Swinging Monkeys

Folding laundry is a fun time in my family.  Weird, huh? I always hear people complain about laundry, but I guess I don't have enough kids yet or big enough kids yet that it is overwhelming for me. Or maybe I just don't wash things enough!  I do one load a day 3 or 4 times a week.  (Not counting those small quick loads where someone has leaked onto their clothes and they need to go right into the wash). Doing it this way, putting a load in just becomes part of my morning routine and it never gets overwhelming. 

In the late afternoon, in that time period before I need to start getting dinner ready and when the kids are starting to get tired, we all go upstairs with a basket of clean laundry to Mom & Dad's bedroom.  I dump the clothes on the bed, and the kids all climb onto the bed with all the clothes. (Note: I rarely buy clothing that needs to be ironed.) They run around on and jump off the bed while we do the little rhyme of "Five little monkeys swinging in a tree, teasing Mr. Crocodile".  I pretend to be Mr. Crocodile and "snap" them off the bed in a hug.  It's so much fun, that it makes folding laundry (which comes after the rhyme, while they're jumping off the bed onto the pillows on the floor) so much more bearable.  They even ask if they can go to Swinging Monkeys. Granted, they're not folding all the laundry for me, but they see me doing it, and the older ones will try to find their clothes in the pile and even attempt folding them all by themselves.  I keep hoping also that this is one of those things that if I don't make it seem like a horrible chore to do, they'll be more willing to help with it or do it themselves as they get older.  More of the "spoonful of sugar" helping the medicine go down, I guess!