at all this domestic stuff? I'll admit that all things domestic do not come naturally to me. Most of the time, I feel like a pretty sad excuse for a housewife. I don't have illusions of a completely mess-free, picture perfect home... but it would be nice to feel comfortable about having visitors stop by on short notice without having to tear through the house to make it presentable. Those of you who feel like you have it all (mostly) together, care to share any of your secrets? How do I juggle nursing the baby & giving him one-on-one time, daily schoolwork for the oldest, playtime with the two older boys, breakfast, lunch and at least having supper started before dh gets home (since he's not home until 6pm)? And of course the housework that really should be done daily lest it get totally overwhelming... the vacuuming, laundry and dishes (thank God for the dishwasher, at least) and general tidying up? Never mind catching a few minutes for myself here and there :roll: I don't feel right asking dh to do much of the keep up cleaning. He's working 6 days a week trying to get our bills caught up so that I don't have to go back to work after my maternity leave is done next March. He doesn't get home until 6pm, then it's time to eat supper. He does 90% of the bedtime routine for the older boys. 2-3 days/week he also drops off & picks up the oldest from some extra-curricular or another in the evening (often times bringing both the other kids so I can have a half hour to myself). He does any of the heavy work I need done, takes care of the yard on his day off, and takes out the garbage when it needs doing. I feel like he does his share around here... but I often feel like I'm not doing a great job of keeping up with mine
We have a joke, if the house isn't tidy, someone will show up, if you want company, don't clean the house or shower right away after getting up-and company will sure come. I don't know how many times someone showed up to visit while there were still crumbs on the place mats from lunch and dishes on the counter. The main rooms of my house that are by my front door are my kitchen and dining room. I make sure those rooms are always tidy because I don't like the awkwardness that I would feel when visitors would come and my house was not tidy. I enjoy keeping my house since we had the carpets removed and installed Pergo. It just seems easier to keep it clean and dusted. You have to do what you are comfortable with. Keeping a house tidy is an endless job. I have found that picking up as we go along and not allowing things to get behind has been best for me. I dry mop every day, sweep the kitchen every day and mop the kitchen every day. We don't wear shoes on the new flooring so cleaning is a breeze.
I have a bit of an advantage over you - I have a 12 year old dd!! She helps a lot. I also don't have a baby. I wasn't always the little homemaker. It took a lot of me changing #1 the way I do things and #2 my attitude about it. I think of this as my job. My husband has a job so he should not have to come home a do mine too. Keeping the house neat and clean, making sure all of our laundry is not only done but put away, educating the kids, meal planning and preparation, running the errands, and feeding everyone is my job. It is also a way to bless my family. I try to remember that what I am doing here is very important to everyone in my house. I also try and remember to do special things like have the house smell good when he gets home either with a candle or some desert cooking in the oven. Ever family has their own schedule too. My husband does not like to eat early so I don't have to have dinner on at 6. Most days I leave here with the kids at 6 to take them to dance. My husband prefers to eat at 8 so that is what we do. My husband also cooks on the weeekends because he likes to grill then. Bottom line is to get a routine. If that means you need to get up earlier to get it all done or whatever. I just love to bless my husband in this way because he blesses me in so many other ways.
I am with Mama Bear on the pergo thing. We ripped out every piece of carpet and now its all pergo or vinyl. Its much easier to keep clean and I feel it actually DOES get clean unlike that dust catcher carpet we had. I was forever steam cleaning that thing and it still looked awful. I was glad to see it go. I do my housework a bit differntly. I have 4 boys although I am only hsing the two younger ones. One graduated already from ps, and one is a Jr in ps next year. Anyway, I do light cleaning during the week to keep it somewhat under control and do heavy cleaning on the weekends (mopping under furniture etc). I give most of the house the once over every weekend. The living room, kitchen, master bath, etc. The kids are responsible for their own rooms and their bathroom but most of my kids are older, I usually have the two oldest ones clean up their bathroom and assign other chores to the younger ones like taking out the trash and stuff like that. I dont know how old your kids are but I will say its much tougher when they are younger. When my boys were little I would clean one room and go to the next only to come back and it look like I never touched it. Not to say that motivating my older teenagers to clean anything is easy. My house is not perfect it gets cluttered, mostly with paper, I have the hardest time keeping the paper monster under control. Usually though it dont take long to straighten it up, maybe 3 hours max on the weekends if I work hard and dont take a break.
