Work and Chores

Work and chores are an important part of family life.   It takes a lot of work to run a household, keep the house and clothes clean, provide meals, and care for the yard and garden.  When children are young, they love to help Mom and Dad, so that's the best time to start teaching them how to work and take responsibility.   We have had different variations of chore charts throughout the years, and our kids have always been responsible for making their own beds, cleaning their own rooms, clearing their own dishes from the table, and doing other chores around the house each week.   Young children also love helping in the garden, and we've always tried to give each child their own little garden plot to be responsible for planting and weeding.  Each child has had a turn mowing lawns, doing laundry, dusting and vacuuming, taking out the trash, cooking dinner, moping floors, and cleaning bathrooms.   Some assigned chores were just expected, and others could earn the kids a bit of extra money

.With six kids, our home has never been a showcase or a model of pristine cleanliness, but I believe that each one can do a fairly decent job of running a household on their own.   The kids also helped with stripping wallpaper, putting up sheet rock, painting, and other jobs when we bought and remodeled our own home, and have earned money helping with the cleaning and filing and paperwork of the family business.

 

DS1 was the first of the children to get a job outside of the family, and spent several years folding and delivering newspapers weekday afternoons and weekend mornings.  Rain, sleet, heat, and snow did not keep him from his rounds.  DS2 soon followed in his footsteps, and for a few years we had two paper routes in the family. 

 Mom and sisters helped out when the boys were at scout camps, and the girls also had their share of babysitting jobs.   As they grew older there were part time jobs at scout camps, the library and at call centers.   During college years they found more jobs at libraries, tutoring, as teacher's aids and lab assistants,  custodial work, serving banquets, cashiering at gift shops, snack shops, and even the local planetarium.

What chores have you or your children done during the years?

What were your first paying jobs?