We’ve used cloth napkins for years, but they were always kept away in a drawer in the kitchen and had to be gotten out at each meal.  It just wasn’t convenient.

While visiting another large family, I found a solution that has solved even more meal time problems than I knew I had!

Our friends kept brown washcloths in two decorative planters at either end of their long farmhouse table.  I adapted this by putting extra rust and tan washcloths my mom had given us and we hardly ever used in 2 decorative containers I had been using for pencils. Because my containers were much smaller than their planters, I rolled each washcloth.

The problems this solved:

1.  Something quick to grab for spills.

2.  Washable and reusable napkins.

3.  Napkins that my child with sensory issues will use (she hates paper napkins).

4.  Napkins are always on the table.

5.  They even look pretty!

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Since we’re having a Raising Arrows Christmas, I thought I would share our ornaments with you and some things we do {and plan to do} with the ornaments!

First off, a little tour of the tree…

My first Christmas ornament. Old...very old.

From my Gone With the Wind phase. I used to want to be Scarlett, now I'd much rather be Melanie!

Little Ty's popsicle stick sled. Not quite as old as my ornament...but still VERY old.

An angel made out of salt crystals. Garin's favorite. Hope she lasts the Season!

These were among our first ornaments as a couple. I made them because our tree was rather bare. I took a styrofoam ball, covered it in fabric strips and stuck a wire in the top as a hanger. 15 years of marriage and they still look great!

Each of the children have a bear ornament made by their Mimi from their first Christmas.

A few months after Emily passed away, a friend lost her 12 year old daughter in an accident. Rachael's favorite color was purple, so we put this bow on our tree that year in honor of Rachael. It remains.

This ornament will be Megan's to open when she is 16. Shortly before I became pregnant with her, I experienced our first miscarriage. The letter on the scroll contains my message to her before she was even born.

When Emmy passed away, someone made a contribution in her name to AgapeCare Cradle. This ornament was given to us by AgapeCare Cradle to honor our daughter.

AgapeCare Cradle

When I mentioned in our post on tree decorating that each child gets to put up his or her own ornaments (we all take turns putting Emily’s ornaments up), Grateful for Grace mentioned how their children’s ornaments are already separated out so that each year it’s an easy grab.  I can’t believe that never occurred to me!  Guess what we’ll be doing this year?!

It is our plan that when each child leaves the home, they will take with them their stash of ornaments to start out their family Christmas tree.  These will also include the Family Ornament from their year of birth.

Each year, we buy a Family Ornament.  Sometimes they are a simple dated ornament, sometimes they are from our travels and sometimes they have our name on them.  If each child takes the ornament from the year of their birth, that will still leave us with a good many ornaments (it only seems like I’ve had a baby every single year. )

So, that’s our tradition and plans for all these ornaments.  How about you?  And don’t forget to link up your organizational tips below!  I need them!

{linked to Orgjunkie’s 52 Weeks of Organizing}

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Now, it’s your turn! Your link doesn’t have to be about ornaments! And you don’t even need to have a large family!

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Today, I’m sharing a large family tip of my own involving…

STOCKINGS!

Years ago, we hung our then-small family’s stockings from a brass NOEL sign I had purchased through Home Interiors.  When the load of stockings began to pull down the sign, I decided to move the stockings to the wooden (also Home Interiors) quilt rack/shelf that held our Willow Tree figurines.  However, in our new home, we had no wall space for the shelf and I wondered what I might be able to do with our stockings this year.

That’s when I saw this…

It’s a stocking tree! However, this particular stocking tree is $169 and only holds 6 stockings. NOT going to work.

Well, my bright idea was to hit up my welder-father-in-law and beg one of these custom made.  Great idea, except for the fact that he retired from teaching welding last year and no longer has access to any welding equipment.  But, me putting the bug in his ear about what I was wanting sent him dumpster diving and he brought me back this instead…

 I love it!  It’s just a simple coat rack/hall tree that he found sitting on the side of the road.  He repaired it and we are using it to hang all the stockings.  It’s such a fun conversational piece and there are plenty of hooks to grow on!

