PUGHS WORK HARD!

" Pugh's Work Hard" is our family motto.  We recite it every week at family home evening.  My kids love that motto. It's probably their favorite thing about Monday night...getting to shout out how much they love to work hard...NOT.  They're kids.  They probably wish that our family motto was "Pughs play"...or "Pughs relax alot"..or "Pughs do whatever they want."  But it's not.  Chad and I were talking the other day about what are the top 3 things we would like to instill in our kids...something I should post about all on it's own...but as we talked about our top 3 it was apparent that all of them required work. We have job charts, dinner chores, and we say "work before play" about 100's a week but a lot of reminding...some may call it nagging... is required every once in a while.  By every once in a while I mean like every 5-10 minutes. To be honest even I am not always great about doing that as the eternal piles of laundry on the floor of the laundry room would suggest. But progress not perfection right?

Anyway- I was super happy to see my little Pughs work so hard and so happily on fall clean up day a few weeks ago.  I was braced for a lot of moaning, groaning, and disappearing children when our "Annual Fall Clean-up Day" came along.  By the way- I've been trying to make work sound less like work by trying to make it sound like an epic family tradition... hence the name, "Annual Fall Clean-up Day" I know it sounds super lame but I think it actually worked.

All 5 kids worked hard and happily for at least 2 hours (Marian had to peel out a little early for online school stuff but she was there and used her magic big sister powers to get the younger kids excited to help out.)

A couple facts about yard work:

#1- getting in the garbage cans is a fun thing 

#2 Jumping off and out of garbage cans is also...fun for kids

The actual raking and dumping into the cans was less fun but everyone was such great helpers and had such great attitudes that it honestly went by so fast.  Good tunes and a promise of Jamba Juice when we were done didn't hurt either.  

Turns out Pugh's do work hard...and at least for this year's "Annual Fall Clean-up Day" we had a lot of fun too!

 

Storytime

 Reading to my kids is probably one of my very favorite things about being a mom.  I started reading to my kids the day we brought Jack home from the hospital.  GOODNIGHT MOON by Margaret Wise Brown.  I have by no means read to my kids every day but I'd say it's been a pretty regular occurrence over the years.  

I haven't read chapter books to my kids in a few years (we usually do picture books...which I love) but I listened to a podcast a few months ago that inspired me to pick it up again and for our first read-aloud in a while I chose Nanny Piggins by R. A. Spratt.  I was laughing out loud by page two and didn't really stop laughing till we finished yesterday morning.  Lucy, Grant, and Grace loved it and listened to the whole book.  Marian and Jack even lingered in the family room a few times while we were reading.  They of course pretended NOT to be listening but I'm no dummy.  Even they thought it was pretty funny.

I pretty much fell in love with Nanny Piggins when, after the kids first met her and told her she should probably make them wash up or clean their rooms...she responded, "Well, you can do that if you like.  But I'm going to go to the kitchen and go through the cupboards looking for things that contain sugar.  Then eat as much as I can until I feel sick.  You can join me if you like."

She's my kind of woman/pig!  Basically the anti-Mary Poppins but twice as fun.  

Our next pick is "Jeremy Thatcher Dragon Hatcher" by Bruce Corville.  I loved this as a kid and can't wait to see what my kids think of it!