to think dp could do more round the house?

[familyfun]

dp tells me he does loads to help with kids, far more than most working dads so im not sure if he is right.
dp works 7-3 mon to fri but chooses to stay till 5 cos they are busy and he gets flexitime for it. im a sahm with dd1 4 and dd2 11 months.
i do breakfast, lunch, dinner, washing up, clothes washing/drying/ironing, clean bathroom, clean kitchen, play with dd2 and do various playgroups, dusting/hoovering, weeding the garden,
dp gets in and eats dinner which we have already finished, then he plays with kids 6-6.30 while i wash up etc, then i bath kids and he gets dd2 into pjs ready for me to bf and then reads dd1 stories and puts her to bed.
therefore he says he has no time on an evening. but once kids are in bed, i do ironing a couple of nights a week, internet shopping, school lunch every night, he sits on sofa.
sat and sunday he plays wit h kids and sits on sofa, i do meals, washing etc.
i have asked him to tidy the spare room which is piled high with his junk, he hant touched it. i have asked him to mow the lawn, he has done it once since august and is covered in leaves. i have to sort his piles of mail he leaves lying on the dining tabel and phone table and feel like he makes me more mess. he also comes homes for lunch, which involves me making his lunch, he eats it while i make him a cuppa, then he goes back to work, leaving me the washing up so no real help.
aibu as a sahm?

wow it takes me an hour and a half tops to clean the house properly

another 5 minutes to load a machine with washing a couple of times a week
another 5 minutes to load dishwasher/empty it
an hour to iron once a week
an hour a day to prepare food

not sure what everyone else is doing with their time if they are doing chores for 14 hours a day, seven days a week

ColdToast Work should be shared out fairly - but that doesn't mean if you're both at home you do 50% - one partner could be taking leisure time whilst the other is out working. Equal leisure / non essential task time is what's important.

im not doing 14 hours housework but i take care of dds all day so its not leisre time as such

dp isnt bothered by mess, so he opens his post and piles it up on the phone table, including junk mail and important stuff all in a pile along with receipts etc, till it is falling over its so high, i ask him to move it but he says he will and then doesnt, till in the end i get fed up of looking at it, it is the first thing people see when they walk in too, so i sort it chuck out junk and separate it into bills/filing and after a while i move it into the spare room on the desk that is piled high, he leaves it there as he doesnt mind the mess.
but why should 1 adult get to fill the spare room full of their crap cos they are too lazy to sort it. there is a whole wardrobe full of clothesin there, all dps, that he never sorts, he has clothes in our room so dont know why he has another wardrobe, only reason is he never throws it out, the desk is overflowing, there are several sports bags on the floor, i literally cant reach the window in there, i cant dust in there.

Just chuck everything into the spare room and close the door. What is the spare room supposed to be for? Why don't you tell him you're going to chuck out the contents if you need the space for something else?

But why are you cleaning in there if it's full of his crap? Just leave it

5 mins day loading washer, 15 mins a day pegging out washing, 15 mins a day getting in dry washing, 5 mins a day putting away clothes, 10 mins a day wiping kitchen down, 10 mins a day wiping bathroom down, 60 mins a day preparing food, 20 mins a day washing up (4 times), 2hrs a week ironing, 1 hr a week cleaning kitchen/bathroom, 1 hr a week weeding/tidying garden/sweeping outside, 1 hr a week dusting/hoovering, half hour internet shop, 40 mins a day school runs, i dont remember the last time i cleaned the windows inside

spare room was meant to be a desk for us to sit at and do work at when we wanted, dp recently did his tax form on dining table as he couldnt find space in spare room, so he left his tax stuff all over the living room for a week.
it is also where i put all xmas presents as i buy them, except there isnt room now, it will be for 1of kids when they are older.

My DH was a bit like yours, OP. Leaving mess everywhere and thinking that the Housework Fairy did all of the household chores. To be honest, mine wasn't even doing his share of childcare, and was just sitting at the PC, watching TV or going out on dog walks when he wasn't working. I sorted it by striking over the household duties and doing the bare minimum of things necessary for the kids and I, and also having a "24 hour rule", ie anything left laying around for 24 hours would get binned, whether that was important paperwork, shoes or newspapers. I applied the 24 hour rule to the kids too and they have been a lot tidier since. You have to follow it through though if you have this rule.

Give him a deadline, say a couple of weeks, after which you will clear out the spare room and recycle/bin EVERYTHING in there. If something vital gets chucked then tough. It'll be an object lesson for him.

Make it clear to him that this will be a regular occurrence

"i get fed up of looking at it, it is the first thing people see when they walk in too, so i sort it chuck out junk and separate it into bills/filing"

There's no incentive for anyone to change if they know that, by ignoring the problem long enough, 'Door Mat Fairy' will come along and do it. Find your Nag Mode love.... and use it.

I'm still wondering what would happen if you asked him to do the dishes in the evening.

It's one thing not minding mess but surely he must agree that dishes need to be washed?

And I agree it would be a bit petty not to wash his clothes, but surely he can do his own ironing.

Stop making his lunch. Why should you? Stop ironing. I don't iron anything unless it's needed, eg a dress for going out. I hang my clothes to dry carefully so they aren't wrinkled. I knew someone who irons towels. That's stupid & a waste of time. You could get those 2 hours of your life back.

if i didnt sort the papers from the phone table they would still be there now, same as the carrier bags full of crap he emptied from his car when he sold it and chucked under the stairs, they were there over a year till i caved and sorted it.
if i asked him to was up he would as yes washing up has to be done. if i ask him to tidy up he doesnt or he sorts his cds that dont need sorting as they are behind glass.
i am now internet shopping and washing up is in sink, we will see

Okay sorry if I'm being thick but are you just leaving the dishes in the sink and hoping he'll wash them? Why don't you ask him to wash them, if he'll do so if asked?

I mean, I know you shouldn't have to ask, but better to ask than do them yourself. Better yet, have a proper talk with him and explain that it would be great if he could just do the dishes every evening, since you do all the other cooking and cleaning. That's totally fair.

I'm just starting to wonder if there's a communication issue here. It sounds like you are dropping hints or issuing vague orders like 'tidy up' or asking for big jobs like 'clean out the spare room', when really what would probably be really helpful is if he would do certain concrete tasks on a daily basis (like dishes or ironing).

He does sound supremely annoying with leaving clutter everywhere and I think the 24 hour rule is totally fair.

he did the dishes yeah
i cant tidy the spare room as it all his stuff and i dont know what he needs, like financial stuff and family photos in there.
he never does anything till its overdue, the box room was a tip till we had dd1 then he tidies it and made it a lovley nursery, except he moved all the junk into the spare room.
wish now id the kids were having a room each so he had to tidy spare room, except then he would move all the junk into our room in boxes to sort and never sort it. he has too much stuff.

I feel for you but I think you are allowing him far too much slack.

I have learned the hard way, that although I hate nagging OH, if I don't ask he simply doesn't care about the mess or whatever. It just doesn't seem to register - even if he has to step over it several times a day! He will however, do most things without complaint if I ask.

I now just have to get him to start realising that just because he is not at work, it doesn't mean he has leisure time. We have lots of jobs that need doing that would take about half an hour each, but he puts them of time and again. Annoying.

These are the jobs that nagging doesn't solve!