Never Get Behind on Dishes and Laundry Again!

Image from scoutiegirl.com

Twenty-five years ago when I was a young mother, housewife, and homeschooler, I had trouble getting all of my work done every day--while teaching a young son to read, keeping a curious preschooler out of everything, taking care of a toddler, nursing a baby, etc. Truly the statement "the days are long but the years are short" was never more real to me.

I had problems that many people who are "self employed" have--plus the added "benefits" of having a lot of littles around making messes and needing seemingly-constant attention. (I really do think they are benefits--but when a man is self-employed, he usually doesn't have to take care of a home, feed a crew, and provide constant care and supervision to little kids! He just, well, works!)

The greatest problem that those of us who are self employed and/or homeschoolers and/or housewives with littles is that of prioritizing. The second greatest is motivation. Why clean this up when it is just going to become a mess again in thirty minutes? Why fix a hot meal....three hours later, I will need to start another hot meal!

I have found many ways to get the motivation needed to make it through those days of many littles and lots of homeschooling needs--but that would take a book to explain, so for today, I would like to address the concept of prioritizing.

When I had little kids, I loved creating systems--toy storage systems, closet organization, bookshelf perfection. These were things, however, that should not have been high on the priority list. The priority list needed to include daily work, like dishes, laundry, meal preps, child cleansing, reading lessons, and unit studies. Not systems!

My husband would come home at the end of the work day, and I would take him by the hand and lead him through the house, making a path through clean laundry, unbathed children in pj's, and stacks of dishes, to show him the toy shelves with all of the toys sorted into baby wipe containers with picture labels on each shelf so that the kids could put the toys onto the right shelves. It didn't even dawn on me that I should have done dishes and laundry BEFORE doing those amazing toy shelves.



After he saw my prize-winning shelves, Ray would roll up his sleeves (literally) and dig in to help bail me out from my day of misplaced priorities. We would get the dishes and laundry done; he would call me "closet lady" --and then we would often repeat the cycle again in a few days. 

As we added more children to our home (and more kids in school), it became obvious that I could not continue to put contact paper on every box that came in the house and hand make labels with bright magic markers. Something had to give--and it was then that I came up with the solution to all of our laundry and dish (and trash!) problems:

Treat laundry, dishes, and trash just like brushing my teeth. I brush my teeth at least twice a day (sometimes three or four if I eat something spicy or I am going out in the evening). And I began doing the same with dishes, laundry, and trash. 

We still adhere to the below schedule twenty-five years later--though I have seldom done this daily work once the two oldest children could handle these tasks, about ages ten and seven--the youngest child or two of the family who can handle the work has always done the daily tasks (so that we more, um, accomplished kids and parents can do harder jobs, like cooking, shopping, cleaning out freezers, weekly bathroom cleaning, discipling teens, mentoring young adults, teaching fractions, organizing closets (!), etc.).





                    TWICE A DAY LAUNDRY, DISHES, and TRASH TASKS


Bedtime: (1) Run the dishes from the evening in the dishwasher
 (2) Put laundry from earlier in the dryer ("fold ups" only; we have always done hang ups in the moment, moving it before it spins out and hanging it up when it is nearly dry so that we don't have to iron)
3) Start another load in the washer before sleeping

Morning: (1) Unload dishwasher and put away any big dishes that were drying on the counter after last night's dinner
(2) Fold and put away laundry in the dryer
(3) Move washer load from washer to dryer and dry it
(4) Gather trash all over the house in the big bag out of the kitchen trash can and take it all out; replace bag

Noontime: (1) Do second load of laundry in dryer (fold and put away)
(2) Start tonight's first load of laundry in washer
(3) Load dishes from breakfast, lunch, snacks, and cooking and run dishwasher

Evening chores: (1) Unload daytime dishes
(2) Load dinner and dinner prep dishes
(3) Bag kitchen trash again and take it out (we only gather from everywhere else once a day, in the morning)


This assumes chore sessions are in place. Even if you do not have good chore sessions right now, you can start with a five minute session before or after each meal and get laundry and dishes done then (even if it is just you doing them). Four five minute sessions can keep everything up if you have a dishwasher. (Note that we do a load or two of "hang ups" in another chore session in addition to that twice-daily laundry schedule. "Hang up" laundry is a weekly chore, separate from the daily laundry.)

