When my children were younger, we lived just around the corner from my husband's brother's house. We would often go over there just so that they could play with their cousins and we could have an adult conversation.
My sister-in-law kept a big popcorn bucket full of toys for the children to play with in the living room. As usual, my kids had thrown every toy in the bucket all over the room and then threw the bucket somewhere.
I had gotten the bucket, but I really didn't want to pick all those toys up with the kids standing there because it would really be pointless! Then I had an idea.
With the other adults sitting around the table in the kitchen, I called out, "Who wants to play 'I spy'?"
All my kids yelled, "Me!"
"Okay." I began, "I spy something red."
Each child rushed to grab something red. Fortunately, they all grabbed a toy.
"Yay!" I clapped. "Everyone wins this round! Put it in the bucket." I pointed to the bucket and they rushed over to drop their treasure in the bucket.
With each new color called out, 3 more toys were picked up and thrown in the bucket with another "Everyone wins!"
At the end, I said, "Okay, pick up the last things and bring them here."
As the children gathered up the last of the debris, my son got this look on his face and yelled, "Hey! This is cleaning!"
