Why in the world does my house look such a mess? From the time the children wake up, we have breakfast, do our memory work, bible study, and our math lessons. I try to keep everyone in the same room but, it never fails, when I take a tour of the downstairs prior to lunch, it's quite a mess.
It's not easy keeping things orderly in a home of eleven. In fact, I've had to realize that things will NOT always be orderly. I mean, if you walked into my home right now, you'd see books stacked in front of the fireplace from our reading basket, a table with almost empty water bottles on the tea table, papers sprawled across the sofa, a laptop on the back of the sofa, and the vacuum lying on the floor. Now it wasn't like this when I started my morning but, somehow, between breakfast and our last lesson, an invisible tornado went through this house and we were sitting right here amidst it . So how do we get things back in order?
Here are a few things that I always revert to when the invisible tornado hits my home:
1. "If any would not work, neither should he eat." (Thess 10:3) Before we can have lunch, everyone has a jurisdiction he or she is responsible for. All jurisdictions must be complete prior to sitting down for lunch.
2. Everybody must be responsible for his/her own things. If you put it down, you must pick it up.
3. Do all things without complaining or disputing. (Phil 2:14) There will be absolutely no complaining (verbal nor nonverbal) about a job you have been assigned or there will be a consequence (a less favorite meal - soup works for my children, loss of free time, or even an extra chore).
As I type, my little blessings are busy getting things back in order so that we can enjoy a comfortable home once again. Soon we'll all be having lunch and quiet time. However, the fourth matter of importance that I've found - a must for success with children, I must now go to inspect all of the tasks that they've been given.
I'm still not sure how things get this way so quickly but it's not as frustrating when there's a plan to get things back in order.
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