When I didn't have a dishwasher, I still kept this same routine, but I just kept hot sudsy water in the sink all day (reviving it as needed) and washed dishes and put them in the drying rack as I had them, definitely at least after each meal, but I (or a child) would often run out and wash a sinkful here and there.

Doesn't TWICE A DAY for each chore (fully done--trash, laundry, and dishes) and twenty total minutes of work a day sound completely doable??? It is! You can do this!

Twice a day--just like brushing your teeth!

Proactive Parenting: The Morning Routine

“The most important thing that parents can teach their children is how to get along without them.” Anonymous

Image Blessed Femininity

One of the most valuable “Proactive Parenting” tips that we have followed is that of the “morning routine” development. Twenty years ago we attended a parenting seminar in which a young mom was discussing how we could make our mornings run more smoothly, teach our children to be more independent, etc. through this thing that she called morning routines. She even had darling picture-filled charts that she made to help her non-readers follow their morning routines. We began morning routines immediately upon arriving home—and we still use them over twenty years later.

I tell moms in our workshops that “morning routines will change the way your entire day goes.” This has been true for us as a homeschooling family, but I definitely think that parents whose children need to get up, around, and off first thing in the morning would really benefit from developing these routines. If you find your mornings extra stressful—and you drop your kids off at school in less-than-happy moods as a result of the hurried, nagging-filled morning or you homeschoolers start your school day off with kids still in pajamas or carrying Lucky Charms into the school room when it’s time to begin—then morning routines are for you.

Below I will give you some tips for starting this outstanding daily habit—and in days to come, I will address various age groups and the morning routine more extensively.


1. Decide how extensive you want your child’s morning routine to be. For older kids (especially girls), we have found that it can be a full ninety minute block that includes their personal morning habits, as well as chores, devotions, and exercise. For younger children, especially boys, we have had morning routines that were simple—and called “room, groom, dress, mess”—signifying that it includes straightening their bedroom, person grooming, getting dressed, and cleaning up any messes they have from the night before (i.e. water glasses, books upstairs, making bed, etc.).

2. If your mornings are chaos now, I recommend starting with a simple list of five to eight tasks that have to be done upon rising—the most basic things that must be done. For example, getting changed, grooming, putting away pj’s, making bed, packing bag for day, etc. This can be added to later once these daily habits are established.

3. Consider what you truly have enough time for in the mornings. We are flexible with our mornings in that Mom and all of the kids stay home and do school, so we have a morning routine time, a chore time, and a personal devotion time—all before breakfast. (When our girls were home, they usually had an exercise time, as well.) If you need to get your kids out of the house early in the morning, you will not want to try to do so many things in the morning as your kids’ rising time would likely be unbearable to get all of those things in before a seven a.m. school bus trip.

4. If your children are always sleepy in the mornings—and hard to motivate, consider starting your morning ten minutes earlier, and waking them up to a story or a chapter out of a chapter book. When our boys were younger, I would sit on their bed in the morning and read to them to wake them up—then they got up and started their morning routines. This seemed to give them some time to get used to getting up and moving.

5. Be realistic in how much time everything takes. When we first set up our preschoolers’ morning routines, we used a timer and had them go do each task, then report back to us. We told them how long that activity took—and wrote down that time plus ten or twenty percent (since they will likely move more slowly in the mornings). Then we added up the total list and came up with an allotment of time for morning routines. This way both of us knew that they truly could get that little list done in that amount of time.

6. Set up consequences or rewards, depending on your parenting style. If you are having really harried mornings now, I recommend that you start out with rewards and then move to consequences. For example, you might have a jar for each child and every morning that the morning routine is completed without reminding, complaining, etc.—and on time—you put a quarter or fifty cent piece in the jar for a treat at the end of the week. After a couple of months, you could remove the reward incentive, but tell them that morning routines are still part of your day—and that if they do not do them according to the guidelines, they will lose a privilege.


The goal of morning routines is that everybody is doing what they need to do in order to start their day—without fighting, coaxing, cajoling, stress, and yelling. It is, in essence, a step toward teaching our “children to get along without us.”


*Watch this blog for future posts on morning routines at different ages and stages, chore charts, and more.

O is for ORGANIZATION--DAILIES, TIMELY TASKS, AND ABC WEEKLIES!

