Working mumsnetters, what timesaving things have saved your sanity?

[ToucheEsplat]

Off the back of another thread I had about struggling with having no free time since I went back to work full time. What time-savers have saved your sanity? I'm looking into getting a cleaner so that I don't spend my weekends scrubbing but they're quite expensive where we live.

It’s quite dull but meal planning. So you only shop for what you need and you don’t have to think about what to cook for dinner when you get home, only to discover the meat you need is in the freezer etc.

Doing it is a pain though. I have a list of all the meals we like and then I stare at it for at least 15mins hoping inspiration strikes!

I follow TOMM (the organised mum method) for cleaning/ organising.
Do clothes, lunches, meal prep the night before.
A slow cooker/ instapot, timer on washing machine.

Do you have a partner? Kids?

At home, it's just me and DD12. My tips are:

• clean as you go along
• if something is brought in from room a to room b for a reason, it must be immediately returned to room A when finished with
• bathroom and kitchen get a good clean at the end of each day so less to do at weekend
• laundry done every 3 days whilst I'm making dinner, then DD puts it all on the heated airer
• realising that everything needs ironing
• I know people will say batch cooking but no way am I spending one day cooking and no one can convince they can't taste the different. Have some easy recipes to hand - wraps, salmon n veg, omelette, stir fry, jacket potato. There is nothing wrong with eggs, beans n toast for dinner either.
• anything for school/work is ready the night before

Robot vacuum cleaner

Online grocery shop.

Online food shopping. I stopped doing deliveries this last year due to Covid, but now there's availability again I'm going back to Tesco to get it delivered, it just saves so much time and mental headspace.

Yes sorry I have 4 dcs aged 7 down to 1 and q dh who does his fair share and also takes care of washing/drying laundry but it's never enough 🙈 I am building a good stash of quick meals and that does help.

Will check out TOMM thanks

I agree with meal planning and have a repertoire of meals that you can make in about 20 minutes. Plus have frozen pizza or nuggets and chips in the freezer - something you can just chuck in the oven when you get home and you simply can't face cooking.

Get into a routine with the washing - firstly be ruthless and only wash stuff if it really needs it - not just because it's been worn once. Put a load on every night (use timer) and hang it to dry in the morning. That will mean you keep on top of it.

After dinner/before DC's bedtime make sure the house is clean/tidy. Everyone has to help - even small DC can put toys in a box. That includes washing up/dishes in dishwasher, wipe down kitchen surfaces, all toys away, run hoover round if needed. You can do this in about 20 minutes and it just means you should be able to sit down and not do more housework once DC are in bed (again, be ruthless about this).
More thorough house cleaning we used to do on a Saturday morning. We had 2 methods - either everyone pitches in to get it done asap and then you have the rest of the weekend or (if DC have Saturday morning clubs) one adult takes the clubs run and the other cleans. Alternate.

Routine I'd say is the biggest timesaver. As PP says, it's so easy to spend more time thinking about what needs doing than actually doing it. If you're in the habit of doing the same thing every day, it becomes second nature.

Yes, I do online groceries and it's a bloody godsend!

Have been sorely tempted to get the robot hoover for a while now.

Make sure you have enough school uniform. Wash, dry and iron it all at the weekend then hang it as a full uniform set so its ready to go each morning without having to hunt down a cardigan in the morning. I will have a dress, tshirt, cardi, tights, knickers all on one hanger so DD can just pick it out of the wardrobe and get dressed with no faff.

If you do it all at the weekend then you also get a few days to fix the fact that you've forgotten Friday will be 'wear spotty socks' or ' dress in a colour you don't have any clothes in' day, so you can panic buy, beg, borrow or steal something without having to scrabble around the night before.

I'm trying Fly Lady. 15 mins of cleaning a day apparently.

Other things
Batch cooking
2nd freezer
Food shopping delivered
Time slots for finances, calls, jobs (I do first thing Sat) and week ahead planning (I do first thing Sun) then its done.

I got a robo hoover second hand on ebay. If its great, brilliant. If its not, I didn't spend a lot. Its still in the box...

@HalfShrunkMoreToGo that’s a cracking idea to have all the clothes for one day, even pants, on a hanger. My DC are a bit old for this now but that would have been genius!

Cleaner, tumble dryer, milkman and online food shop.

• Teaching the kids to tidy up, take empty cups and plates to the kitchen, and etc
• laundry basket in each kid’s room
• washing machine with a timer and also a heated drying rack attached to a plug with a timer on it. Washing is done overnight, put it out on the drying rack before school run, the timer auto switches on the drying rack at 8.30 and turns it off at 6pm
• refusing to iron anything, ever (works as long as you empty the washing machine promptly so nothing really creases)
• DECLUTTER. Not having loads of Knick knacks or photos out - bare surfaces are easy to clean
• decent shoe, hat, umbrella and bag storage in the hall, accessible to the kids. Everyone knows where stuff is, and it means even the 2 year old can get himself ready to go out in the morning.
• a second fridge freezer in the garage, so there is ample room for shopping and we don’t run out of stuff
• a Thermos food flask for me, my DD and DH (hot soup or vegetable pasta is easy to send to take to school or work for lunch)
• a really big pile of microfibre cloths in the kitchen and bathroom. Enough so they can pile up in the week, keep them soaking in a small bucket, and then be washed en masse in the washing machine end of week. If you have them to hand upstairs, you can wipe clean the bathroom incl the floors after showers and baths, means you keep on top of bathroom cleanliness really easily. Use different colours for different uses.
• a nice plastic table cloth in the dining room. Ours looks like linen. Means kids can spill food, crayon, etc and i can wipe it clean easily.

