Rebecca’s Cure: Getting the Kids Involved

Cleaning and organizing your home is not easy if you have small children underfoot. If you have a baby, forget about it! I know you can put them in a sling and still do the vacuuming, but have you actually tried it? It’s like doing one of those extreme military workouts. Mine are past the baby stage now, so I decided it was high time we tackled this Cure as a family.

Some tasks are clearly going to be more successful with kids in tow than others, and cleaning out the front porch felt like a good place to start. After all, what child doesn’t like splashing around with water and bubbles?

I mentioned our embarrassingly muddy and cluttered porch inmy project list. Most of the elements for a successful landing strip are already there — coat hooks, a bench-cum-shoe rack, a doormat. It’s just that nearly all the shoes and coats in the house have migrated to the porch, making it impossible to find what you want in a hurry. So, we removed all items not used on a regular basis to a cupboard in the hall, gave the floor, windows and bench a good clean, and hey presto, we have a decent, functioning entryway.

My three-year old enjoyed scurrying back and forth with armloads of flip flops, party shoes and summer raincoats. But mostly she enjoyed getting soaking wet mopping the floor. The great thing was that although it took me a little longer to get everything done, it was more fun doing it together.

While we were busy on the porch, my husband was sprucing up the peeling paintwork in the hall. And installing not so much a landing strip as Heathrow Terminal 5, aka the Hemnes 5-drawer chest from IKEA. There is a drawer for each of us for storing hats, gloves, sports kits, etc, and one left over for the endless stream of paperwork that makes its way into the house.

I was on a roll, so I decided to jump ahead to theartwork taskand hang this very sweet framed print from theV&A shopin London. It fits perfectly over the chest of drawers and perks up our now not so dreary hallway.

How is your Cure going? Have you roped in your family, your partner or housemates, or are you going it alone?

Helpful Links:

• One Minute Tip: Create a Basic Landing Strip
• Our Favorite Entryway and Landing Strip Ideas
• How to Conquer the January Cure…With Kids
• 5 Ways to Inspire Kids to Help Clean Up
• Making Your Home Your Own: Prep Artwork for Framing and Display

• Join the January Cure
• Go to the January Cure main page

Rebecca’s January Cure:

• Rebecca’s Cure: Making a Project List
• Rebecca’s Cure: Defunking the Bedroom
• Rebecca’s Cure: This One Nearly Killed Me!