Once you learn to "Delight in Dailies" and get the things done that need to be done on a daily basis, it is time to get other things done, but what?

I can remember when my husband and I were first married, I would ask him, "How do you know what to do every day when you go to work?" I just couldn't figure out how he knew what needed to be done.

He would always ask me, "How do you know what to do when a student comes for tutoring?" or "How do you know what to do around the house and with the kids every day when you get up?"

I remember telling him, "I just do." And he would say it was the same for him at work.

Prioritizing at work and at home are two very different things though. I mean, at work, you have a boss waiting for you to finish something. And you have deadlines, etc.

But at home, once you get the dailies done, everything else that isn't a daily is always screaming out to you! (Come to think of it, before you get the DAILIES done, everything is screaming out to you!)



I have followed two very simple tips in working on non-dailies:



1. I always do the next thing that is due. I call these my TIMELY TASKS.
(Well, almost....like just now I was printing recipes for my cooking morning tomorrow and I got sidetracked writing this post. Technically, the recipes are due before this because my cooking day starts at 8:30--and this could wait until tomorrow--but I digress!)

Once I am done with my dailies, I always ask myself what is the next thing that has to be done--my editor is waiting on a document; student papers have to be edited for class the next day; tomorrow's meat has to be marinated; bedding has to be moved to the dryer in order to go to bed tonight, etc.

This one little tip always keeps me moving in the right direction!





2. I have an ABC WEEKLIES list. 


Yes, for many years, I hardly saw this WEEKLIES list, but now I get to some of the things--and I am having so much fun! 

After I get my dailies done--and I have "put out fires" by doing the next thing that is due--then I am ready to consult my WEEKLIES list. (I finally get to organize a closet or clean out the snack cupboard!!!)

But I don't just have a WEEKLIES list; I manipulate my WEEKLIES list. I go down the list task-by-task and write an A, B, or C beside each one.

Then when I have a chance to do something off of it, I do an A task. And I keep on doing A tasks all week--anytime I get a chance (after my dailies and timely tasks).

No matter what else happens in any given week, I know that I have my DAILIES done; I have my timely tasks out of the way; and I did as many A's as I could (and occasionally even a B or two!).

This isn't a glamorous approach. I don't craft beautiful things. I don't decorate my home Better Homes and Garden style. I don't always cook from scratch. I don't scrub between the washer and dryer.

But I feel like an organizational genius. And my home runs fairly smoothly. And I spend time with my kids and husband. And we eat decent meals. And we always have clean clothes and the trash out of the house....because these things are my DAILIES.

When I was homeschooling a houseful of children, the new readers read, the writers wrote, and I checked their work, read aloud to them, talked to them, and taught them the Bible...because these things were my DAILIES.

Because I always did my DAILIES.....I became an organized homeschooler! 


Everything is always crying out to be done. People want us to do everything. Our extended families need us. Our church needs us. Our ministries need us. Our jobs need us. Our children need us. And we can start to feel like the hamster on the wheel very quickly if we don't have a plan in place to get to the important things.


My DAILIES, TIMELY TASKS, and ABC WEEKLIES have helped me do that for many, many years!

(Now back to my recipes!)

Beating Procrastination

No matter how many years of experience I have in getting things done and no matter how much I understand about procrastination and its effects on my life, I still occasionally do one really dumb thing: Put off doing something because I think it will be too hard or too long or too laborious or too messy or too boring or too something!

Then I finally do that undesired task only to find out that it was a thirty or sixty minute job--and the great feelings I have after I am done far outweigh the work itself!

I have, however, in the past few years learned some coping mechanisms for procrastination.

Here are a few tips to help you the next time you feel procrastination coming on:



1. Stop! 

Think about the situation for real. Ask yourself truly how long the task could honestly take. Answer yourself. And if it is under thirty minutes, JUST DO IT!




2. Break it down! 

We have taught this technique to our kids in study skills, chores, room cleaning, yard work, etc. Just take the big job and tell yourself that you will not try to do it all right now. Instead, tell yourself that you will simply do ten minutes a day three times a week until the task is done. You won't have to face the entire thing. Just set a timer (another thing we have taught our kids!) for ten minutes. When the ten minutes is up, marvel at how far you got on the project--and leave it until your next ten minute period.