Angie, You have written my post. I have really been struggling with these same things. I feel embarassed by my house. I have two little ones and am pregnant right now as well. My husband like yours works a crazy amount and does extra stuff like yard work and such when he does get some time. So he can't help me either. I can't seem to get it all done, or even some of it at times. My dishes pile up, the laundry piles up ( usually the clean stuff I get it washed just not put away) The floor always needs moping, and I won't even mention the kids room or ours. Let alone the "deep" cleaning stuff like wiping off the appliances off or things like that. I feel embarassed to have people come over, so does my husband which really hurts me. I do try but I am just not good at it. Now I can cook like crazy and it is good. But the cleaning kicks my hinney. I wish that I was a good housekeeper and my husband felt comfortable in our home. I have really tried hard this past week to stay caught up. But then I feel like my kids have to pay the price of me not spending time with them. I also get grumpy because I don't get down time. I have two things I am working on. First I am working on downsizing. I am getting rid of a ton of things, and stuff. I figure we can't make a huge mess out of just a little bit of stuff. I have done things like only kept out 4 plates, so we have to wash them before we eat and we don't have a ton stacked up on the counter. 2nd I am working on my attitude, and get up and go. I am not a self starter, I do well as a second manager etc. To be honest I hate being at home all the time, because i am a major people person. I work best under pressure and when I get rewarded by people who acknowledge that I am good at my job(like at my past jobs) I know that to change my situation I have to change my attitude. Granted I have been working on this for a while and my hormones play havoic with my drive and determination. One last thing is that I was telling one of my friends that I had a problem with this ( she has never been to my home) and her home is perfectly clean. Her kids are grown and moved out. She told me that her kids both have told her they wished she would just let the dishes sit for a while and played with them some when they were growing up. So she warned me to not go to far in changing me.
I also have mostly tile floors and they help but it is still a pain, because I have to sweep and mop them so often. One day I was complaining to my dh about how much dirt I sweep up everyday. He was laughing and asking where it all came from. At that exact moment our yellow lab got up and there was a huge outline of her on the floor in dirt. I guess she had been out rolling and then came inside to rest. I try to keep them outside when they are that dirty but the kids just let the dogs (2 of them) inside when ever they ask.
I am not a perfect housekeeper by any means. I do have help on occasion from Dh with some chores but for the most part it is up to me to keep the house clean. The kids occupy most of my time during the day (I have a two year old toddler and an 8 year old son). I do my heavy cleaning in the early morning and evenings when the kids are asleep. My oldest son helps me with tidying his room and with laundry (sorting the clothes and folding them to put up). Both boys pick up their toys after playtime and put them away. I feel it is important to teach the boys good habits of picking up after themselves. There are days I feel overwhelmed and things pile up on me but I take it in stride that I can't do everything and there is no such thing as a supermom. My advice is do what you can alittle each day. Pick one room to work on each day. I try to keep the main rooms that are visible to guests clean (Living/Dining room, kitchen and bathroom).
My 5 room house generally has 2 or 3 rooms that are a complete mess and the rest are barely passable. I've been getting the kids in on the work and that helps but I can't do it by myself. When it gets horrible I'm now resolved to just call for help. Yesterday my sister and a friend of ours came over and in about two hours we gave the bedrooms, kitchen and living room a clean sweep so I'm now sitting in a half-decent house. Tidy and ordered. I had to get past being embarassed and just let them come over. We're now thinking of making this a semi-regular thing - maybe every second weekend we'll visit one of us, clean, have supper and coffee and gossip.
Tiffany, great minds think alike. I think of keeping my house up as my job also. I dh goes to work everyday for 10 hours and I look at housecleaning as my job. When he gets home I like to make sure dinner is made and the house is clean. Of course it isn't always perfect all the time but it is clean and picked up. Don't look in the utility room, that is the IT room!
I am with Tiffany 100 percent. It's my job to do this and I'll try my hardest to do it. Yes, my girls are older and do help, but they been helping since they were old enough to pick up toys. Give everyone small chores and go from there. Start with one room and clean it really good and do all the other rooms when they are all done, just keep them pick it up and it will faster and easier the next time. I know sometimes it don't work. But, you can do what you can do.
