Motivation for Cleaning

After being asked several times what was the motivation for cleaning, I thought I’d put it down in writing to clarify it for myself. I would love to say I am a super godly mom who knows exactly how to motivate my super godly children to serve cheerfully. To be honest, there is often manipulation, threats, bribes and fussing. We rarely do things just right and even then it's tainted with our sinful natures. I can’t think of any moment when I was the super godly mom, but there have been break-throughs among the girls of being the cheerful servants a mom would want.
First of all, you have to remember that I do have three teenage daughters and the two younger girls get a lot of slack when it comes to housework – too much. In our cleaning this summer we have had big breaks of fun so that it isn’t all cleaning. We are trying the idea of a week of cleaning and a week of fun. On the weeks of cleaning, I have the girls work all morning as hard as I can get them to move. Then in the afternoons they can slack off, but I am still working on housework. They are often volunteering to help a little more. The older the daughter the more responsibility she seems to feel to help. On the weeks of fun we do our normal chores and have friends over, go swimming, play a lot of games, sleep late, go to the library, whatever “fun” we can afford. It is much easier to motivate the girls when they know there is prize at the end.
Children need to learn the value of work, but I think every once in a while it's okay to reward them for their work. Thankfully, my husband gets his reward for his work at the end of every month which he gladly shares with all of us.