3. Get someone's help. 

This summer I was sinking into a little depression after a family friend died. I was just so mournful for his wife (one of my best friends) and his children (my children's best friends) that I found myself unable to tackle very big jobs for a few weeks. After a couple of weeks of not getting much done, I realized that I had to do something to get myself in gear because classes would soon be starting and I would not have the time that I had in the summer. I decided to work on the things that I couldn't face at that time only when I had help. My fifteen year old son and his teenage friend became y assistant for a couple of hours once a week--and I saved the things that I just couldn't face by myself (things that I normally could have dug into without a problem) for when the three of us could work together. I finally got my freezers cleaned out, some garden produce put up, and my freezer meal preparations back on track. Sometimes it just takes a little help to get us moving in the right direction!




4. Make things you are constantly facing into weekly or daily tasks rather than saving them up until they feel formidable. 

An example of this for me is vegetable and fruit preparations. I used to save them all for one time each week--then I found it harder and harder to come up with the block of time needed to slice, dice, and julienne. Instead I made what was one big project into ongoing daily tasks.




5. For really difficult things, just dig in for a minute or two. 

I know that doesn't sound long enough to even get anything done. But a minute or two here and there starts to add up. Also, one minute soon becomes three or four minutes--and your momentum will start to build.

 I had like ten bags that were filled with various things--a document bag, gym bag, swimming bag, swimming toy/snack bag, old purse, new purse, lunch/snack bag, etc. And I stuffed them in the corner of the room, got two new bags at a garage sale (document bag and purse/go bag) and started using those two instead. Every time I looked at those dozen bags stuffed in the corner, I got a knot in my stomach. I just didn't want to face them.

 One day I told myself that I would just pull out the top bag and spend a minute or two on it. By the end of that ninety seconds, i had that bag cleaned out and put away! The next day I did another couple of minutes. My momentum was building and my bag pile was going down. Remember: You can do anything for one minute!

Entrees ready to go to the freezer!

I hope these don't sound trite or silly--like why in the world couldn't you just clean your freezer or sort your bags, lady! I think we all get overwhelmed at times with way too many things to do. And these tips help me during those times to JUST DO IT!

Three Chore Sessions Each Day!

When our children got older, I moved out of colorful chore charts on poster board types of display and into typed charts created in Excel in report covers.

When it comes to chores, I am thankful that I learned the approach that we have used for the past twenty years plenty early in my homeschooling tenure:

1. Attach three different chore sessions to twenty to thirty minutes prior to each meal. 

2. Use one of your "chorers" for meal preparations for that upcoming meal. (Eventually, our kids did breakfasts and lunches completely by themselves for the family--and either did dinner with me or rotated through and took a different night each week as they got older.)

3. Put the most crucial chores in the first chore session--the things that need done every day regardless. For us, this meant one load of laundry, one load of dishes, trash throughout the house, wipe down bathrooms, get out/start something for evening meal, and fix breakfast. This way you will almost always get to the priorities ("dailies")

4. In the second chore session, put more dailies and a couple of weekly tasks. (For us, this meant another load of dishes, laundry, and trash; lunch preps; possibly baking; and another weekly or two, such as dusting and vacuuming, cleaning out fridge, etc.)

5. In the third chore session, I put the things I only dream of getting to and dinner preps. (I always had a child in the kitchen with me each evening as I prepared dinner--unless the child fixed it himself or herself!)

6. Before each chore session, I called out "Room to Room"--which meant that each person should go through the main rooms and pick up what they have out. This allowed the chorer for that room to dust, vacuum, etc., without having to pick up first.

The key to successful chores, in my opinion, include the following:

A. Do dailies daily! Do not skip dailies. Do not try to do anything else until the dailies are down pat.

B. Never miss the first two chore sessions!

C. Have everybody work the entire chore session. (If someone got done early, he came to get another task or helped someone else. This wasn't a race--it was a daily lifestyle that helped us have time for homeschooling and all of the wonderful teaching, heart training, and family times that we wanted to have.)

D. Don't make it the least bit optional. After a couple of months of this lifestyle, my kids never even questioned whether they had to fold and put away three loads of laundry that day or fix lunch every day or cut up a fridge full of veggies. It was a way of life--a way of life that made our family successful.

