To want a clean house and a baby?

[princesspineapple]

I'm almost 38 weeks pregnant with my first baby... And a bit houseproud. Is it possible to keep your house nice when you have a baby?
Our house was always a bombsite when I was growing up... My DM is one of these "love me, love my mess" types... And I've always hated that attitude.
I've spent the first week of my maternity leave nesting, and my house is sparkling (and a bit bleachy )... My friend came over yesterday and was laughing about how it will look like a Chinese laundry / graveyard for brightly coloured plastic crap within a fortnight, and I'll forget what flash wipes are even for.
My MIL and colleagues have a similar view and I even got a little "please excuse the mess, my children are making memories" sign when I left work. I hate it!
AIBU to think it's lazy? Or AIB a dreamer? Or what tips do people have for keeping a clean house and a baby?

Being adaptable is the greatest parenting resource. You might have a very easy baby, a tidy house and a Pinterest page that makes tired mothers with colicky balls of rage want to tear their eyeballs out but you might not. It's a rare child that gives you an easy ride the whole way in any case. I have three dc's. If I could only go back in time and tell my newly pregnant 27 yo self, it would be to stop trying to plan what it will look like when I have a baby and just trust that I will do the best that I can with what I had at the time ( a colicky ball of rage, as it happens).

I remember asking DMum how she coped with 2 babies quite close together, when we were drowning in a sea of mess with just one.

She had no dishwasher, terry nappies with a twin tub washing machine, no dryer etc.

She pointed out that they didn't have much 'stuff' to get messy, had enough clothes for us but not wardrobesful, and she kept our toy box, which all of our toys went in and I'd forgotten how tiny it was - a sturdy cardboard box with the alphabet painted round the side, and it was a cube of about 3'. All of our toys and games went into this box, so there wasn't heaps of plastic tat strewn across the house. No BLW, and no food/drink outside kitchen or away from dining table.

It was a bit too late for us, although we did cut down on the tat/clothes quite a bit which definitely made the house seem more 'under control', but your 'messmaker' hasn't arrived yet, so you can control the amount of stuff that comes into the house right from the start.

I absolutely hate those 'making memories' things, it's one of the few phrases that really gets my goat. You don't make memories, you can't force them (fondly remembers DS favourite memory of expensive day at theme park being the lemonade and packet of crisps in the pub garden on the way home!).

"As you tidy they untidy everything you have just tidied or if that is not possible they go to another part of the roman untidy that. If they are a little older and you are tidying a room whilst they are in another 'watching' tv you will find that the room is descimated . You go and tidy that room and the whole cycle beings again"

That...

Someone without children once said they'd done their housework for the week (in an afternoon) and couldn't understand why I found that a completely alien concept, that it stayed clean and tidy long enough that you didn't really have to do it again for a whole week.

In my experience, it was fairly easy to keep the house clean and tidy with a baby (though a clingy, hardly-ever-sleeps baby would make things more difficult) but it gets a lot trickier as they get older, particularly if both parents work. Bigbuttons' description above is my life at the moment.

I would be very selective, however, with the cleaning materials you use. Don't want more chemical nasties around a baby than absolutely necessary...

I think it completely depends on the child and the house.

With my first, I lived in a compact, fairly minimalist house that was ridiculously easy to keep clean. I was also extremely lucky to have a very chilled out baby. My midwife and health visitor used to comment every single time at how on-top of everything I was. I wasn't really, I was just lucky and my cleaning routine was minimal because there really wasn't all that much to do.

Ds2 was another matter. We'd moved by then to a house that was (and still is) much harder to keep clean. First house was a new-build, with open plan space downstairs. This is a period property that has small rooms, seemingly endless swathes of dust and lots of dust traps etc. On top of that ds2 did nothing but scream for the first few weeks (until we took him to a cranial osteopath - he's been ultra laid back ever since though). I managed to keep things ticking over, but it was never as clean or tidy as our first house. What helped was clever storage that meant once the dcs were in bed, everything could quickly be tidied up out of sight.

There's also a huge difference between clean and messy. Yes, the house looks messy when the dcs are playing with toys, but as soon as they are put away at the end of the day it looks fine. Just because there are toys out doesn't mean the place isn't clean.