I am a Flylady and Magical Holiday Home fan. :love:Those websites keep me on track housework wise. We just did a major summer declutter and plan to do another one before Christmas.
I agree that this is my job and I do the best I can, but with 3 little boys it gets to be a bit much. So.... I also agree with getting help if you can. When I was pregnant with my youngest my aunt started coming over. My husband usually works 2nd shift and most weeks he works 10 hr days. On top of than he has side jobs, so when he gets up in the morning he leaves to work on them and then goes to his regular job. So all the house work and most of the yard work falls on me. My aunt is not married and her only child is away at college so coming here gives her something to do and is a tremendous help to me. She comes twice a week in the evening (unless dh happens to be home). She does help with the housework, usually nothing heavy... just all the little stuff that piles up. Mostly she takes care of the kids so that I can get caught up on everything else. They love it, she has fun and I get a break..... win-win!! She also will watch them so I can go to the grocery store or whatever. She has been an absolute life saver. It's amazing how much an extra set of hands can accomplish in just an hour or two.
I'm in the same boat, and what I've found that helps me is to make a schedule. Just like my ds9 can't hardly function without a schedule, I've found that it makes my life easier if I have a PLAN for housework, too!! Now, I realize thta I'm a strange, A-type personality, but this works for me! My husband has MUCH higher standards for housework than I do, too. If all of the dishes are clean (albeit in the dishwasher), the table and counter (heaven forbid the STOVE) are all wiped off, laundry is clean (and most of it is put away), and most of the toys/etc are picked up out of the living room and kitchen floors - to me, the house is clean. For him, if the sinks aren't cometed and the floors swept and mopped, ALL the dishes and laundry clean AND put away, EVERY flat surface shiney... and who knows what else - then the house is not clean. LOL He's working on his views, and me on mine. Surely there is middle ground! I've found, like Sandra said, that doing a little each day is a big help. But I can't leave it at just "do a little each day." I have to have more structure than that. I do two loads of laundry every day but Sunday and Monday (our "weekend"). Beyond that, I do one "hard" load (regular clothes that need to be folded and put away) and one "easy" load (towels, socks, or dh's uniforms that only take a moment to put away). Ds9 folds, hangs, and puts away his own laundry these days, and also sorts the dirty laundry for me twice a week. I do ONE load of dishes, at the end of the day. Ds9 unloads the dishwasher after lunch each day. Saturdays, I do two loads, because there are usually several large pans that haven't fit with the rest of the loads through the week. I sweep the kitchen almost every day, adding the living room if I'm energetic (once or twice a week). I spot-mop the kitchen twice a week, and dh mops the living room for me weekly. (I have back issues, and mopping is a huge deal for me physically.) Weekly, I take on a "big project" and clean our bedroom, the little boys' bedroom, the bathrooms, or in the garage. (See how that works? With 4 "projects" I can do one weekly, and all of them get done every month!) I discovered something. If I keep these things done, on a dh standard (meaning everything gets put away, not just washed, and sweeping the floors is a big one, and making my weekly projects a priority), *dh will* do some of the deeper cleaning on his second night off. At first this bugged me, because I'm STILL not doing my job to his standard. Right? No... he likes doing it, the weirdo!! But he only gets to do that deep cleaning he likes if I keep the minimum standard. Now, not everyone is that blessed (no, you can't borrow him! Sorry!!), but it sure has motivated me to work enough to get to the point where he CAN help - and do that weird stuff he enjoys. Now, if it happens that he only has one night off any given week, he doesn't do it. Or, if his two nights off are not consecutive nights, he doesn't do it. He's tired! (He works nights....) Often, if I know he won't have two consecutive nights off, I've found that my motivation lacks and I have to "catch up" the next week. Anyway. Ramblings. An oft-discussed topic in my house.
