanted to yell many more times.  All in all it was productive and their room looks much better and I think we should have enough space for Eleses birthday gifts and all of their Christmas gifts.

Tags: charity, cleaning, toys
Posted in Average Length Activities | No Comments »