My new housekeeper is about 40 inches tall, weighs 37 pounds, and requires a certain amount of supervision. Yes, that's right, my 3.5 year old Katelynn has been cleaning up a storm with me lately!I loved to clean as a child. My mom gave me a dime to clean the tub, and she had to place limits on how often I was allowed to perform this task! Yes, I am a nerd. However, KK has a very different personality from me and I did not expect her to take to the cleaning; it has been a fun little surprise and very welcome in late pregnancy, when getting up after bending to the ground feels about like being an Olympic dead-lifter.
It started a couple of weeks ago with mopping the floors. I usually let KK have her own mop, but in the past she has abandoned it quickly after getting frustrated with her inability to control it well. However, I guess she has developed enough now that she can now handle it much better and I was in shock when she was still helping me - very enthusiastically I might add - after 30 minutes! Yesterday we gave toilet scrubbing a try and that is her new obsession. She thought she was pretty hot stuff.
Today made for a bit of long afternoon since it is too darn hot (i.e. 105 degrees) to go out and do much these days. KK was clearly bored and I asked her what we should do. Her response: "Let's CLEAN mommy!" Ahhhh, now that's a girl after her mommy's heart!
Be sure to warn her about not mixing bleach products with ammonia products. A girl can never learn that lesson too early!
ReplyDeleteIf you guys ever get really bored, you can come clean my house. I do not share your enjoyment of cleaning, and Izzy is scared of the vacuum cleaner, so we need all the help we can get. ;-)
ReplyDeleteKatie, have you seen the For Small Hands Catalog. It is a Montessori materials site and has all child sized (but not toy or plastic) cleaning products. Just something to consider for your little "housekeeper." You could gets brooms and mops just like yours but sized down for her.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.forsmallhands.com/store/index.php?main_page=index&cPath=72&zenid=85c6c8840260252e29ea371fb9a1b10a