Job Chart

I didn't vacuum for a month before the girls were born. I didn't feel well enough to do it. After the girls were born I took the advise to not worry about the housework and just enjoy my babies. I didn't vacuum until January. With everything going on, Brandon didn't vacuum either. Going 3 or 4 months without vacuuming wasn't too bad. In fact it was only a month or two longer than we normally waited between vacuuming.

Brandon was in school, and I was working during most of our pre-babies married life. We weren't home a lot and so we didn't get the house very dirty. We cleaned when the house needed it. It was our running joke that we only cleaned the bathroom if we knew we had company coming.

Once I stopped nursing and felt like I had my life back I started thinking I should start cleaning the house more often. But it was so easy to tell myself that I would mop the kitchen floor tomorrow, or vacuum tomorrow, or do anything tomorrow. And then tomorrow would come and I'd tell myself I'd get things done the next day.

I needed something to motivate myself to clean my home. My white-board To Do list wasn't enough because I erased whatever I would accomplish. I wanted to see what I had done. After thinking about it for a few days I made this job chart:

I made it by gluing paper to those magnets that cleaning companies give out. The magnets make it so I can rearrange the jobs depending on the type of week I'm going to have. I stuck a bunch of stars to magnets so I can give myself a star when the job is done.

Every Monday I place the jobs on the days that I think would be best to do them. Then as I complete each job I give myself a gold star. All week long I can see the things I have accomplished.

Is it working? YES! In the three weeks I've been using this chart I've cleaned the bathroom an unprecedented 3 times. Actually most of these things have never been done weekly.

Yesterday I added several other jobs to the chart. I also added a place where I can give myself check marks each time I do a daily job. These daily jobs are things I do all the time because I have to. Now it's fun to check them off once they are done.

And what's the reward for completing the chart? Nothing really. Just a few stars to look at and the satisfaction of a clean house. I like having a clean house so that is enough of a reward for me.

It's nice to know that the girls can crawl/roll on the floor and not get dirty. And here is sneakily filmed movie of the girls playing on my clean floor. They will only do this when they think I'm not looking so I've had to be sneaky when I try to film them doing this. Yesterday was the first time I ever caught it on tape.