Martha, the Grouchy Fairy...

First and foremost- I am not taking ANY credit for this idea...I'm merely passing on a possibly useful tool. In this month's Parents magazine there was an article entitled, "The Pickup Fairy" by Rebecca Barry. I couldn't find a link to the article online so I'm just going to sum it up here.

Getting Kaden to pick up his toys is like pulling teeth. He is always demanding "help" in the form of me doing it all by myself. So following the articles advice, I explained that I had just found out about the cleanup fairy who lives in the forrest (he is immediately interested because he just learned all about the forrest in Yellowstone). Her name is Martha and she is grouchy. She comes at night time with her ginormous bag and takes all the toys you leave out when you go to bed. Kaden begins adding to the story himself- asking all sorts of details like "Is she like a bird? Is she afraid of the sun? Does she see into our house with binoculars?" It must have made an impression because last night he cleaned up every toy in the family room and his room with no fuss!

There is the minor detail that yes, I am telling a little fib. I do feel slightly guilty since it's not exactly a nice fib like other holiday characters who visit our house. The article's author felt the same way and when she checked with an early childhood education specialist who said not to worry about the ficitional fairy because "This is the stage of development when kids are really into dramatic play," so it makes for a fun and interesting reason to clean up. Kaden is just getting REALLY into pretend play & really enjoys making up silly stories and scenarios (i.e. "have you ever seen a green haired boy?!"), so this was just the thing for him.

More posts about our yellowstone vacation coming soon...