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Now, it’s your turn! Your link doesn’t have to be about stockings! And you don’t even need to have a large family!

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Today’s Large Family Organization tip comes from Miranda, Air Force wife (to a deployed hubby) and mama to 4 kiddos, ages 7 and under.  Miranda can be found blogging at His Path ~ My Steps.

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Every morning I get all 5 of us up and ready for school. Pajamas get thrown everywhere! Same thing happens after bath time! Towels, clothes, socks, EVERYWHERE! So we started a random “laundry check.”

I pick a child and tell them to go do a laundry check. He/She goes to every room, including bathrooms, and grabs all the laundry and takes it to the laundry room.

I do this once or twice a day. It’s my 3½ year old’s favorite job. He feels like a big boy helping with laundry. (this also works for toys, books, etc. Anything they pull out)

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Now, it’s your turn! Your link doesn’t have to be about laundry! And you don’t even need to have a large family!

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Today’s Large Family Organization tip comes from Erin, mom of soon-to-be 5 and Stacey, mom of 7.  Erin blogs at Filling Quiver.

The reason I combined both these tips is because they were so similar, I thought they nicely complemented each other.

First, Erin:

I have all boys and one thing that helps streamline our laundry time is to buy all the same brand of socks (same color, same markings etc) but in the respective sizes for the kids.

Sock matching time then is just matching sizes (although sometimes daddy gets a little boy sock in with his mix). It makes it much easier for little hands to help match socks. They can lay one on top of the other and see if they “fit” together. My 2 year old helps match socks and loves that he can be helpful!

and Stacey:

I buy 6 bags of  unisex white socks for all the children to share and I put them in a plastic bin near their shoes near the door.

No time matching they just go from the washer into the bin.

Every six months or so I throw all of the old ones away and buy six more bags that way they always match and there is never an old sox with a new one.

I have 4 pairs of black dress socks the same kind that I put in a box with their church shoes that we get down on Sunday.

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Now, it’s your turn!  Your link doesn’t have to be about socks!  And you don’t even need to have a large family!

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Today’s Large Family Organization tip comes from Sharon, mom of 6.

My tip is for cutting down on the number of cups the children use each day. Instead of giving each child a certain color, they each have a spot for their cup.

The cups are lined up on the edge of one of the kitchen counters, and we’ve written their names in pencil (it does smudge, but cleans up easily with a magic eraser when we want to re-write them).

After meals, they return their cups to their spots. One of my more independent children was doing this on her own at the age of 2.

This really cuts down on the number of cups I have to wash each day, and cuts down on the number of times they climb on the counters to reach the cabinet to get out a clean cup!

Amy here…
Can I get an AMEN!  This is one of those things EVERY large household deals with.  I have a friend who uses different colored electrical tape to mark the glasses and the spot.  Since we rent, I’m not able to do this, but I wonder if there is a way to do something similar.  Suggestions?

Now, it’s your turn!

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Today, I’m speaking at the Replenish Your Soul online marriage conference!
More info here!

Today’s Large Family Organization tip comes from
Christie DeSilva- mom of 4
In the living room, we have a big-ish canvas bin affectionately named

“The Miscellaneous Bin“

We pause a handful of times per day and call a “two minute clean-up.”

Even toddling one year olds can easily help with this. Everyone just moves anything that doesn’t belong in the public rooms quickly into the miscellaneous bin.

No putting it away, jut move it to the bin if it’s in a room where it doesn’t belong.

Then, usually twice per day, but often times just once, it’s Miscellaneous Bin Time. We all work together to re-home the miscellaneous items away appropriately, which only takes a few minutes. Also, as we are walking through the house, we can grab stuff in the wrong spot and just set it in the bin on our way through. Keeps the house ten times tidier!

