Joy!!! Take 2!

I have been talking about things that bring me joy lately. It is nice to talk about them because there are so many things that are not bringing me joy and sexy has been very good at reminding me that there are things to be happy about in my life. Yesterday I was talking about doing some cleaning around my apartment. I hate to clean but I also hate messes. When my ex moved out last year he left me with a huge mess. Over the past year I have improved my apartment significantly but there is still a lot of work to be done. Now that my living room, bedroom and bathroom or mostly cleaned and organized it is time to move on to other areas. There is the kitchen....wow, i have a lot of organizing to do there. Then the front room...time to get rid of the rats and haul all that junk out to the dumpster. And then of course Jr's room. Sexy and I were having a conversation about motivating Jr. the other day and she really had some great ideas. I'll get to those in a minute but 1 idea she shared with me a while back is to spend so many minutes a day cleaning and then the task doesn't seem so overwelming. So, Jr and I talked and I told him we were going to spend 30 minutes every night cleaning his room until it was all clean and organized. This is how yesterday after schoool went. Jr. came home and I let him play for 30 minutes. Then he did his homework. (sexy's idea) We then walked to the store and came home and cooked dinner. We ate at the table and talked about his day and what he did at school. We then put the food away and did the dishes. Then it was time to clean his room. I was expecting opposition but I didn't get it. I set my timer for 30 minutes and gave him specific tasks to do and it worked. He was amazed at how much we got done in 30 minutes. The whole evening worked well. He did not grumble about his homework or doing any work. Then after his room we relaxed by watching a movie and then it was bed time. I was so pleased with his good attitude and results. I really hope this continues to work.