All dressed up in their Sunday Best!
you stress out when there are dishes in the sink.
This one defiantly does not apply to me--sometimes I wish it did--at least some of the time.
I can go to bed with dishes in the sink. It does not bother my husband either, so that makes life livable for us. Don't get me wrong--we are not slobs, at least we don't think of ourselves that way. But we do not need everything in our house to be put away, right away.
I do like a neat house, and I get in the mood every couple of weeks, we both pitch in and get the house all ship shape. I do have 'company' standards. If we are having people over I get in the mood, of a sudden to have a neat house.
Our house is lived in and comfortable--not a showcase. I marvel at those couples and families that can pull off living in a very neat house all the time. I really wish I had less tolerance for mess. It would make those biweekly cleaning fits a lot easier--or even unnecessary. I admit, that would be nice, but for us I guess, it is just not worth the stress.
[Tolerance--don't you love that word? It has so many applications in our lives--that will have to be a future blog topic.]
I have had to 'forgive' myself for being this way--tolerant of mess, that is. What I mean by this, is that I would like to be more neat and organized, so I used to 'beat myself up' over it when I was younger. Luckily I live with a wonderful man that does not want or need to live in a 'castle', we agree on the amount of clutter that is acceptable. When a bill gets lost--we change our ways, straighten up more often and life is good. That has not happened in a long time--so I guess that is progress.
The message I want to pass on to my readers is this: Give yourself a break once in a while--leave the dishes in the sink for the morning if you are dead tired--they will definitely be there in the morning--unless your spouse decides to do them for you--that would be a win, win, situation, is what I say.
Montessori:
What should I say about mess tolerance in the Montessori environment? Well, we are taught to keep thing neat, organized, dust free, updated, beautiful, interesting, to have eye appeal...I could go on and on. All of that is really important and my classroom is always more organized and at least as clean as my own home. That is what the children and parents deserve.
But, we can make ourselves, and consequently, the children, crazy with this. I am not advocating dusty shelves, mixed up shelves, and general disorder. I am saying that we need to give ourselves and the children a break.
The children come to us with a wonderful sense of order (at least most of them) and we do need to foster that natural sense of order or they will loose it and have to learn it like most of us had to do. It is wonderful to complement that natural desire to put things in order. I marvel at the child that makes a bee line to the pink tower and straightens the tiny top cube for no other reason than to make it "look right'.
But, I do not agree with the teacher that tries to put order and avoiding messes over fun, and the child feeling 'at home' in the environment. As with everything, we need to strike a livable and nurturing balance in the classroom, and in life.
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