To not understand how people have an evening.

Good god, this sounds like hell.

Kids are 6 and 8 and you need to tiptoe out of their room? 20 mins of ‘stories’?? Screaming blue murder?

If this isn’t an advert for getting babies into a routine early on and expecting them to get themselves to sleep I don’t know what is.

And why the hell are you cooking two dinners?? Just eat together, your kids surely don’t require different meals?

I honestly despair of how some people engineer their lives to be as miserable as possible.

Just seen that quoted message above - yes, you’re eating too late. And possibly pottering too much with these tasks - you need to work efficiently to preserve your evening and some proper down time

You are massively inefficient OP. I cook, load the dishwasher and wash up, all takes less than an hour. A load of laundry takes 5 mins to put in. Unloading the dishwasher in the morning whilst making a brew takes 5 mins. I sweep and mop the kitchen daily and this takes 10 mins. My house is a big 6 bed and there are 8 of us. I have loads of time in the evening🤷‍♂️

What time are you eating? I find that if dinner is too late it all goes to shit - ideally the dinner should be cleared away / dishwasher running before bedtime stuff kicks in.

Honestly, make the change now - my kids are teenagers and then you really don’t get an evening to yourself any more. You’re in my good old days, evening-wise!

Hoovering, wiping the floor and clearing out the fire takes 1.5 hours??

And why did your DH have to stop off to get another ingredient? Just improvise!

Emptying the dishwasher takes 3 minutes - just do it in the morning so stuff can go straight in it as you cook.

You’re answering your own question OP, you’re making your life so much harder than it needs to be.

I’m a single parent to 3 DC and am more efficient than this.

I’m with you OP. Husband and I met through a triathlon club so one of us trains each night, the other does the kids. Get home from afterschool club at 6, my husband 30 mins later. Feed our children (6 and 8) then start bedtime at 7:15. I cannot get bedtime down to less than 90 mins. Bath - 20 mins, stories 20-30 mins then it takes them ages to go to sleep and they’ll scream blue murder if we leave the room before they’re asleep.

Tiptoe out at 8:30 on a good day, 9 on a bad day then start cooking our dinner. Bed by 10 having washed up and poss a few admin jobs. Kids wake up every night at least once (we’ve NEVER had both sleep through) and wake up in the morning and do it all again.

We’re permanently exhausted. It’s not a very satisfying way to live. We earn very well but at taxed to the hilt. Life might seem better if I could afford to buy new shoes but yet I’m still shopping on vinted.

So today as an example kids left at 8:15 for school. While they were getting ready to leave I ran a sink of hot water, washed some plastic tubs from last night and shoved a pan, jug and oven tray in to soak. Once they had left I dried the plastic tubs, washed pans and put on side, entirely emptied dishwasher onto a clean section of counter drying as I went, then put everything away in one go, then picked up remaining dirty dishes from a pudding last night and breakfast and shoved those in and finally dried and put away the pans. By doing one thing completely at a time it was a lot quicker than if I got out, dried and put away each item individually. It’s taken me about 15 mins to do that and read this post/type a response. Often just making sure you do things one at a time speeds things up a lot.

I’d focus on a room a day for cleaning, rather than doing whole house hoovering and cleans. And get this app for your phone ‘The Organised Mum Method’. The method is little
and often and she talks you through a clean so you’re very focussed. I suspect you’re not being efficient if it’s taking you so long to do everything. So Monday it’s lounge, Tuesday bedrooms etc. Each clean takes half an hour. You also do 15 mins a day of general upkeep (something laundry related, quick bathroom clean (maybe just clean a loo and sink), straighten the beds and hoover main traffic areas). There are guided cleans on there for after meal clean of kitchen etc. The longest of those is 20 mins which indicates you’re spending too long on clearing up after dinner.

The way I’d do it in your circumstances is to communicate clearly when everyone will arrive home at the end of the day. First person home prioritises getting the meal ready so you can sit down and eat as soon as the last person gets home. If there’s other time going spare whilst dinner is simmering away, get lunches prepped for tomorrow and do other little ‘fill in’ jobs like emptying the dishwashwer (ours is full size and takes maximum five mins to unload) or putting a load of washing on etc. You can also use that time to tidy a room and run the hoover over the floor. Five mins tidy and five mins hoover max!! Sit down together to eat and chat. Make main meal the ‘together’ bit but if the kids are faffing and having pudding, one of you can supervise them and the other load the dishwasher and put things into soak. Get kids to clear their plates and put things straight into the dishwasher you emptied earlier rather than stacking on the side. One supervise baths and bed if needed whilst the other finishes the kitchen and completes any housework jobs (20 mins). Then both sit down when kids are in bed.

My advice would be to get into good habits early on with the new baby - you will thank yourself for it.

And you do know that homework is for the child, not you?!

It’s quite easy.

Dinner at 6, clear up and so packed lunches straight after (kids should be helping), then relax.

I feel you OP.

On my office days I don't get home until 6.45/7. So that's a quick heat up of a batch cooked meal and then I do DD's bedtime (7.30ish) while DH cleans up (swap each day).

Those days are actually easier in terms of cleaning as there are no peelings etc to clean, it's simply putting the dishwasher on, cleaning the table/surfaces, sweeping and mopping (if needed), tidy any remaining toys (try to get DD to do this before bed.).

