how do you contain the mess?

[4C-mom]

I have four kids (9yrs, 6yrs, 4yrs, and 23.5months). my house seems like its always a mess! They bring toys in the living room, leave them there, books and crayons in the living room on the floor, shoes and clothes on the floor, blankets on the floor. the baby likes to pull things and throw them. he pulls the vaccuum over, pulls books off the shelves, towels out of the linen closet, etc. their rooms are a mess-sure they clean them, but then at bedtime, they play and they get messy again!

they do have chores, but the mess they make is more than the chores they do. TO make them clean up every mess they make woudl be doing nothing but constantly cleaning.

i've considering saying no toys in the living room, anyone done that? should i just let htem have a messy room (baby in his own room, 9 yr old in his own, 4 and 6 yr old girls share)?

how do you contain the kid made messes?

[My3guys]

Well, we do a couple things. We do have a playroom and my neatness standards for that are far beyond what they are for the rest of the house. In terms of the more "public" rooms, this is what I do. My kids all have a huge sweet tooth and we have a "special treat" every night. The rule is that before special treat, we all spend 5 minutes cleaning. It is amazing what 5 people can pick up and put away in 5 minutes. It really helps a great deal.

When the playroom gets too awful for me to be able to handle, what I do is tell the boys it is time to clean. Then, I give each of them one toy to pick up (legos, marbles, chalk, cars, whatever). All they have to clean up is their one thing then they are free to play some more. The whole thing does not get cleaned up in one setting but we slowly chip away at the mess which helps.

Good luck to you.

[rubidoux]

Well, I have an almost six year old and a five month old. The little one doesn't really contribute, though he does keep me on the couch quite a bit. lol But there is still kid mess everywhere I look here. When my older one was smaller, it was actually alot easier and he helped more, but somehow over the years the toys have gotten less homogeneous. I used to be able to keep his stuff all in four buckets. I had one for wheeled things, one for people/animals, one for trains/tracks, and one for stuff that didn't go in those categories. So he totally got that at 3 and could put stuff away in their categories, although it never happened unless I was sitting with him helping. But that worked out fine. Now I feel like I don't know where to put his stuff and I can't see him doing anything but stuffing it in the closet.

So, none of this really applies to you, but I feel your pain.

[cappuccinosmom]

they do have chores, but the mess they make is more than the chores they do. TO make them clean up every mess they make woudl be doing nothing but constantly cleaning.

It might for a while, but they'd quickly realize it's more fun to tidy up quickly so you can do something else. This is a requirement I've had since they could pull things out, so with 4 it's going to be a lot of effort and time for you to teach them. If the mess is driving you crazy though, it will be worth it. Little ones actually tend to enjoy throwing things in bins and "helping" mama, so that toddler age is a great time to teach it! We make a game of it "Can you throw the block in the box? And can you throw this block in the box? Wow, you go them all in! Yay!" etc.

Our toys are in easy-to-reach, easy-to-open containers. Some things that are "sets" (blocks, trains, legos) have their own boxes. Even the 2 yo can sort the toys into the right boxes with minimal supervision.

I also contain most of the toys to one room--our living room. If they start hauling things to other rooms, and especially the kitchen, it gets out of hand very fast, so I just don't go there.

[jtbuko]

Originally Posted by 4C-mom

I
i've considering saying no toys in the living room, anyone done that? should i just let htem have a messy room (baby in his own room, 9 yr old in his own, 4 and 6 yr old girls share)?
how do you contain the kid made messes?

I have just two kids and daycare, and usually only work with the 6 and under set so not the same situation but....

Toys in the kitchen drive me batty so we have a pretty strict "no toys in the kitchen/ dining room/ entry hall" to keep mommy sane and all of us safe rule... I enforce it kind of playfully and they seem to dig it. When the rule is broken an alarm goes off (I say "beep beep beep" like a bus backing up, now the kids all do it too...) until it is picked up by me or one of them. I assume that would work for other rooms too.

Other things that help:
* everything has a specific home
* the majority of the toys are now kept in the kids room
* we rotate toys
* we freecycle a bunch of stuff whenever it starts to get out of hand
* we usually (but not always) try to clean up each area as we transition to the next... before we go outside or start a fun project etc.

[newbymom05]

I only have two kids, a 4 y/o and 1 y/o. I let toys migrate all over the house, but before we leave to go somewhere and before we go to bed, all toys must be picked up, so twice a day pick-up. And as I walk through our house I pick up and put away. The key for us, though, is not having a ton of toys. All of our toys fit into 2 bookshelves and one large costume box--that makes it a lot easier. I'm assuming more kids = way more toys, maybe you could rotate them? Put a box or two in the garage and see what happens.

[K1329]

I have a friend who's house is spotless. Her secret? Mini - cleans all day long. She gets the kids to pick up before they leave, before a snack, etc. BUT, I've also noticed that her own belongings are kept neatly.
I've tried to institute the "mini-cleans" with limited success. But, I've also noticed that my own belongings can get pretty messy, too. I'm currently trying to set a good example with my own stuff and having several cleaning sessions daily. Trying being the key word! lol

[Storm Bride]

Not well. I'm very organized about some things, but not about clean up. DD1 is fairly cooperative, and ds1 isn't bad (he leaves his clothes around too much, and doesn't do anything without being reminded/nagged, but that's about it). DS2...ugh. He won't cooperate with anything, including cleanup. It's really frustrating.

Once the heat wave is over, and I'm fully recovered from my last c-section, and dd2 has hopefully settled into a schedule that's a little less random, I'm going to seriously work on this place. It's even getting to me right now.

[becoming]

We clean up the toys before lunch, before dinner, and before bed. All of them. Every day. The kids are just so used to this way of life that they don't complain.