Cleaning House

Cleaning House

A Mom's 12-Month Experiment to Rid Her Home of Youth Entitlement

Kay Wills Wyma

Entitlement seems to be engrained in children these days. The author was astounded to realize that her children fit squarely in this category. Her strategy to combat this was to come up with challenges that would show her children what life was really about, while teaching them the lessons they needed to know to go out as well rounded adults. Each month she presented a different skill.

I loved the concept. I purchased it because I occasionally see glimpses of entitlement in my own children. The book started out strong. The author writes with humor and it was entertaining to hear how she began her journey. I liked several of the experiments she tried with her children. But after about experiment 2-3 I, kind of, lost interest. The author seemed to loose steam with not only her experiments, but also writing about it. It began to fill up with her ideas about life and thoughts on other subjects. I took away several great ideas that I will tweak and implement with my own children. I was also a little amazed that she didn't get her husband completely on board before starting something so major. That seemed to put a sour note on the whole thing. It also lessened the enjoyment for me to read about their fighting. I appreciate the honesty that she brought to the story, but would have enjoyed it more if she had stopped to include her husband in the whole thing from the very beginning. 

My overall impression was that it was a fun and entertaining book to read. It was a story of one person's journey. Not everything would apply to everyone, but it has some great take away thoughts that make it worth the purchase in my opinion.