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Amy here…
I love this idea!  It got me thinking, so I looked on Amazon for some Miscellaneous Bin/Tidy Up Tubs (and I also thought of Thirty-One as a place to get some snazzy bins too!)  Here are a few ideas:

This one is very classy and would go with just about any decor…

This one comes in a myriad of colors and is very reasonably priced…

This one is not reasonably priced at all, but oh so cute!

You could probably even just use a plastic tote from the discount store, but the canvas does look a lot nicer!

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A short time ago, I found an old notebook that I used to make notes from audios I had listened to or from homeschooling and homemaking ideas I had as I read books or listened to conference speakers.  The notebook was old and falling apart, so I pulled out the notes and decided I would start looking through them and see if there was anything worth adding to OneNote or blogging about.

One page caught my eye because at the top was written my oldest daughter’s name with a curriculum we never used scrawled next to it.  As I looked down the rest of the page, I realized it was followed by all sorts of notes to myself…

goals I wanted to accomplish…

five years ago.

It was a fascinating blast from the past as I realized some of these goals have become second nature and some of these goals never happened…yet.

So, today I share with you my goals from the past and commentary on those goals because it is just as good to look back and see where you have been as it is to look forward and see where you are going.

1.  No phone calls in the morning – make calls at rest time. I don’t heed this, but truth be told, as I have aged and had more children and my circle of friends have aged and had more children, the phone calls are fewer and further in between.  We are all simply too busy to sit on the phone all morning long and chat.  The occasional days I do take a phone call in the morning don’t end up being a big deal in the overall scheme of things.

2.  Breakfast:  Winter = hot, Summer = cold – Hmmmm….Breakfast has always been a difficult thing for me.  I did not get this one down and I’m not sure I want to.  I did however recently decide to add Green Smoothies {thanks Erica for making it super simple!} to our list of breakfasts.

3.  Write out a few simple goals for each day the night before. Most of the time I do this, if not the night before, then the day of.  I even wrote a post about making simple goals when I have morning sickness.  In fact, I was thrilled to see Sarah Mae talk about this in her ebook 31 Days to Clean.  It really does help to have something to shoot for and something to cross off throughout your day.  Now if I could just remember to make this same kind of list every time I sit down at the computer…can you say rabbit trail?!

4.  Start trying to cook bigger batches and freeze the leftovers. This one made me laugh since bigger batches 5 years ago would have looked like our normal batches now.  This is a goal I would like to work toward and do occasionally accomplish, but not consistently.

5.  Schedule a little bit of housework every day. Let me take you back…I had just had #4.  Remember, my Crossover Baby?  Prior to his birth, I was doing FLYlady with success, but then I hit the wall and could no longer accomplish a full day of cleaning and one day of laundry and manage to keep the house clean for more than a few minutes at a time.  This goal must have been made shortly after finding out about Large Family Logistics (when it was only a website and not a book).  I didn’t end up adopting Kim’s exact days, but I did take her concept of bite-sized pieces and ran with it.  You can see our Weekly Chore List here.

6.  Be in bed by 11 pm and up by 7 am. This has translated to an hour later on both ends.  And for me, that is actually a very good and doable goal.  And yes, you may all now gasp at how late we get up around here.

7.  Have a routine, but not a highly scheduled one. Way to go, Amy!  You’re learning, girl!  And guess what…you end up writing an entire series on this and making it into a homeschool conference session!

8.  Start school with a book. I do start school with a book…the Bible!

9.  Read outside when possible, learn outside when possible! I do this, but not enough in my opinion.  This time of year is absolutely beautiful for learning outside, so note to self…GO OUTSIDE!

