This one is for the parents whose children float between two physical spaces…
We begin with ten articles of clothing, let’s call these ‘jeans’ though we could just as easily be referring to pairs of socks, shirts, undergarments, whatever….
Anyway ~ there are ten pairs of jeans. Five pairs at one house, five pairs at the other. As a few weeks roll by, one of the parents (it doesn’t matter which as it seems to work both ways) one of the parents tells the other ‘hey, we’re down to two pairs of jeans at our house’ and a rebalancing of the clothing is conducted.
Now, the child has left one house wearing jeans, and returned to that same house wearing jeans. You’d think this is a one-for-one exchange, yes?
No.
One household suddenly has eight pairs of jeans while the other has two. Still ten, none have been outgrown and donated or ripped or some such. Still ten total, just imbalanced as to their location.
Do you experience this?
This phenomena falls into the same unexplained mysteries camp at the Bermuda Triangle or what happens to that other sock in the dryer…
If you’ve solved this phenomena in your family life, please, share.
I can totally relate. Stumbled on your post searching for how “normal” households approach the clothing issue in a two household situation. We’ve tried all sorts of options to try and minimize how much the ‘back and forth’ effects the kids. There’s very little advice or productive discussion out there on the topic. We have most definitely not solved the phenomena in our home. If we do I’ll be sure to check back and let ya know what worked for us. 🙂
Excellent Shawn! 🙂 Let me know if you find “normal” households, too ~
Thanks for the comment.