Recently, McKenna and her BFF put on a play for us entitled, "The Life of a Princess," which amounted to "a princess is pretty and doesn't have to do anything for herself."
I'm sure Disney is to blame. I mean, have you ever seen an ugly princess? Only the wicked step-sisters have some facial disfigurements. And Cinderella...she was completely wronged by having to cook and clean. You never saw her do any of that after she married the prince.
So, of course it couldn't be that she's our youngest. Or that she's too darn cute that she gets away with everything. Or that she has the sweetest temperament and anyone would do anything for her. I'm sure it's not that fact that her older brother carried her...on his back...through all of Rome. And anywhere else she doesn't want to walk. To. This. Day.
And I could probably be on board with the whole princess thing if we didn't have one little problem (because did I mention she's nearly perfectly adorable?)...this princess has a princess room...lots of pink...lots of toys....lots of pretty dresses and shoes. What the princess doesn't have, is a maid. She has completely taken to heart her views that a princess has everything done for her, and we can't get her to clean her room.
I read a post today that described various methods of getting an end-goal with her daughter. I've tried them. I have offered rewards. I have withheld playtime. I have tried, "You can't come out til it's done." Eventually she does have to go to school. Or, "Do one section at a time." I think it just shifts from area to the next. I have gone in and helped and directed. I have offered siblings to help. They end up frustrated and leave. What finally takes a week or more to do, is undone in one afternoon.
The thing is, I'm an organized person. She has bins, and shelves, and baskets. Everything in her room has a place. She is content that the new place is on the floor. I've considered taking away toys, putting them in a tote until she asks for them back. But we tried that with the oldest. Didn't work.
I know some that ignore it...treating their kids' rooms as "their" space. And I try to keep the complaining about it to a minimum. But, day after day, it's getting old. And this morning, when she couldn't find her shoes, which were in the midst of her dress-up clothes, I hit my limit. Any suggestions for getting a princess-in-training to at least pick up her room?
Tuesday, April 26, 2011
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3 comments:
My mom would go in and do a clean sweep and put everything that was on the floor or under the bed or not put away in a garbage bag. We had to work to earn our stuff back. It sucked, but it pushed us to put things away. I guess the basic idea was "Well, if it's on the floor, you obviously don't care about it so I guess it must be trash." If we didn't earn it back within a certain amount of time, it was donated to charity (unless it was an important and/or very sentimental object)
Needless to say, there was a certain sibling of mine who ended up donating a lot of things to charity. I won't name names....
I agree with Ashley, we did the same thing about a year ago and while it worked, we haven't been consistent. As a matter of fact I just sent the last toy bag (We initailly pulled out over 8 garbage bags of toys and clothes) they never earned back to the Airmen's Attic. They never asked for the stuff again and didn't miss it, so away it went.
BTW, that BFF of hers is probably NOT a good influence. :-) She really does think she is a princess and her older sister is her Cinderella before the ball. Oh, and the boys are her mice!
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