Dollar Dash

A few of my friends do what they call the "dinner dash". After dinner, their families set a timer for 10 minutes. In that time they need to clean up all the dinner dishes, put food away, sweep the floor, etc. If they get everything done in 10 minutes they get to put a dollar in a jar and are saving for whatever is their goal.

I've taken this idea and instead of doing the "dinner dash", we do a "dollar dash". I find that at night, when our house is a complete disaster, I have no more patience and get mad at the girls for not picking up. And lets be honest, there's yelling and there's crying (the girls and occasionally when hormones get the best of me, I cry too). There's lots of whining and complaining and toys are left out. It gets VERY frustrating night after night. I've hated how we end up saying good-night - mom is mad and the girls unhappy. UGH.

Now comes the dollar dash, before pjs and story time I set the timer for 10-15 minutes (depending on how messy the house is) and we get to cleaning up. There is no yelling, the girls are running back and forth between rooms putting things away. We've ended the day on a good note- there is happiness and peace! We've done it 3 days now and it's been working well. So far we have $3 towards going to see Monsters vs Aliens!