Now I'm the mean mama

The three youngest (twins 6 and Aaron 7, 1yr 6days apart) spend a lot of time arguing over toys or picking at them til stickers come off or they don't work any more. Dh and I just emptied the playroom. Of everything. Hopefully now they'll see we mean it when we tell them to take care of their things and to learn to negotiate. I'm not going to get rid of them all together just yet. They can begin to earn things back but we've had it with the arguing. I feel like the meanest mama on the planet taking their toys away. But we had to do something.

 

Sounds like a great idea to me!! I'm mean with you!!! I'm just overwhelmed at how much stuff we have for them to play (or not!) with!!!

 

Let us know how it goes -- I've dreamt of doing that.

 

I've gathered up all the toys littering the floor and put them in trash bags. If you just throw it down, it must be trash, right?
I've made them throw away every treat in the house after I caught them sneaking candy in their room. If I can't trust you with sweets, we just won't have any in the house. A wii controller or game found on the floor goes in time out for 24 hours, no questions asked and no discussion. I'm so tired of the dirty clothes on the floor that I'm on the verge of refusing to wash anything that isn't in the hamper.

You go Mean Mama! :diablo:

 

Good job mama !!

 

We've done those things with toys, treats and game controllers! My kids are 5 and 6 and I think the first time we did it, the boys were close to being 4, DD would have been 5. It works really well! We've only had to do it twice in the past 18 months or so. Now I tell my kids they have 5 minutes to clean up and put away, or the toys go in my office (which is locked and off limits to them). They have to earn them back. If they fight over a toy, they lose that toy. And if they leave game controllers on the floor or on the couch, my DH locks them up for whatever length of time has been told to them.

The extra bonus is it's a really great way to clean out the toy collection. As the kids earn back the toys, you get a great idea of what toys are important to the kids. Mind always forget about at least half of their toys. When they stop wanting to earn toys back, I know I can get rid of what's left. And honestly, my kids don't have that many toys sitting around, so it's not like they have a whole bunch and it's easy for them to forget because they have so many.

Mean Mama's rock! :woohoo: