My children do “jobs” around our house. As I’m sure yours do at your house. I think it’s very good for children to have responsibilities, even when they are young. You know, my father-in-law as a child, always had warm milk strait from the cow on his cereal. And while I happen to think that’s a big disgusting, he (nor his other siblings) thought anything of it. It was normal. It’s the same with training a child to always have responsibilities. Since it’s always been that way, they won’t think it’s not “normal”. And trust me, growing up in this family, since we are so “out there” anyway, the more things my children can have that are “normal” the better it will be.
But, back to the sliverware drawer. Most of the time, the younger children (say Isaac or Grace) will empty out the sliverware from the dishwasher. I used to have the nice compart rubbermaid thingy to organize and seperate the forks from the spoons and so on. But I realized that it was tedious to always try and keep the spoons in the right place (because, you know, they never make it big enough to accomodate any more than 8 place settings!) and if a job can be made a bit easier, I’m all for it! Besides, little hands not only put the sliverware in, but they take it out to set the table, too.
I got this idea from Adam’s work and it is working beautifully! I have a seperate container for each item (forks with forks, spoons with spoon, etc. ) and in the back of the drawer is where all the “not used much, but sometimes” items are kept.
See? The spoons are not falling into the forks, the serving utencils have their own space, it’s easier for little fingers to put things into and get out of, and Mama has an orderly drawer. All is well.
Now, if only the 7 years worth of girls clothes and 4 years worth of boys clothes could be this easily organized and KEPT THAT WAY!
Go on, visit Rocks In My Dryer for more ideas of what works. You never know what you might stumble upon!