kids will be ecstatic, but their parents may be slightly less excited. All moms and dads know what it’s like when the children are home all day, every day: The house gets messier, because in addition to all of the fun (and messy) things that kids find to do, there is no real downtime for parents to keep up with the clutter build-up. The good news is that no matter how old your kids are, you can take steps right as school ends to make sure that they’re lending a hand in keeping chaos under control while they’re home for the summer.
“Take advantage of the free labor available. Your kids are home all day… what better time to put them to work?”
Insist that they keep to some sort of routine
It might not be necessary in your situation to make them go to bed at their normal weekday bedtime or to wake up with an alarm clock, but it’s a good idea to keep some semblance of normalcy. When kids have no routine, their cavalier attitude is likely to extend to their organizational behaviors. Keep them on track by having them pick up their rooms nightly after dinner, continue making them be out of bed and dressed by whatever you deem is a reasonable hour, and implement some “family tidy time” in lieu of some of the time that they’d otherwise be spending on homework.
Take advantage of the free labor available
Your kids are home all day… what better time to put them to work? Choose a project and assign it to your kids to do over the course of an hour, a week, or the entire summer, depending on its scope. Do the books in the living room bookcase need to be organized? Maybe you need someone to go through all of the bedroom closets, taking out items that have been outgrown? Does the garage look like an avalanche waiting to happen? Keeping age and ability in mind, assign these chores to your kids to help keep them occupied, to stall the mess-making, and to help the house get more organized.
Call in the professionals
If you are having trouble keeping up with your home’s organization, then there is no shame in calling in professionals to help! Having custom closets installed or hiring a professional home organizer can make a huge difference in the way your home functions, now and in the fall when the kids go back to school. There are so many organizational products available now; you can get your office, pantry, garage, closets and guest rooms in excellent order with a custom organization solution.
The best thing about getting your home and family organized this summer is that the effects will linger throughout the next academic year. With any luck, you won’t have to “retrain” your kids to follow a routine and keep themselves in order once August or September rolls around and they’re back in school again!
