OCD at Work

All of my children have been messy slobs free spirited children who couldn't be bothered to clean up the messes creations they have made upon the path of life.  The consequence of this, of course, is that their rooms and the rest of the house are often in a state of chaos.  But then there came Ryan, little Ryan with his OCD tendencies.  After 5 children, I finally got a child with organizational skills.

I'm not complaining about Ryan's OCD traits.  If anything, I'm fascinated.  It's like looking into the mind of a savant.  Ryan doesn't like his food to touch on his plate and will direct where his food should be place.  Ryan needs extra time to get into his car seat in the car.  He likes to buckle himself, but there's an order and a process to it.  If there should happen to be any extra distractions, like his stuffed dog or his backpack, he thinks they need to be buckled too.  But lately, he's begun packing his own lunch.  Other mothers might be offended that their 3 year old taking over this job, because the way I pack it isn't the way he wants it.  But I just say go for it.

He usually packs it on the kitchen counter but this morning he decided to do it on the kitchen floor.  That's okay, I mopped it last week.

 

Notice how neatly he has everything placed.  His napkin is laying behind all his food and he's placed his cheese slice in the pocket on the lid.  His clear plastic spoon is laying against the side of the container.

This morning I only gave him half a sandwich so I put it in a plastic bag.  He knew this wasn't right and found his sandwich container. No problem, we'll just put the bag in the container.

Notice how carefully he pats his food to make sure it's in the correct position.

 

Proud of his work.

 

Then he found box of dehydrated apple chips and wanted those too.

 

The lunch box opens up and he found its correct placement.

 

All in a mornings work.  Now if I can just harness those organizational skills to tackle my house.  Just think what this house could look like.