Lowering my standards and expectations. Being kinder to myself. Deciding that done was better than perfect.

Instant pot, slow cooker, electric oven we can set to come on and stop cooking too.

Developing routines, having a laundry system. Using the delay start on my washing machine (I don't like running it over night) so that washing finishes when I wake up and I can hang out in morning.

Planning ahead as much as possible and being flexible with my routines.

Having a DH who properly shares physical and mental load.

I’ve given up cleaning, don’t iron, live off fish fingers, oven chips, and chaos

Putting the washing machine on timer so it's done either when we wake up or it's finishing as soon as we get in from work.

Milk delivered so there's no running to the shop if we run out, it's there in the doorstep in the morning.

A cleaner, it's worth every penny.

Meal planning and sticking to it, just buying what we need for those meals this taking away any indecisiveness about what we're eating.

Always use the dishwasher,I load it whilst making my lunch and drinking my cuppa. Then the kitchen is tidy when we get home at half six.

Same as pp my dc have to help otherwise they get a tired and naggy mum at the weekend.
Washing done every second day even if it’s a half load as I don’t tumble dry apart from towels and then don’t have room to dry things.
I don’t bulk cook but have the same menu running over a 2/3 week period. Oddly as a lone parent I have found that decluttering means I have less to clean/tidy and makes it all easier to stay on top of.
I make sure uniforms (5 of everything for 2 dc) and my work clothes are good to go by Sunday lunchtime.
I don’t iron anything at all anymore, life changing.
I have a list of of all additional jobs/diy that need doing for the year / month and do one a month, more if I have the energy.
But most importantly I rest and watch TV loads and think about what I need to do

Always get the "big shop" delivered. Sunday morning but not tooo early!

Ive teenagers and I pay dc1 to do some housework. I know she should just do it for nothing but.... well, she'd be asking for money if she werent earning it.

Robot hoover. We have this one and it copes with two husky-cross type dogs, a long haired cat, plus me and DH: www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B07BFP9TNH/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_glt_fabc_4PKJRY0JWQCKA2VEPF7R?tag=mumsnetforu03-21. It goes off every day on a timer.

Gousto boxes every fortnight to save me having to constantly meal plan and to force DH into cooking a bit more, as he wants to learn but we have HUGE rows because he won't learn from me as apparently I'm a fuss pot 🙄 cook.gousto.co.uk/raf?promo_code=ALLIS33205208&utm_source=androidapp that link gives you 60% off your first box and then 30% off each box in your first month. Rarely had a duff recipe or ingredient problem in over a year.

Using a squeegee in the bathroom every day after we've both showered

We do:

• Online grocery shop every other week
• easy food eg pre grated cheese, frozen chopped onions etc - saves waste and also time
• load of laundry every day, set on timer to wash overnight and be ready to hang up in the morning or the wash dry function eg if towel wash
• meal plan, but also have a couple of set days for things so not constantly searching for inspiration and means we have an ‘easy’ meal to look forward to e.g soup and toastie on a Wednesday night, a ‘mince meal’ on a Thursday like spag Bol / chilli
• Always try to double up whatever’s cooking either for freezer or the next day
• try to do things / jobs as they need them save them building up into a list of jobs e.g batteries need replacing in something, taking things up / downstairs, putting something away
• try (but fail frequently at this) to get all jobs done and dishwasher on before kids bedtime so that can come downstairs and have some downtime - this is my daily challenge !

Don't follow social media types with show-home lifestyles. Don't be too hard on yourself if it takes time to adjust and everything is not perfect. Easier said than done!

Getting everything done the night before. All washing up, all lunches sorted. Coats and shoes where they should be, bags packed. No clean clothes that aren't away, that kind of thing. If you wake up and everything is ready, makes the morning loads better. Then an hour after tea getting ready for the next day.

Bigger jobs, I only work 4 days a week, so I have an online shop delivered on Thursday and then spend Friday cleaning or doing admin, or anything else. Sunday we might need a top up of milk and bread, but the weekends are free for us to do whatever we want.

I WFH now so I use natural breaks to get stuff done.
Chuck a wash on in the morning and put it out when the kettle is on

Whip the hoover over downstairs while my next cuppa in boiling.

Have a food delivery. I use Hello
fresh.

Kids sort their own rooms out

After break i nip upstairs and give the bathroom and quick wipe down