Quote Originally Posted by DDH View Post
And to answer your question, yes, ds is old enough. He is 13 and needs to take some responsiblities here to help me. I have enabled him to be lazy too. I am in such bad habits of doing everything for everyone and I need to stop it. Bad habits are hard to break and where do you begin.
With my DS, I started with one thing and made him completely responsible for it. (emptying the dishwasher) I worked with him on it, reminding him, showing him all the *hightly* complex ins-and-outs of putting dishes on shelves and sorting silverware . Once he had a good grasp on it, I stopped reminding him. And I didn't go along behind him fixing things. ("Yo, dude, get over here and put the cups on the shelf, not stacked on top of the plates!")

Gradually I've added more things (learning to load the dishwasher, another highly complex task... sigh, running the dishwasher; folding the clean laundry, running the dryer, running the washing machine, sorting clothes into darks and lights; taking out the garbage. Now we're working on remembering to put a new bag into the garbage can after taking the old bag out. Sheesh, the cogitation it takes to remember that detail is HUGE when you are a teenager!)