got my game face on .....

Good morning all ! Today is a new day and things are a changin' here in the Breazeale household.

While taking my 14 year old daughter to school this morning I was informed that I "don't even care" . This was brought up because there is a new cd out today that she wants and she told her dad that we need to go get it , well , her dad told her that she hadn't done dishes or swept in two weeks . The dishes and sweeping rule goes like this .... two nights a week each girl has to do dishes or sweep , while one is doing one of those chores the other girl will do the other then the next night they will switch , this is all that I ask them to do other than keep their rooms clean and take their dirty clothes from their hamper to the laundry room . Since Mr. Breazy pointed out that she hadn't done her chores she got all definsive about it like she always does and she waits until we are on our way to school , away from Mr. Breazy to let me know her opinion . The reason she does this is because #1 Mr. Breazy will smack her mouth if she gets too smart mouthed with him and #2 she knows that most times I will hear her out and then we talk about it and in the end she does what she was supposed to do in the first place . I don't have a problem with the way Mr. Breazy handles things because that is what works for him but it doesn't work for me . I rarely smack my kids bottoms because I find that taking the things they enjoy most is what hurts them the most . Sure , you can spank them , and we do believe in spankings around here , but that doesn't work with me .

When it comes to our children Mr. Breazy and I are completely different , however, when he diciplines I don't step in and when I do the diciplining he doesn't step in , I will stand behind his decision and visa versa and God help the child that tries to play us against each other . Anyways, my daughter says that I suffer from OCD when it comes to cleaning and organizing , which is true but I also understand that they are kids and things aren't always going to be as clean or as my daughter says "perfect" as I might want them and that is okay with me as long as they make an effort . Here lately there has been no effort to do anything helpful around here so yesterday as soon as they got home from school I told them that I had been in their rooms and I was not happy with the way they looked nor was I happy with the closets in either room . I gave them until 8pm last night to get everything cleaned up and organized a bit . Both of them done as I said and believe it or not it didn't kill either of them! My sons weekly chore is to clean the bathroom once a week and help me keep the trash emptied in there . He always does what he is supposed to do without a fuss and his room is always picked up and mostly in order , very rarely do I have to get on to him about his room.

Anyways, I got to thinking about what all my daughter said this morning about me not caring and I am really pissed so I have decided that playtime is over , we are gonna get our game on around here . I am giong to create and print some spreadsheets today listing things that have to be done daily and checked when each chore is done . I am also going to list the activities that they are going to earn by doing these chores . Each one of my three kids will have their own list . When they get home and read the lists , I know my oldest is going to blow up but I will be ready and waiting for that. My kids don't get alot of tv time the way it is and if they want to mess with me then I will take the tv's completely out of their rooms and sell them . Tv is a very precious thing to my kids because we monitor what they watch and how long . With my oldest I have alot of goodies to take from her if she wants to give me lip and I am willing to take it all . I don't care if her room is left with nothing but a bed in it when we are done , I am going to show her ! I probably sound like a terrible mother but from my view point my kids have it easy because all I ask them is to pick their room up each day and then once a week do a big cleaning on it , this seems to keep those horrible messes, that takes hours to clean ,from happening . The only other thing is what I mentioned before about dishes one night sweeping one night , and then my son does the bathroom one day and helps keep the wastebasket empty in there .

If you have any really good ideas , please leave them in the comments or if you have certain things you have your children do I would love to hear about it . Hearing about these things lets me know that I am not alone in this battle ! Y'all have a good day !