Why is my house so dirty

Thirded.

Agree! I don't live in London but even just visiting, blow your nose and it's black!!

At least it's not London, I hope?. When I lived there I used to come home, blow my nose and be aghast at the colour of what came out.

Sense the tone, @RampantIvy, sense the tone!

A couple of points that haven't been mentioned are static electricity which attracts dust to surfaces and holds it....eg anything with a plastic type coating, tv screen, and so on. The other thing is that I live on clay soil and I KNOW this makes a difference because I have lived where the soil was not preponderantly clay and the dusting was much less. Are you SURE you have to wash curtains so often though? Even when I had 2 mud monster dogs I only washed curtains maybe twice a year.

Water filter vacuums are popular on the continent but not in the UK; they work wonders at cutting down dust levels. A faff to empty and clean though.

I have two teenagers and two Labradors, and work full time. I have accepted that we are destined to live in a rather dirty house.

I’ve got a Eufy vacuum that does the downstairs daily. I blitz the housework at the weekend or when guests are coming but generally don’t tend to worry too much. I certainly don’t wash my curtains!

Are you in the UK? We moved countries/continents several times and there's a huge variety of dust.

This
It's probably a combination of human skin cells and particles from the log burner
Very very bad for your health

Except for a few asthma sufferers allergic to house dust mites.

Most dust is human skin and a dog always adds a fair amount of dander.

I have fairly light coloured sofas (covers changed to a darker colour in winter) but I always have the dog covers that go over the whole sofa and tuck in as I have a ECS who likes to lean his muzzle on the arm. Dogs confined to one sofa only. And dog beds during the day and night. They are only allowed on the sofa with us in the evening.

I think where you live makes a difference too. We used to live in a town and the dust from outside was black. Life is muddier in the country but there isn’t as much dust somehow. And if there is it’s very light.

Do you open your windows daily Op ? Always best to let the air circulate.

Get hepa air purifiers https://www.verywellhealth.com/do-air-purifiers-help-with-dust-8631179#:~:text=When%20used%20correctly%2C%20air%20purifiers,many%20types%20of%20air%20purifiers.

We have 3 adults, a dog, and carpets, but very little dust. Some houses seem to collect it. Luckily ours doesn't.

But, we did make the choice to have leather sofas when we had kids and dog. We open windows and back door for at least half an hour a day. And I'd never have a fire/burner, having grown up with those dust generating machines. Would suggest a service and replacement door seals. Maybe an air purifier would help with getting those particles out of the air?

Unsure why curtains need washing quite so often? Maybe look into a pulley type track system? Helps reduce touch points.

What is it about the cushions and curtains that makes you clean them?
I'll hoover pet hair off the sofa but washing is a once every few years sort of thing - curtains pretty much never. They never get dirty - I don't understand what you're seeing? (I do plenty of open doors etc to keep things fresh)

Re dust - it's honestly just totally natural / part of life. Some of it comes from carpets, your own activities etc, a lot of it is just airborne so if you have windows open a lot will come in from outside. The solution is just not to worry about it - in historic houses they take care not to over-dust - it damages the surfaces more to dust than to allow it to rest there for a short while. Leaving it a long time it can need a more aggressive clean so balance is key, but basically there is zero need to dust at the sight of... dust. Let it go!

What was that Quentin Crisp quote, ' There's no need to do any housework, after the first four years the dust doesn't get any worse' haha, or something like that 😂

This might be the problem in my bedroom actually, it is carpeted. Thanks for the tip! 👍

No-one ever died of dust.

I couldn't be doing with washing sofa covers every two weeks though. I think a light colour probably isn't too practical with kids and a dog. The dirt is probably still there with my darker coloured ones but I can't see it 😁

The dog will cause extra work. I do an hour a day between 6 and 7, (sad), and every day it is messy. (Dog here too).
Dust everywhere.
I would love a cleaner to do the annoying extras, the basics takes up enough time.
We need to start putting things back into the right place, the children are the worst.
No advice on solving the issue, following for advice.

Do you have carpeted floors? If so, consider getting a carpet shampooer or hiring one, for a deep wet clean-made a big difference to us (we have a dog too!)

I have this problem with my bedroom, it gets so dusty and I don't know why. Dust on the curtains, even', i'm always having to run the vacuum over them, all the surfaces get so dusty all the time. It's not as if I have woolly blankets giving off fluff and dust. Drives me mad. Strangely the rest of the house doesn't seem to get as bad. I always wet dust so not just moving the dust around. I usually leave a window open a bit in there all the time so maybe it's coming in from outside. One of life's mysteries 🤔

Learn to ignore the grot.

Check the log burner though as people have suggested.

Log burners are terrible for indoor air quality, if you’re using that and not getting enough fresh air into the house, it could well be that.

De-humidifiers strip moisture out of the air, you still need allow plenty of oxygen and fresh air into the house to replace the stale, dusty air.

Has there been any building work near you house and when I say near I mean a fairly chunky distance not just next door - even a few streets away.

Demolition of buildings and construction creates masses of dust that travels much further than you'd think and gets in the air and settles on everything.

My old house was extremely dusty. I had to wipe everything down every few days and it was definitely noticeable. We lived in the city, close to a busy road.

Having moved out of the city I no longer get much dust. It's a relief. But of course there are new bug bears now!