E. Don't eat until the work is done!

F. Have I mentioned not to skip? 

Freezer Entree Series Coming in June--Power Hour

Braised Beef Cube Mix

Did you know that some freezer entrees can be assembled as you are putting away groceries or flipping some pancakes for Saturday brunch? Did you know that you can quite possibly put four or six entrees in the freezer in under an hour with just a litte preplanning and organization? And that you can become a freezer cook without carving out three or four days of shopping, precooking, cooking, bagging, labeling, and freezing?

I have been an avid freezer cook for twenty-three years next month! I started out small with the Make a Mix Cookery cookbook (which has a few freezer entrees and "starters") and within a few years it wasn't uncommon for me to have fifty to two hundred freezer entrees, side dishes, soup starters, and more in my freezers at any given time.

I homeschooled six children at one time during one point in our parenting (seven children total), so my days of school and discipling and disciplining were long. While we taught our children to work hard, and they did all have kitchen duties every day, including breakfast prepaations, lunch duty, and assistant chef to Mom in the evenings (and eventually full responsibility for an evening meal each week), it was still a lot to think about/pull off daily cooking of that much food for that many people for all three meals. My freezer cooking made this aspect of my life so much easier.

However, like many freezer cooks you might know, it was quite a production during cooking week. It usually took at least three days to really shop, cook, and freeze meals and side dishes. It was exhausting but so worth it.

Fast forward now when I am at a point in my life in which I only homeschool one child and I work full time hours on writing, editing, teaching (testing my books), blogging, speaking, etc. My schedule isn't flexible enough right now to take off for three or four days to do freezer cooking any more. Yet I still have a houseful of adults (four kids ages fourteen through twenty-two and two parents) to feed!

Enter the freezer cooking method I have been utilizing more and more in the past few years--that of coooking multiple batches of one recipe at one time and using one of them for that day's meal and freezing three, four, or five others for later. It takes very little prep time, small amounts of planning, and I have entrees in the freezer in a flash.

Join me this summer as I share recipes, along with the measurements/scaling needed to do Power Hour freezer cooking for your family--and end up with a freezer full of entrees this fall with only an hour of work once or twice a week. I will share our old favorites, the recipes I began freezer cooking with twenty-three years ago (like the Braised Beef Cube mix in the picture above and Grandma's Meatloaf), as well as newer ones (like beef enchiladas and marinated meats for stir fries). I'll throw in some desserts and side dishes here and there. And without setting aside an entire week or taking a lengthy class, you, too, can become a freezer cook. And you will absolutely love the convenience and ease of having freezer entrees.

Hope you will join us! You might want to subscribe to this feed via email (in addition to FB) to ensure that you don't miss any. Watch for the header Power Hour Freezer Cooking!

Graduation Time: Butterfinger Dessert

It's graduation time around here again! Sixth graduate from Training for Triumph Family Academy in twelve years--with only one to go as of a couple of weeks from now! While graduation is a lot of stress and work, it is also a joyful time as we reminisce, put together photograph slide shows, work on scrapbooks, plan the graduate's favorite foods for his party, and just celebrate the wonderful person that the graduate is!

I am using Pinterest to start collecting and organizing my recipes. We always use a lot of tried and true favorites to start with then add to the menu. This year Josiah wants a Nacho Bar/Taco Salad Bar, and I am all for that because it is easier than making up individual sandwiches, potatoes, side dishes, etc. Get it all ready and put it out for everybody to build their own! I will post my meat recipes for that as it gets closer.

In the meantime, here is one of the desserts we will have there--assuming it tastes as good as it looks. (We are testing it out at our ballroom dance tonight!) It is super easy, and we can make it in little individual plastic cups/bowls to put on the dessert table, which is super fun to create.

I got the recipe from Key Ingredient, and it was low fat and low sugar. I like to serve the real thing when I have parties or take things to events, assuming that the people there want something that looks ooey, gooey, and yummy to taste ooey, gooey, and yummy too! :) So here is my version of it.


12 oz prepared angel food cake, cut into 1" cubes
3 small packages of butterscotch pudding, instant
4 cups milk
1 (16 oz) tub of whipped topping, thawed in fridge
18 fun sized Butterfinger candy bars, chopped (sons like to do this with a mallet in a zip lock bag)



1. Prepare pudding with milk and refrigerate for at least fifteen minutes (longer is fine).

2. Spray 9 x 13 glass baking dish with cooking spray and sprinkle half of the angel food cake cubes over the bottom of the pan. (Note: This is heaping for a 9 x 13 pan--do not plan to cover it. Next time, I might do a jelly roll or a 9 x 13 and an 8 x 8.... or at the very least use a deep foil pan if I don't care about aescetics!)

