September 2

Today I decided that it was about time for Audrey to start pulling her weight around this house...so she did "chores" with me all day long! =)

Really, I just was trying to find a way to actually get something done during the day. Audrey always wants to be right by my side. She gets mad if I even walk to the other side of the room without her. It drives me nuts, because I never feel like I have even a second to get something done without interruption. (I'm probably exaggerating this a bit...she will sit and play with her toys and books by herself for periods of time. But it just feels like she is ALWAYS wanting my attention).


So today, I decided to use Audrey's clinginess to my advantage. And I enlisted her "help" to complete the day's tasks. Here is what we did:


1. Laundry. Audrey is a big helper when it comes to putting clothes in and taking clothes out of the dryer. She is not a very big helper when it comes to folding clothes. Her idea of helping is to take all the neatly folded clothes and throw them all around the room.


2. Sweeping: I let Audrey have the swiffer, while I took the broom, and we swept the kitchen, dining room and entry way. This worked fairly well, as long as Audrey was able to manage the swiffer. She had a hard time handling it sometimes, and that made her very frustrated.


3. Vacuuming: In the past, Audrey has been somewhat scared of the vacuum. So I thought I would let her help me push it and see if that made her a litte less scared. She did think it was fun to push it, but at the speed we were going it was going to take all day to vacuum one room. So I got her popper/push toy and told her it was her own "vacuum". That kept her busy long enough for me to sweep the living and piano rooms. She kept pointing to hers and saying, "Audrey. Gacuum." And then to the vacuum and saying, "Mommy. Gacuum."


4. Baking: Since the rest of the day had gone so well, I decided to be brave and try to bake some muffins with Audrey tonight. And she totally impressed me. We've done a little bit of cooking (I've let her drop a few vegetables in the crockpot)...but I haven't ever tried to bake anything with her...too much potential for a messy disaster I thought. Tonight, with my help, she mashed the bananas, put all the ingredients into the bowl, stirred everything, put the dirty dishes in the sink, put the muffin cups in the pan, and then put the batter in the muffin cups. I thought for sure she or me or the counter or floor (or all of the above) would be a mess by the time we were done...but she kept everything pretty clean and followed every direction I gave her perfectly. Seriously, I was so impressed.


And then we put the muffins in the oven, and I told her when the oven beeped she could have a bite. When the oven did beep, she was so excited. She yelled, "Oven beep! Bite! Eat!" and ran into the kitchen. And then we ate muffins. And they were delicious!


Lessons I learned today:
1. When Audrey is "helping", it takes twice as much time and energy to get chores done. But at least some things got done.
2. I often underestimate Audrey's abilities. I think it is because I am in denial about her growing up. I'm not ready for her to do all these big girl things. I want her to be my little baby forever!
3. Audrey liked being a helper. She kept saying, "Help me" all day long...meaning she wanted to help me do whatever I was doing. (The girl doesn't quite understand pronouns yet!).