10.  Plastic dishes for breakfast and lunch. I actually did do this for a time, but the reason it didn’t stick is because I really do not like plastic dishes.  I use plastic only for my youngest 2, but everyone else uses regular ole plates.  Now, my reasoning behind this was so that my then 5 year old could help with table chores (a newly instituted event back then).  Instead of using plastic, I now have all the plates, glasses (yes, REAL glasses too) and silverware in a cupboard next to the refrigerator where the younger children can easily access them and help out with my supervision.  Typically, it is the 7 and 10 year olds who set the table and put away dishes from the dishwashwer, but back then I didn’t have anyone over 8, so plastic made sense.

11.  Easy lunch, bigger dinner. Five years ago my husband worked from home.  Although I do not remember the circumstances behind this goal, I imagine I was trying to have big meals all the time and was burned out.  This is a goal I hold to even today.  Our lunches are fairly simple most days and our dinners are typically the largest meal of the day because Daddy is home at that time.  Recently we pulled out of the Feast or Famine cycle (thanks Sherry for opening my eyes to this!) and when I made my last Once a Month Shopping meal list, I made sure we had both Feast Meals and Famine Meals intermixed throughout the month, rather than all the Feasts at the beginning and all the Famines at the end.

12.  Take a short walk each day with the kids before lunch and then come home for lunch. I don’t do this, but it sure does sound like a nice idea!

Well, that was fun!  Thanks for sharing in my blast from the past.

How have your goals changed over the years?  I’d love to hear about it!

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Children love the thought of being awarded the roll of “Babysitter.”  It’s a big title with a lot of weight and meaning behind it.  It means

THEY ARE IN CHARGE.

Or at least that’s what they *think* it means!

More accurately, it means they are trusted by mom and dad enough to be allowed some form of authority in a younger sibling’s life.  They are most definitely not THE authority, but during the time they hold the roll of Babysitter, what they say carries weight and has the power of, “I’ll tell mom and dad,” behind it.

But, they have to be good leaders.  They have to gain the respect of their younger siblings.  And they have to possess the skills it takes to care for younger children.

So, how do you begin teaching these skills?

One of the best ways to teach babysitting skills is through organized play.

Often, we will begin by letting an older-younger babysit a toddler sibling in a confined area.  This could mean in a playpen, a play yard, a swing, a high chair or a bedroom (that is safe from choking hazards).

Why a confined area?

1. The younger child is less likely to escape.

2. The older child is less likely to become distracted.

3. If the older child does become distracted, the younger child is still “safe.”

We also give the older child ideas for what and how to play.  They can feed the baby in a high chair, they can push the toddler in the swing, they can hand toys to the little one in the play pen, they can play cars or blocks in the play yard or bedroom.

This is “organized play.”

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Today’s Large Family Organization tip is from Lisa Mather, mom of 6, from A Day in the Life of Raising 6 Munchkins (you can also find her beautiful handiwork at Six Munchkin Stitching!)

One thing that has helped me is to menu plan.  I will sit down on a Sunday afternoon and plan meals for the next two weeks on a calendar that I’ve printed off of the computer.

I’ll have already placed dates and events that I need to remember to better plan the meals, whether they’ll need to be a quicker meal or a day where I’ll have the availability for a meal that requires more prep.

As I am writing down my meals, I have a shopping list right next to me to write down the ingredients I’ll need that I don’t have already in the house.

If I am unsure of what I have left, my daughter becomes the gofer and will go on the hunt for me.

It has helped tremendously with impulse shopping as well as the, “What should I make for dinner?” dilemma.  It also provided flexibility for those days where you forget to defrost meat and are able to look at the menu and go, “Okay, I can make Monday’s meal today and this meal on Monday.”

Note from Amy: This perfectly compliments what we do with our Once a Month Shopping.  To learn more about it, click here: Once a Month Shopping Series.

Do you have a Large Family Organization tip you’d like to share? Link up and/or send it in to amy at raisingarrows.net

Note: you can link up AND submit the same tip to be featured here on Raising Arrows!

Click here for submission guidelines and button code.

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