3. Fold whipped topping into pudding with rubber spatula. (Do not use a mixer or whisk or your whipped topping may become liquid.)

4. Pour half of the whipped topping/pudding mixture over the angel food cake cubes.

5. Sprinkle half of the Butterfinger candy over the pudding mixture.

6. Repeat layers, ending with candy.

Shopping Day: Stir Fried Veggies Side Dish and Fruit Salad

One of our many traditions/housekeeping rituals is that of cleaning out the refrigerator on grocery shopping day (which now with six "adults," ages fourteen to over fifty living here is twice a week!). Everybody starts carrying in groceries, and as they are carried in, I sort them and bark out orders: "The SMALL deep freeze; not the big one. I need to be able to find this on Wednesday!" etc. etc. Also, while they carry (and I sort), I clean out the inside refrigerator and have people bring things in from the garage refrigerator. (Yeah, I am a mean multi-tasker after thirty years of homemaking/parenting/homeschooling/working!)

Anyway, all of this is going in WITH teenage boys talking about their day, our college age daughter going over her schedule with Mom or Dad ("Is it okay if I leave in ten minutes to run, so I can get five miles in before it gets dark?"), the dog pulling things out of the trash can as I put things in, and, of course, a radio drama playing in the kitchen cd player. (Yes, I can work with a lot of noise too, another survival skill developed through the years!)

Usually, one of these shopping days falls on "leftover night," so I start organizing food for that night's meal, "re-loading" (as my kids call it) some of the leftovers so that they look new, and cutting up old fruits and veggies  before we put away the new ones. Someone will be called upon to make a quick fruit salad out of leftover fruits--and somebody will often start chopping leftover veggies to create a quick side dish to go with the main entree leftovers that we usually have.

We have gotten pretty good at throwing together fresh vegetable stir fries fairly quickly. We have variations on this side dish another night--we almost always have a chicken-veggie stir fry or beef veggie stir fry as one of our main entress each week. That night is is more involved and time consuming (cutting up meats, marinating meats, all the chopping and dicing and stir frying required for two huge pans of main dish meat/veggie stir fries). And, unfortunately, I don't have much help on that night!

However, for "shopping day stir fried veggies" as a side dish, it is literally anything available chopped by whomever is available. I'll give you some steps on tonight's version, though it changes according to what's left in the fridge on shopping day, who is home to help prepare veggies, and how many are there to eat it. (Leftover stir fry is not one of my family's favorites!)

Tonight's Version:

1 lb baby carrots
1 small zuchinni
6 oz snow peas
1 large green pepper
1 onion
1 lb brocolli
garlic
Mrs. Dash
oyster sauce
soy sauce
beef or chicken broth*

*Note: I seldom use oil to make a stir fry. If I do, it is just a little olive oil or coconut oil. I usually use broth to "fry" my stir fries

+I am a big pre-cooker. And I precook in the microwave, despite what some say about the microwave. It steams brocolli perfectly, and it is fast. So...

1.  Steam carrots in micro. (I put carrots with a tablespoon or two of broth in glass measure and cover with plastic wrap. Then I steam for three to six minutes, depending on how many carrots I have and how done I want them before I add them to the stir fry pan.)

2. Heat small amount of broth in skillet while chopping onions, garlic, and  peppers.

3. Stir fry aromatics (the three in #2) while you pull out the carrots.

4. Clean and chop brocolli and start steaming it in the micro in the same way as the carrots.

5. Slice zuchinni in thin rounds.

6. Add carrots, zuchinni, pea pods, garlic, Mrs. Dash, soy sauce, oyster sauce, and more broth, as needed and turn fire on medium high. Stir frequently as they cook.

7. When stir fry has just a minute or two left of cooking time, fold in the brocolli. (My guys do not like mushy brocolli, so I fold it in at the end.)

