When my kids were little and I was teaching full time and running extra-curricular theater shows, I used a concept I called "pick 10." The idea was, as I tried to teach my kids to clean up, that I could pick up 10 dinosaurs, 10 Legos, or 10 of-what-ever-they-had-been-playing-with BEFORE they could. The challenge helped them learn to pick up.

As they grew up and life became more complicated, I used the idea on myself. I played "pick 10" when my house got more messy than I could handle. I could easily pick up 10 things that were out of place and put them away before I went to work, or ran to pick up one of the kids from where ever they were, or before I went to bed.

Now, when picking up is more than I can focus on, I still play "pick 10."