Tuesday, May 12, 2009

New Project!

It has been a while since I have done any blogging and there is so much to catch up on! Rather than wait 'til I have time to share everything I am going to put something current today and worry about the rest later. This weekend I installed a system that is (hopefully) going to cut my towel washing in half and all but eliminate the "whose towel is that in the middle of the floor?" frustration. I have not yet figured out how 4-6 kids (sometimes we have 2 extras) who don't even want to take a shower can create 4 loads of towels in a weekend and at least one parental meltdown trying to get people to pick their wet towels up from the floor.

Here is a picture of my kids bathroom on a typical Saturday night after everyone has showered, actually that is a good night because the towels are actually on the bathroom floor and not on the bedroom carpet.

BEFORE:





















I bought six solid colored towels and six individual hooks. I painted the hooks to match the towels and assigned everyone a color. Everyone is allowed to use ONLY the color they are assigned and if they are caught using someone else's towel, they have to do his or her assigned chore that day. Now after showers are done I can go into the bathroom and see if there are any towels on the floor, if there are I know exactly who put it there. If there are any empty hooks I know whose towel is missing and no longer have to check all the corners in each room. This is what it looked like this Saturday after showers.

AFTER:



BEAUTIFUL!!  Here's to lowering my stress level.  

11 comments:

fish said...

what a great idea! you are amazing. i seriously need to hire you to teach me your ways. hope you are well. glad to see you've finally updated the blog-- withdrawal symptoms were beginning to set in.

lelu said...

Growing up mom gave us our own towels. We all had hooks on the back of our doors to hang them up. My kids each have there own towels too. I love your matching hooks. Too cute! You're such a great mom!

It's a great life! said...

The matching hooks were really just to further my sanity, I love being able to tell at a glance whose towel is missing. I suppose it is more about being lazy than being a good mom.

Walters Family said...

That is EXACTLY what I did. I color coded my kids. Each had their own color. They had their towel, plate, cup and sometimes toys (when they were really small) all in their color so I knew exactly whose was left out. The boys were red, blue, yellow, green and the girls were pink and purple. That worked out soooo well. I love the matching hooks... didn't think of that.

Jana said...

Lisa, you are great! love to see what your clan is doing!! Love you!

kelly said...

oh gosh lisa....i SO "get" that!!! i went through the same "towel" crisis...hahahaha. yep, you got it girl. i did the SAME thing. hmmm...my kids have their own towel color, and i even had their first initial monogrammed onto it...you know, just in case they "forgot" which color was theirs!! OH RUBBISH!!! heheee ;)

Alicia said...

My Mom assigned us colors too. We had a special towel and cup (because she got tired of us using thirty cups in one day, just because we wanted a drink of water). I got pretty used to the system, and when I moved away from home I about fainted when I saw that my roommate had used my freshly-laundered towel and then thrown it on her bedroom floor (I had been pacing the house all morning looking for my towel so I could shower). Suddenly I understood why my mom had been so crazy about towels being on the floor. I hoarded my towels like a maniac after that. Ha ha!!

Your towels look so pretty on their matching hooks!!

Unknown said...

You are an inspiration!!! And the towels and the hooks are WAAAAYYY too cute. By the way, we are excited that you here by us at least for the summer! Yipee for us!

Bonnie said...

Hi cuz!!!

I found your blog YEAH!!!

Rob was just mentioning a couple weeks ago the whole one color towel for each child thing and hanging them on individual hooks to clean up the cluttery mess...but the color coded hooks really make it just that much better! Love it!

Hope all is good with you guys.

Ronda Batchelor said...

I did the same thing, but went even farther. They each have that color for most every thing. Like toothbrushes, bags, water bottles or whatever.

It's a great life! said...

Ronda, I have threatened them with that! They have gotten better at keeping up with their own things just because they don't want to be tied to one color for the rest of their lives.