A Quarter for your shoes

Grace takes after her father. leaving a string of clothes and left over items in their path so we know exactly where they have been. if this was a game of Clue, it would definitley be the winner. As the famous game goes..."Grace Bond in the living room with the red crayon." But unfortunately, this isn't just a game...this is my less than perfect home!!! That I will admit, i love having perfect and have pretty much given up that idea with 2 children under the age of 4. Really, i keep the downstairs pretty clean and stash all the mess upstairs! anyways, back to my point. oh yes, Grace takes after her father...of course. every time we walk in the door, it's off with the shoes and upstairs to put on jammies. I began to grow weary of my efforts of continuing to pick up after 4 people in this family....myself included. there's just not enough time in the day. and let's face it..people will not be all too impressed with the words "she was a clean freak" at my memorial service.  Instead why don't we teach the 3 yr old to clean up after herself! wow novel idea. I guess i just haven't been doing it b/c i figured she was a little too young to be cleaning already (unless it's a diaper wipe out of Savannahs box..then she loves to clean the tables) and I figured isn't this a form of child labor or something? But then hmmmm what if i started small? so i began with "a quarter for your shoes." I told Grace everytime she puts her shoes away without me asking, she'll get a quarter. It seems to be working..ive had to remind her more than not and i've even been met with "no i don't really want a quarter today" response. (wasn't expecting that one). But all in all, we are making progress. I even went upstairs one morning to check on her b/c she'd been up there for quite some time. I walked into her room and she was going back and forth from one side of her bed to the other. What are you doing? i asked....she responded "i'm making my bed!" with a big 'ol grin on her face.  Wow! I was impressed. I'd like to say my little plan is working....