How tidy is your house?

[StrawberryShortie]

Just that really!

Is your house always tidy (guest ready) or do you have a mad panic to get it all done before guests arrive?

I feel like all I ever do is tidy and mine is never guest ready

Usually clean. Until my partner makes it messy.

Usually quite messy.
I do my best, but a combination of young children and fibromyalgia generally keeps things untidy.
Mostly I scurryfunge.

Currently very tidy. My teens argue about whose fault the mess is when I get in from work.

Got home tonight and it was just as I left it this morning .... one teen is away!

Guest ready? Our guests take us as they find us.

Downstairs is (generally) guest ready/acceptable
Upstairs is always a hell hole

Every room clean and tidy.

But

I am semi retired and my kids are grown up!

When they were little my house looked like a toy and crap tsunami had hit it

So don't be despondent- there is light at the end of that untidy tunnel!

My house is a fucking shithole after the holidays. I'm back at work now so it is likely to remain a shithole for some time

Not really sure what 'guest ready' means. Our house is as it is and people take us as they find us. I would not expect to be tidying up just because someone was visiting.

I live in a permanent renovation site. DH starts something, starts something else, oh look a third project... and sometime after the fifth gives back to the second, forgetting number one. He’s admittedly an anti social bastard, so I swear this is his technique as I’m too embarrassed to invite anyone over. My BBQ came with a 5 year warranty... the warranty expired and it’s still in the box. Last year he promised I could have a party for my big birthday... All the floors were up, and two walls were missing.

He’s just about to rip down the ceilings in the bedrooms

Thanks @ellapaella I will do the same!

Monday, Tuesday, Very tidy and clean. Wednesday a bit messier, Thursday, Friday a pit and Saturday a quick tidy and Sunday a deep clean.

Awful. Just awful. I want to cry every morning as it gets me down so much. Some days (most days) I do cry about it.

A combination of things meant it was barely touched for a year or so then I had a bit of a disaster and now it's too much. I can't afford Lino or anything for the kitchen and it makes me want to gag.

I can't have anyone over. I don't want my kid's friends to see it. I've stopped socialising in case my friends suggest popping over.

It's left me near suicidal on some days. It's too much for me.

Messy. I leave it tidy and it messes itself up... or itcould be the children. Plus dh is a bit of a hoarder. No hope for me. It really stresses me out because people see it as the woman's failing. All my neighbours have gorgeous houses but all are retired and have cleaners and some have gardeners.

I throw fab parties though and can glam it up for that. We just have too many hobbies/interests/too much crap

I spread one of the aforementioned piles of tat over the spare bed the other day (spare bedroom also my office) with the intention of sorting through it all/filing/scanning paperwork etc. Cleaner has sorted it all into neat piles

I love crafting, hate housework and have absolutely no willpower!! 😂

@UterusUterusGhali if it makes you feel so awful wouldn’t it be easier to do something about it? Is physical health stopping you? I know Lino costs money but cleaning and tidying doesn’t.

Can you tackle one room at a time? Get onto free cycle and see if anyone has any off-cuts of flooring? Furniture if you need it?

@serbska well fuck me, why didn't I think of that! 😂

I'm a single mum with a chronic disease that leaves me utterly exhausted. I sleep on my days off so I can go to work. I have no help. I have severe depression, which makes it all feel more overwhelming.

I'd love to pay a cleaner to blitz the place, but I'm a single mum working for the NHS. I can barely afford food. I can't afford to drive to the local retail park let alone buy paint.

I do try. I really do. But it's just fire-fighting.

I genuinely don't get the 'guest-ready' thing. In fact, I think this is the only time I've ever seen this expression. Fair enough if you are someone who genuinely cannot relax in an environment you perceive as untidy though this seems to be heavily gendered learned behaviour, given the frequency of comments on DHs who apparently cannot 'see' mess, so presumably another way of dealing with it would be figuring out why exactly you can't relax in mess but surely you don't spend time on the monumentally dull and unrewarding gruntwork of domestic chores in case an unexpected visitor arrives?

What are they going to do, run a white-gloved finger over the tops of your doors and hold your glasses up to the light and tut? Are you surrounded by incredibly house-proud, judgemental people who make a habit of calling at awkward times to catch out your inner slattern?

Panic. It's not so bad now that we have an utter angel of a cleaner, so at least it's not grimy - but DH is very untidy and DD is 3, so even if I was uber-good at keeping things tidy (which I am not, though I am much better than either of the other residents of the house) I would be fighting a losing battle.

My best tip (which I cannot remember where I read and has saved me countless times) is: Baskets! Keep or put a basket in each room, and when you need it tidy, chuck everything in the basket and tuck it somewhere unobtrusive.

Clearly, you will eventually run out of room in the basket and need to empty it AKA tidy properly, but it will buy you time and make the room look presentable in a jiffy.

@InezGraves given that several people on the thread have said they don’t have friends round because they hate the state of their house, I would say ‘guest ready’ means ‘a state you are not ashamed of’.

Humans are hard wired to feel more relaxed in calm, clutter-free environments. Men and women, however if ‘not seeing mess’ means your partner clears it up that’s a win-win for lazy people isn’t it...!

I get that serbska, but in some cases on this thread it sounds as though the shame is a depressive symptom, and the physical exhaustion that goes with bad depression or illness is responsible for what the poster clearly genuinely considers a shameful mess.

But perceptions of 'acceptable/unacceptable mess are subjective,anyway. Remember that thread a couple of months back where a poster posted a photo of her ordinarily lived-in-looking living room and asked whether it was unacceptably untidy, and got everything from 'it's fine' to 'that's disgusting, I'd be disgraced if I were you and I feel sorry for your children'?

I mean, when you go to someone else's house, are you mentally inspecting the skirting-boards?

I mean, when you go to someone else's house, are you mentally inspecting the skirting-boards?

Nope!

But my house has a cat living in it anyway which loads of people would consider grim.

Untidy, but we have two very large teenagers.

And we’ve got too much stuff.

Always tidy. I don’t like mess or clutter

Always messy. Rarely have people round because I have to do a mad tidy.

Kids have a lot to answer for though, constantly leave Lego bits, cars, toast crumbs etc everywhere. Drives me bonkers.