I started homeschooling when I had a newboard and I also worked from home. Here was a typical day: Go up and got the kids taken care of, breakfast baths beds made etc. I would Nurse baby during breakfast time for older one. Get bath while older kid attempted to make her and pick up room etc. Put baby in car seat and took her into bathroom with me. (not into bath LOL) 1 hour to 1.5 hours Let 4yr watch a cartoon while I did house work and got dinner started. Salads made, juice made, take meat out to thaw, Chop onions peeled potatoes etc. Housework was short little jobs like cleaning a bathroom and starting a load of laundry for like 15 minutes then I worked on dinner. Another day it might be dusting a little or vaccuming and another day it might be cleaning the glass on the sliding door, and glass mirrors around th house. NUrse baby 30 mins Homeschooled and played with baby etc. Homeschool time was a back and forth between the both of them. We stayed flexible. I would go and move laundry from one machine to another during HS time. Nurse baby while homeschooling. 1.5-2 hours Lunch then errands or library or park time Nurse baby at park etc. 2-3 hours Back home usually by 3-3:30. Nurse baby . Reading time, more homeschool if needed, work on business work a while perhaps. nap maybe, this was flexible time 5:00 Power hour I would nurse baby and then again With supplemental formula bottle this feeding. Sleeping baby alot of days and a little baby freedom for mom. this is the peddle to the meddle hour. Older child had to play quietly or help, the baby often slept or was quiet/contented if awake. I would spend this hour picking up the living room and other rooms. I would do other short jobs like pay bills, or sweep the front porch, or pull a few weeds in the bed out front. I would put a snack out for hubby. My goal was to get this stuff done by 5:30 then I would let the older dd watch another cartoon and I would take a power nap before Dh came home. He would come in and eat and drink something, then sweep the kitchen and bathroom floors and take out the garbage and look at mail and newspaper before taking his shower. During this time I would get dinner ready. During the day, I would move the baby around from one room to another. I would let her lay on the floor, or in the car seat, hold her, and would nurse her while I taught and use the computer. After we ate we would run out for any shopping we needed etc. THen later at night I would work on computers and stuff. On the weekends, we would take the first 2-3 hours and have power hours. I would take the lawn work and outside stuff and dh would do house work and laundry inside with the kids. It was out goal to take off for lunch and have the rest of the day off. With two people working for 2-3 hours we got thelonger jobs done and they were not so bad because we had done lots of upkeep during the week.
Daylynn, I can relate to your husband redoing the work. My dh is a compulsive sort of guy. His is a neatnik. He comes in and has to do some staightening and housework to unwind from work. When we first were married this bothered me. I was offended that he would refold and straighten the laundry and restack it no matter how I did it. He would also straighten and change the dishes in the cabinets. THen I noticed that the dishes were not always put up the same way by him, and ditto the laundry. He was making sort of like designs in the space available with what ever clothes were there to fill it in drawers or closet shelves etc. Okay, this was an eye opener. I realized then that this was compulsiveness on his part and these things became his job. He put dishes up, folds and puts up laundry for the most part, or I will fold it and he puts it up from the basket. He would sweep no matter what, so that is his job. Ditto vacuuming. I keep the living room area up, but he does the rest of the house, except for that once a month vacuuming where I pull out all furnture from walls and vacuum baseboards and along walls etc, to keep dust and spiders from being a problem. We wash the stove everytime we cook, but once a week he pulls out all of the burners and pans and washes them and lifts up the lid to the stove and washes under there. I think he likes to see the hood of the stove open.:roll: ..........and the Lord knows he can't work on a car.:wink: so this is as close as he gets to getting under the hood. The microwave is a job I am apt to do while the kids are eating lunch. Its only a 5 munite or less job if you do it often. Does yours try keep the coat hangers spaced evenly and have no extra hangers in the closet??
I haven't read all the replies here, but I say you are doing more than your share. You are teaching, raising your kids, feeding your family, and creating a home for them. I'd stop feeling guilty. If your house was messed up while you're on the couch watching Days of Our Lives, that would be different. You're pulling a full time, 24/7 job right here, right now, Mom.
I used to like Flylady, BUT.. you have to be on the computer to get Flylady! I would read about what I should be doing.. instead of doing it!
So, why are we girls like this, feeling like cleaning is our 'job' and that there is a 'standard' we must live up to? Especially if there are tiny ones or several small ones underfoot? It is just not possible to do it all without one- or several- things not being done 100%. And honestly- how many of us choose housework over time with our kids? That housework will still be there when the kids are grown and gone.. but the kids will be grown and gone. And boo to any husband that complains about the house! Let him take the kids to his job and see how much he gets done, lol. I bet not much. Just my 2 cents.