My childhood was the opposite of yours. We weren't allowed anything downstairs at all. Everything had to be perfectly clean and tidy all of the time and as a result I made a conscious decision to make sure my children never felt like they couldn't relax and enjoy being in the our home. They do make a mess, regularly, but it's no big thing and easy enough to tidy so not worth stressing about.

Tabula, that's what my folks did, a big weekly clean. Tgey had a spotless house with two toddlers. I wish it had rubbed off on me.; I'm quite good but on a small flat my work papers tend to follow me around and the flats too small to have a dedicated spot for working.

As others have said, it very much depends on the baby. To maintain your current high cleanliness standards, you would need a very easy baby. I started off ok, then the sleep regression kicked in. Now I physically can't be arsed cleaning. As long as the kitchen is clean and living room clutter free, I can deal with unbleached bathrooms and dusty bedrooms.

Please don't set your expectations too high or you could be very disappointed at a vulnerable time.

I think that maternity leave is for looking after your baby, and you can't tell beforehand exactly what that means for you. If you're lucky and you care enough, you might also be able to do other stuff, but don't count of it, and don't be tempted to judge yourself or anyone else on the basis of domestic work. Parenthood is hard enough without that.

Having said that, I never knew what a flash wipe was before I had kids, and now stock them at strategic points throughout the house. So that item at least might be a stayer! Flexibility is key. Good luck.

Will depend on the baby and your style of parenting (I am pretty indulgent. Hate crying. Have very ltitle structure to the day) and how much help you get. You might have little choice in being a lazy box set mum if you get a boob fiend. Tbh the real filth doesn't start until they're toddling.

Different people have different standards and will prioritise housework accordingly. Sounds like your experience has made it more of a priority to you. Fair enough.

But having a baby may change this. Don't worry if something prevents it for a while. eg cuddly baby, reflux baby, your own health, tiredness. It's not women being lazy...it's women juggling lots of jobs and doing what is necessary first. Women often feel guilty other things like the hoovering have to move down the list; that's why you're colleagues gave you that sign. Because we all feel the guilt, even if our standards aren't striving for bleachy perfection.

It's worth bearing in mind that a little bit of bacteria is a good thing too - a completely sterile environment will prevent the natural collection of bacteria a baby needs to mature their immune system. Yes it needs to be clean to prevent infection and sickness, but not totally sterile.

Not only does it depend on the child, it depends how old they are. When they're tiny they often sleep for hours in the day and it's easy to keep things tidy. Mine's now coming up to five months and is going through a 'will not be left' phase. He will not nap unless he's on me/ next to me do that's cut several hours a day out of my unencumbered time and the house is much messier.

Yanbu to want to keep things tidy - I'm much happier when the house looks nice, but yabu to think it's lazy. I get that you're afraid of turning into your mum it the reality for many of us is that with a baby you only have a very short amount of free time a day. How you use that free time is going to be up to the individual. Some may want to collapse in front of the tv, others may want to clean.

I try to keep a basic level of order (bathrooms clean, kitchen clean, laundry done daily) but a bit of clutter is a lower priority for me than half an hour with a book or some sewing, or a bath. As a poster above says, there's a huge difference between a clean house with a bit of tidying up needed and a dirty house.

DS is 8 weeks old, and we're just getting on top of cleaning / tidying again. You may call me lazy if you wish op - I'd be happy to wake you every time the lad does, keep you awake until he's done feeding, and scream at you throughout the day regularly every time you try to do anything beyond feeding, changing, or amusing him. Of course, you'll also need to let me move your sacrum out of alignment to make walking uncomfortable and also kick you really hard in the crotch with toe caps on then stitch it up... Oh and you'll need to punch yourself in the boobs regularly too. Then see how much of a priority hoovering is.

Maybe wait and see how you get on yourself before you judge anyone... And be prepared to cut yourself a bit of slack too. I wish you an easy birth and an easy baby.

I'm shit at housework, and I don't notice mess. I'm not lazy, I have other priorities. If you prioritise housework, you demote something else, doesn't have to be the baby. Babies are all-consuming, though.

I'm shit at housework, and I don't notice mess. I'm not lazy, I have other priorities.

