Clean-Up

Earlier this evening, just before bath time, Elias climbed on my lap and asked me to read him a story. I told him that we would read lots of stories after he took a bath. (That is part of our normal bedtime routine). He got off my lap, and ran out of the room. I thought he was going to run into the bathroom because he often does that when he hears the word “bath.” However, I then started to hear some interesting sounds coming from the other room so I got up to investigate. What did I find? My son was putting away his toys. No prompting from Mommy or Daddy. No clean-up song. He just knew that clean-up is what happens before bath, and started himself. He even was sorting the toys into the correct bins! Talk about clean-up/parenting win! I’m proud of my little guy. After clean-up he got his bath and his stories. Routines really do work.