Step 1: Announce earlier in the week that Saturday will be a family work day. This will give your teens plenty of time to make other plans and not be around on Saturday morning.
Step 2: Resign yourself that it’s just you, your husband, and your four young kids participating in Family Work Day. That’s okay. You got this.
Step 3: Instruct 6-year-old to pick up any trash she can find. She decides she needs gloves. You stop pulling weeds to go find her some gloves.
Now the 3-year-old wants gloves. You find her some gloves.
The 6-year-old has decided she actually doesn’t want gloves because “they make her hands too hot.”
Copying her older sister, 3-year-old also discards gloves. Put gloves away.
Step 4: When your 3-year-old gets bored and starts annoying her older sisters, give her scissors and instruct her to cut weeds. Your 6-year-old will want to cut weeds too, so you’ll have to get her a pair of scissors.
Step 5: Enjoy the peace that comes with happy snipping. Never mind. Your 6-year-old just cut herself with the scissors. Take her inside to clean the cut and put on a Paw Patrol bandaid.
Step 6: Tell your 10-year-old to clean up the corner of the yard with trash and broken toys. Proceed to argue with her about the definition of “family work day.” Discipline. Instruct again. Check her work. Instruct again. Check it again. Do this several times until either she’s in tears or the job is done. Or both.
Step 7: Put noise-canceling headphones on. When kids have questions or problems with siblings, point them toward their father. Finish your work in peace.
Autumn's Writing 