8. Continue to add more broth as needed while cooking.

And it looks like the picture below! :)

Taming the Television Part II of II

“There are games to be played, living room football to be conquered, talks to be had, words of affirmation to be spoken, talking books to be listened to, stories to be read, lessons to be learned, foods to be cooked, lego castles to be built, crafts to be made, tales to be told, songs to be sung, and hearts to be won. Turn off the television and turn on relationships.”

Today I bring you more tips for Taming the Television. I pray that these will help you to make the most of the time you have with your children. You will never regret the hours upon hours you spend discipling, mentoring, nurtering, heart training, and playing with your kids--take it from a mama with a thirty year old! Smile...

7. Replace television with something else—you!

About thirty years ago we went to a parenting seminar in which the speaker told a story of a dad who wanted to get rid of his family’s television. His children balked at the idea. He told them that he was taking away the television but giving them something else. They asked him what this something else was, and he replied, “Me!”

Everyday his children would call him at work, anxiously awaiting his arrival home. “What are we going to do tonight, Daddy?” And each day he gave his children something far more valuable than television: he gave them himself.

Don’t just remove television, certain nights of tv viewing, or tv time without replacing it. There are games to be played, living room football to be conquered, talks to be had, words of affirmation to be spoken, talking books to be listened to, stories to be read, lessons to be learned, foods to be cooked, lego castles to be built, crafts to be made, songs to be sung, and hearts to be won. Turn off the television and turn on relationships.





8. Have the children earn television hours.

This has been suggested to us many times when we speak about time management and time with your children, so it must work well for some folks! I have heard of various ways to earn tv time—same number of hours reading as watching, getting so many minutes per chore, earning minutes by doing things on time (i.e. homework done by six equals 30 mins tv), etc.




9. Watch out for preschoolers' screen time!

This isn’t a method for controlling as much as an admonition. Your preschoolers will grow to dislike simple pleasures very quickly if they watch television and movies all day. We had a “no movie during the day period” rule most of our lives. (The exception to this was one hour of educational dvds, like Reading Rainbow, Doughnut Man, NEST videos, etc. for one hour after naps with one particularly trying child.)

Note: The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends no more than two hours per day of television for two year olds through preschoolers and none at all for children under two. There are so many more educational, meaningful, physical, and fun things for two, three, and four year olds to do besides watching television!

We teach the concept of "setting children's tastes" in our parenting seminar--and it is so real and so true and so impacting that we want to shout it where ever we speak. Just like my two oldest kids despise pop because we "set their tastes" by not ever giving them any when they were little, so we set all of our children's tastes for continual entertainment by bombarding them with it when they are young.



10. Make a “no turning on the television without permission” rule.

 I am amazed when children come into a house and turn on the television. I have seen semi-pornography on commercials for television shows many, many times when we are at someone’s house watching football or in a motel viewing television. I would never consider letting our kids have the remote control to a tv and flipping through the channels. They just see way more than they should see at their ages (or more than I want me or my husband to see!).



11. Be careful not to use television as a babysitter too much.

I know preschoolers and toddlers are demanding. I had six kids twelve and under all at home by myself twelve to fourteen hours a day every day—without television (or even computers!)! However, continually putting little ones in front of the television is simply not healthy for them. Their attention spans will not lengthen like they would if they were listening to talking books, listening to you read aloud, "baking" a play-dough pie, or building with Duplos. Use the television as a babysitter only when it is absolutely needed—and try to find other ways to entertain toddlers as much as possible.




12. Limit daytime viewing for everyone.

 We always told our kids that daytime isfor learning and working—and evenings are for resting, fellowshipping, playing, and family. It is extremely hard to control the number of hours our kids watch television when they watch from seven to eight before school and again from four to six after school—to start with!




13. Pay attention to how much time children spend using all screen media.

In a study recorded in the Official Journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics, the hours of actual screen time logged by children versus the hours that parents estimated were significantly different. In our media-driven age, we should be aware of all of our children’s media/screen time—not just television*. In order to control the amount of time our children sit in front of entertainment screens, we must be realistic and honest about the amount of time they truly are being entertained by any screen.




14. Do not put a television set in a child’s bedroom.

The aforementioned study discovered that children with televisions in their bedrooms watch significantly more television than children without. Furthermore, parents monitored television habits much less when there were many television sets in a household—and especially when the children’s rooms contained televisions.