I do try to tidy as I cook and get stuff in the dishwasher but it depends on what I'm cooking - we cook from scratch so not much food I can just chuck in the oven and wait for.

Washing is the one thing I'm always behind on - I utilise the weekends and wfh days to catch up on that. I usually try to do at least one load in the machine a day though, even if it doesn't get put away for a day or two! I do only work part time too, I imagine 5 days in the office would be pretty challenging.

Having said that, we can usually sit down at 8.30/9ish together to watch an episode of something. We tend to watch something togther a few times a week while other nights we do our respective hobbies - reading, games etc.

We've just had another baby so no idea how we will fit in another bedtime - I'm hoping by that point DD will be able to be read to and then fall asleep by herself. We also don't have to squeeze in homework yet which I'm dreading.

I think we do more at the weekends. Almost all laundry for example is done at the weekend. I hate having the dryers up in the week.
we finish the post dinner clear up by 9. Ds goes up. DH and I watch something for one hour then I go up and read and DH games a bit.
we don’t make packed lunches. Ds gets school lunches. DH takes the bits and prepares at work and I wfh.

If you're on Instagram, and probably other platforms, there are loads of accounts that specialize in bagging up ingredients in advance for slow cooker meals. Find one and the algorithm will keep you fed for months 😂

Everything goes in the dishwasher here. Survival of the fittest.

I think all the jobs tou described like taking down decorations etc are a week end job.
if you couldnt do it at the week end then it waits for the following one.
i dont sleep in at the week end in actually i m
up between 8 and 9 instead of 6.30, then have a list of chores to do. I dont blitz them but they are all done by sunday dinner time. During the week, only the kitchen will be done everyday.

for me you re doing too much during the week.

Yeah, there's no point saying "I hear you OP! DH and I get home at 6.30..."

Your problem is how long you take to do things. Unload the dishwasher while you’re cooking. Then it’s empty to be loaded as you get finished with things as you’re cooking, it’ll take maybe 5 minutes after eating to put the last bits in.

We don’t buy anything that’s not dishwasher safe, and if we do, it does in anyway accepting that a shorter/less perfect life for the item is better than wasting our precious time washing up. But even when we do wash up, there’s no way on earth we could drag it out for an HOUR.

I suspect your lack of free time is because you are inefficient with the time you do have (eg both parents waiting with the kids while they eat slowly, taking so long to wash up). You could easily claw back an hour of the day with some time efficiencies.

I never get evenings as the kids are always doing extra curriculars. I’m normally facilitating baths and packed lunches between 8-9pm and then I’m
in bed myself at 9.30-10pm. I just consider it family life. My mother never sat down and watched Tv when we were kids.

you got in at 4pm but don’t serve dinner to slow eater until after 7. That’s bonkers.

you need to deprioritise. A tray ale could have gone in a 5 and been ready at 6. That buys you a whole hour, or even earlier.

I wouldn’t hoover at such a critical time and therefore delay everything else.

This is crazy and there must be some Olympic-level faffing going on.

Loading and unloading the dishwasher, washing by hand things which can't go in the dishwasher and putting a load of laundry on should be taking 30 minutes tops, not 90.

@AleaEim she’s a dervish, doesn’t stop.

Maybe OP will change her routine then.
Some people don't have dishwashers or slow cookers or dryers (or avoid using them).

We don’t batch cook, but we do make what we call grab bags at the weekend.

On the day we shop, we prep (reusable) freezer bags with all of the ingredients for meals.

So we have all of the ingredients for chicken casserole chopped and ready in one bag, all of the ingredients for a veg curry in another, for beef stew in another, paella (minus rice) in another etc.

We try and buy well with dates so none of the bags have to be frozen (I’d always forget to take out of freezer!).

By doing this, you will save time prepping dinner each day, you will have less washing up daily( as no chopping etc) and the dinner can go one can go on much earlier meaning your slow eater isn’t encroaching on bed time and creating earlier clearing up time after dinner.

And as you aren’t prepping a meal each day, you can use that time before dinner to make lunches. (Although I’m not clear why the lunches take so long; we have five to make and I do them in fifteen minutes. My husband takes twice as long but he makes one up and then moves on to the next - so rather than chopping enough cucumber/pepper/tomatoes for five, he cuts up enough for just one every time. Finishes that lunch prep then moves onto the next. Drives me potty! Also, if I know the next evening is busy with clubs, I chop enough veg for the next night’s lunch prep too and just tupperware it until the next evening.)

All of the above should give you some time back in the evenings. (Also, do note despite getting uniforms and bags ready each night and doing the above with food, I’m not super organised so please don’t think I Ive got it sussed, I haven’t! I just realised that I had more time at the weekends than in the evenings/mornings.)

I feel this on work days I finish at 6pm. Come home and walk the dog, thats an hour. Make and eat tea, clean up kitchen, prep lunches for next day, bit of tidying around, have a shower and then its bedtime. No time to watch tv usually but then I do like to be in bed for 10pm as up at 6am. I would like to fit in the gym but other than getting up at 5am to fit it in then I dont think I could ever fit it into my evening! When written down it doesnt sound a lot but it takes longer than you think, and I am not a slow person!

Bloody hell. Why are you sending work emails so late?? Would somebody have died? You already had a late day due to work.

Fuck working at 10pm at night!!!