Doctor, Doctor!

I go through great pains to teach my children to "be clean" and how to clean.  I have taught them an organized way to go about it.  I know, only ME right?  Shaney and Jared are very clean people.  I NEVER have to tell them to clean their rooms.  In fact, all of Shaney's room-mates were amazed at how clean and organized she was...all year.  You're welcome!  And Jared is extremely particular about his room.  This pleases me, and I never question if those two are really mine (chuckling).  Matthew is an entirely different personality.  He is extremely organized in his head, but struggles to execute it on the ground.  He is charged every evening at 6pm to tidy up his room for the night.  And I often have to sit in there to keep him on task.  I HATE DOING THIS!

(switching gears for a minute - hang with me)

Dave and I love watching episodes of M*A*S*H.  And for some reason I was always fascinated with triage.  How they go about assigning patients according to need and survival rate.  This is how I go about cleaning, tidying and organizing my home and my life.  Sounds weird, I know, but it works for me.  So why not try it on the children?

On this particular day I explained to Matthew what triage was.  And in a way, a critical patient is like a group of toys that can be picked up and make the biggest difference.  I typically go for larger toys like stuffed animals.  Those take up a lot of space on his floor.  And other big things, blankets, pillows, etc.  And then easier things like Hot wheels.  And so on.  I would call out, "Doctor, Doctor!"  And suggest to him a couple of patients, he would triage, and then he would go about taking care of his patients.  It worked, I couldn't believe it, but it finally worked and he got his room CHEERFULLY cleaned.  Halelujia!!!!!  Score for the mommy.  You never know what will trigger that kid.