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Holy cow, our house was quite the mess the last few weeks! With all of us coming down with a really terrible cold, I really let the housework slide. Now that we’re feeling a bit better, it’s time to get this place more ready for the holidays! I love getting my kiddos involved, and they actually love it! Here’s some tips on How to Make Chores Fun: Floor Cleaning to Windows.

Now, our biggest issue with keeping the house clean is that we have a LOT of wood floors…basically our entire main floor! With the food messes the kids leave each meal in the kitchen, to the dog hair and dried grass that our two large dogs drag all over, it gets REALLY yucky on our floors despite how often we try to keep it cleaned! To tackle this job for our ‘Get the House Holiday Ready’ family mission, we needed some help! We ran to Walmart, hit up their cleaning supplies section, and grabbed the O-Cedar ProMist.

I wanted this model because it has the nice microfiber cloth, which picks up pretty much everything from the dog hairs to crumbs to leaves. I also LOVE that you don’t have to use a specific type of solution for the fluid…you can put in whatever you’re needing at the moment! Sometimes we just need some water for a quick clean-up, other times we use our ‘pet’ cleaner for their little accidents. I even mix some disinfectant cleaner with water and put that in the ProMist when I want a nice, deep clean!

I’m a bit nervous to show this….but I want you to see how well it picks stuff up….

Gross, right? Anywho…once you’re done, you can just toss it in the laundry and reuse it! No need to purchase more pads or anything.

The absolutely best part? Our kids usually do our floors for us! It’s one of the chores they really love doing, and this mop makes is super easy for them…and does a great job even if the kids aren’t the greatest little cleaners. It was Superman’s chore to clean the downstairs floors this week, and he had a blast….check out his awesome dance moves!

Yup, he’s a total ham! Yet, despite all his jumping and silliness, the floors got amazing clean!

If there were any spots that needed a little extra scrubbing (like sticky candy stuck there), Hubby stepped in to give a little extra muscle.

I love clean, shiny wood floors, don’t you?! I wish the dogs would let it stay that way….

 How to Make Chores Fun

• Have a reward system, like our chore chart or our chore rewards treasure chest. Some chores are just to help out as part of the family, some are actual ‘paid work’.
• Have a specific morning each week (ours is usually Saturday) where everyone helps clean. Get a little treat afterwards, such as donuts or a drink at the gas station.
• Let each of the kids have a cute ‘cleaning outfit’, maybe an apron, that they get to wear while they clean.
• Act like ninjas! Tell the kids the mess/germs are the ‘Bad Guys’ and they need to ‘ATTACK’ them! You’ll be surprised how fiercely they clean!
• Turn up the tunes! It’s always more fun to clean while dancing and singing along.
• Hide a little ‘reward’ in the area they’re cleaning. Finding a little candy while mopping or a quarter while dusting can really get them motivated.
• Play ‘go fish’ with your socks while doing laundry!
• Do a ‘Ten Minute Tidy’ before dessert. Set the timer for 10 minutes and everyone does as much cleaning and organizing in that time as they can. Everyone who joined in gets to enjoy a yummy dessert!
• Get a plastic police badge for cheap, then take turns being ‘Inspector D. Clutter’. The inspector can go around with a box/bag and put stray items in ‘jail’ (the box/bag). For the guilty parties to get their jailed items free, the owner must do a chore.
• Let each family member design their own ‘cleaning caddy’ with items that only THEY can use to clean (ie their own washcloth, own gloves, etc.)

There’s so many more fun ideas, just let your imagination go! Above all, make sure your children receive positive reinforcement for a job well done…or at least for good effort! Don’t expect them to do as well of a job cleaning as YOU can do, but little by little they’ll get better.

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