Have a Laundry Basket for Each Person

By

T&T Grandma

My granddaughter loves to help fold towels and washclothes. I started to roll them for the drawer, which then she (3) could do, too.

For my own kids, we figured weekly chores and they rotated weeks. They could trade items on their own, collect fees from their siblings to do extra chores. The youngest did the best on the money end, always willing to get paid by his brothers to do the dishes, laundry to the lines, scrubbing toilets, etc. They could also cook/bake up a storm the same way, assigned chores.

By the way, I did not do allowances, they got the comforts of home, computers, etc. For extra like movies, other things, they went to the neighbors looking for odd jobs to do what they wanted, babysitting, mowing lawns, weeding gardens. They learned to do community charity time for many things. They hired themselves out as strawberry pickers. They learned so well they got paid by the bucket rather than the hour. Where at 8-9 could you work 3 hours every morning, eat all you wanted and make a good wage for the day.

By

MartyD

A wonderful idea! Kids need to learn what it takes to get those clothes back in the drawer and on the hangers in the closet! You get a thumbs up from me!

By

Carly34

To weedytj -- lighten up and back off!

To talkingbookworm -- ingenius idea -- Kudos to you for thinking of it or finding the idea. Kudos means "Good Job" in case you aren't familiar with American slang. : )

By

louel53

I love these hints that teach children responsibility and independence. My sons did their own laundry for most clothes, and we shared responsibility for whites and jeans (as no one person had enough for a full load). Each kid kept his laundry basket in his room-- one needed two-- one for cleans and one for dirty, as he never got around to putting things in the closet, but it was his room, so not my problem.

By

Cricketnc

Since there's only my husband and I here, and he's gone 3 weeks at a time, this wouldn't be practical for us. BUT! I did alter it a little. I use one basket for each type load----whites, lights, darks, colors, sheets/towels.
Also I have one of those 3 basket rolling things. I used to roll it back and forth from our bathroom at the opposite end of the house to the laundry room. But it never failed, it was always in the wrong end of the house when we took off our dirty clothes! So I got 4 of those pop-up/collapsable baskets. I put those in the bathroom where we take our showers and change clothes, and the roll away is in a corner of the laundry room out of the way. Now when it's time to wash a certain load, I just go in the bathroom and bring it to the laundry room and dump it into the rollaway. Then I can return the basket to the bathroom and I don't have piles on the floor anymore.

By

Glenn'sMom

I used to do something like this when we had 5 little ones at home. I'd fold the clothes on my bed and they could come in through the day and get their basket. I never took it to their rooms so if they didn't have clean clothes in the drawer they knew where to look.

By

Cyinda

YES! I just love your idea! My kids also each had their OWN color of bath towel. No dropping them on the floor after using & their own set of dishes (all the same but a different color for each child & they were responsible for washing them after each use (a mug, a bowl & a med sized plate). This isn't just helpful to mom, it also teaches responsibility!

We also had a Saturday rotating chore chart for the 3 oldest kids (vacuum, mop, dust, etc) & when a child turned 14 years old I'd sit down with them & have THEM write out the checks & pay the household bills each month for a year. This way they learned how to write checks, along with budgeting & how much it actually takes to live & that money doesn't grow on trees!

They also got paid 2 cents a page to read a book & we only allowed 5 hours of TV each week (& got paid 50 cents for each half hour they didn't use) & we didn't have cable! (but we rented a lot of movies as a family & they were never bored!)