I know, I know. When I was working I worked extremely hard. I actually find it hard to have boundaries when I am working, all hours etc. I worked hard in school and uni and got excellent results. But my house is a bit of a mess - not because I am lazy, but because I really, really, really hate housework. OP, I think you are really harsh on your Mum.

[and you remind me of my dh. His attitude towards me is like yours towards your Mum, but it is very hard to live with].

And having said that, I am off to fold mountains of washing. You just wait! (Or don't have 3 kids).

It helps not to buy too many toys or pieces of baby equipment. You don't need most of it, TBH, and then there is less to keep on top of.

enjoy your nesting I remember it well

Whilst most things in your future are unknowable, we can be reasonably certain that some mothers will judge other mothers through gossip about their homes. it is never too soon to resolve not to join in. just admit cheerfully that you enjoy housework. In that way you don't get trapped in either camp :)

I was a neat freak but have learnt with dc2 to let my standards drop until the weekend. I could clean but it would mean either letting baby cry or buggering my back up with the sling on trying to do things in unergonomic ways. So I compromise by doing a good clean and tidy at the weekend when dh is there to help, and just washing up/cooking/laundry in the week. Toys go away at night, beds get made but no more. There is a lot more laundry with a newborn in the house. Dd is 4 weeks. Last time I would stare at bits of fluff on floor and it would stress me out, this time I avert my eyes because cuddling and letting baby sleep on me is more important.

Yeah I sometimes despair of the sheer mess created by my 3yo. I like to relax in a tidy space (not that there's much 'relaxing' going on during the day anyway!) but while I tidy one area she's off wrecking another. And repeat to fade. ('Fade' being bedtime I guess). Who was it that said 'trying to keep the house tidy with kids around is like trying to rake leaves in a hurricane.'?

Preferences aside, the main reason I dislike toys strewn around the floor is that it can be bloody dangerous tripping over and slipping on stray bits of plastic tat. In a very few weeks I'll be negotiating the labyrinth with a babe-in-arms.

The place might be untidy at times but it is clean. I would consider that to be more important. Teddies littering a freshly mopped floor beats sticky toys coated in pet hair neatly stacked in the corner of a room.

I think it can be but my problem was buying too much crap such as more toys and baby stuff than I really needed. More crap=more mess!

It will depend on your children but also on you, op.

If your genuine preference is for tidy and as clean as is realistic, then tidy and as clean as is realistic is what you will end up with.

I am tidy by nature (my mum once talked to the health visitor about me as a toddler, as I appeared to enjoy tidying up my toys more than playing with them ) and have always, always managed to have a house that is reasonably tidy and reasonably clean. That's through the baby and toddler stages of three boys. Admittedly they were easy babies but have all been very typical toddlers in the messy stakes!

My strategy has always been:

1. lots of nice storage and be organised with it, i.e. box for cars, box for train set, box for playfood, etc etc and then nice wooden cube storage units to bung it all in.

1. let them make as much mess as they want during the day but everything gets tidied away at the end.

1. Keep kitchen stuff tidy as you go along. Never leave washing up piled to do at the end of the day - too daunting. I wash up, dry up, put away and wipe down kitchen surfaces after every meal, so surfaces are always clean and it never gets overwhelming.

I can (and regularly do) host play dates where I have six or more DC running riot round my house, feed them all tea and snacks and drinks, they get out the toys and the playdoh and the God knows what else and the house can look like a bombsite at the end. This doesn't bother me because generally within an hour of everyone's departure we can get it tidied and organised and it's as if the playdate never happened.

Key thing for me I think is that I actually enjoy tidying up. It makes me sound like a complete loon, I realise that, but making things look nice and tidy gives me pleasure and I enjoy the process of making things look nice and tidy. I find it really therapeutic. And that has always applied for me even after sleepless nights with a newborn or horrendous days with a toddler etc.

I'm sure it's possible.

Depends on where your priorites lie. My priority was definitely not having a showhome. Yours might be. Everyone's different.

I was pretty anal about it when my children were little but after nine years of clearing up crap/"encouraging" the children to clear up crap I'm a bit bored of it and have decided I'd rather spend my time on social media. It doesn't seem to have had much impact on our happiness either way

dietcoke yes I said that upthread. Some people really do like tidying. For them keeping clean house is much easier. I wish I liked it