15.  Turn the television off when it is not being used for purposeful viewing.

 The study previously cited found a negative association between the use of television as “background” and children’s time spent reading. Quite frankly, reading is a simple pleasure that many children do not enjoy—background noise of television is not conducive to enjoying this pasttime that takes a great deal more effort than simply viewing and listening.



16. Pinpoint other nonscreen, in-home activities that your children enjoy.

When discussing the idea of reducing television viewing time in your home, you might have a family meeting and draw up a list of other ideas of things the family can do instead of watching television. A website devoted to helping families reduce their dependence upon television, The Television Turnoff Network (http://www.televisionturnoff.org/), lists one hundred alternatives to “screen time” that parents can suggest to their children.





Family time is worth fighting for. The relationships that can be developed when some of the distractions are removed are incredible. The amazing things that we and our children can do with the time that we are not watching television are worthwhile. Don’t let your children set out to spend nearly fourteen years of their lives watching television!


*Jordan, Amy, PhD; James C. Hersey, PhD; Judith A. McDivitt, PhD; Carrie D. Heitzler, MPH. “Reducing Children's Television-Viewing Time: A Qualitative Study of Parents and Their Children.” Official Journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics. Web. Feb 2010.

Crock Pot Wednesday--Hamburger Stew

On Wednesdays, I like to have something in the crock pot for lunch. We have cottage classes here, teaching over fifty homeschooled students once-a-week classes, such as writing, English, biology, economics, and more. It is tons of fun--but a super busy day, so I put a stew or soup together in the crock pot that my co-teachers (first two sons, Joshua {30} and Jonathan {20}) and Jakie (our only homeschooled student now :(   ) can eat whenever they get a break.

This week's crock pot entree is Hamburger Stew. I originally got this recipe over twenty years ago when I began freezer cooking. It fit the bill perfectly then when hamburger and shredded-off-the-bone chicken were our main meats--and almost always used IN recipes to stretch them further (as opposed to chicken pieces or hamburger patties).

 It can be assembled then frozen before cooking (though the ingredients are all precooked). Then I can get it out of the freezer, defrost it, and either put it in the crock pot or oven. I no longer make it as a freezer entree because I have found that if I have precooked hamburger in the freezer, this stew comes together so quickly that I don't need to even take up freezer space freezing it already assembled. However, if you are new to freezer cooking and looking for some satisfying, one dish entrees to start with (that are simple), this is definitely one to begin with.

Note: It is a tomato-based stew as opposed to many beef stew recipes that are gravy-based. It does have a lot of beefy flavor (not tomato-y like a red sauce or something), but the tomato sauce makes it a completely different stew than our beef stew recipe. Also, I use small vegetables in this (not like the picture that has some chunky veggies). I like smaller veggies with the hamburger but larger, chunkier veggies with stew beef. Just be sure if you use some larger and some smaller that they are fully cooked before assembling; otherwise, the vegetables will get done cooking at different times.

Hamburger Stew

5 to 6 lbs. raw ground turkey or hambuger (16 to 18 cups cooked and drained)

6 cans tomato sauce (15 oz)

3 cans mushroom soup or golden mushroom soup (You may make your own or make a beef gravy for this.)

5 ½ cups beef broth

1 ½ cups milk (or cream or half and half)

6 cups cubed hashbrowns (or 3 cans potatoes)

6 lbs frozen mixed vegetables

6 TBSP minced onions

1/2 to 1 tsp garlic powder (I use a garlic-herb mixture and put more than this calls for)

6 bay leaves

Extra beef base or powdered brown gravy mix, if desired

1. Precook any fresh veggies that you substituted for the frozen (i.e. carrots, green beans, potatoes, etc.)---only if using substitutions.
2. Brown meat and drain.
3. Mix all other ingredients together. (If mixture seems especially tomato-y or thin, I will stir in a little brown gravy mix.)
4. Place heaping amounts of stew in 3 (9 x 13) foil pans (deep ones or two shallow ones; or one gallon freezer bags if planning to cook on the stove top or in the crock pot).
5. Freeze and label:

Hamburger Stew              Serves 10-12+

Thaw. Bake covered at 350’ for 45 – 60 minutes.

6. May also place in freezer bags and label, then place in casserole dishes at baking time (or cook in crock pot).
7. May also simmer on stove top for under an hour on medium, stirring frequently.

+Each recipe (this makes it three times) serves ten to twelve people.