To ask for your easy life hacks?

[Polkapjs]

I need easy ways to make life easier and help me get my life in order in all areas

Tonight have have used a garlic press with an UNPEELED love of garlic as recommended by Jamie Oliver. Genius.
Give me yours that don’t involve needing stuff I don’t have but help make stuff a bit easier or cheaper?

Magic Eraser.
Completely addictive. Removes spots of dirt from walls... crayon marks... everything. Ended up cutting one up and having a bit in most rooms. Brilliant!

Littlemiss Love the get well box idea and cycling the toys!

Hang bras off a chippy trouser hanger I’m the wardrobe. Just hook the straps over the “ears” of the clips

Like the stuck on hooks ideas. I

My df gave us a load of their tat as he is moving and sorme wonderful stick on hooks were included

Oh the excitement and a telescopic mop for windows and floors that was still in its box

I need to get out more lol

hang bras off a chippy trouser hangar I'm the wardrobe
I've no idea what that means.

After kids have had their bath, stick the bathmat to the side of the bath. Drains into the bath and doesn't get mouldy so less cleaning/replacing.

Clippers trouser hanger not chippy, bloody autocorrect. The type of trouser hanger where two clips grip the waistband of the trousers

Oh right, you hang the bras off them. When did you start to believe you were a wardrobe?

Frozen onions, mushrooms and peppers. Brilliant for chilli, spag Bol etc

Lazy garlic, chilli and ginger

Frozen chopped veg, mash, risotto, chips etc etc

Never iron.

Use as many gadgets and online services as possible to make your life easier. I have roomba, mop roomba, handheld cordless hoover, fast cycle dishwasher, tumble dryer etc. Avoid real paperwork. If you can afford it get a cleaner, gardener, bin cleaner, window cleaner, handyperson, painter and decorator -this is my current dream!

10 for a pound cards from Card Factory and gift bags for birthdays. Christmas I bulk buy wine, chocolate and nice shower gel and gift bags from somewhere like Home Bargains. I only wrap for my own dc and occasionally where an item won’t fit in a gift bag. I have plain wrap from ikea.

Declutter and then you need to declutter at least annually. You have to accept it is an ongoing process. Have a bag on the go for donations all the time.

Ensure all that live in the house pull their weight - you were not put on this earth to do housework! Also make sure you’re not responsible for all the thinking regarding the home, family etc.

I’m seriously considering waxing my cat as there’s trails of fur tufts everywhere at the moment

Probably my most useful tip If you have more than one DC then use a permanent marker to put one circle on the tag of all of eldest DC clothing, when it gets passed down (or when next child gets new clothes) add another circle (continue on with how ever many DC you have) So you can easily tell who each item belongs to and prevents arguments when one DC has grown out of something and insists it's still theirs. Also means you can give them a tub of washing and get them to sort it without arguments or being asked "which pile does this go in..."

I love this thread but don't understand why the flap for the card in the wrapping paper is helpful.

To save sellotaping it on.

Buy basics cheese and use the grater attachment on your food processor to grate the whole block, freeze it in portions in little freezer bags. You don't need to defrost it before using it.

Buy fresh onions and garlic (and any other veg actually) and use the food processor to chop them, bag them up and freeze them.

Only buy fresh peppers if you need a whole intact one for the recipe or if you're having them raw, frozen chopped peppers are great and much cheaper! (You do have to put up with having the horrible green ones though).

Get everyone to pull their weight.

DC put their own laundry away and have done from age 4+, they can empty a dishwasher, clean shoes, strip their beds, clear and set the table, tidy their own toys.

I batch cook when appropriate and meal plan for a fortnight at a time. Means that the DC meals are balanced with school meals and everyone can see what’s for dinner during the week ahead (chalk board in kitchen). This was my biggest change as it cleared daily headspace about what to feed everyone, makes shopping easier and results in less waste.

Fellow long hairites - use a seam ripper to cut through the hair wrapped around your vacuum cleaner rollers.

Fellow singletons - buy large loaves of bread and portion up into packs of however many slices you eat per day. Keep one pack out, the rest in the freezer.

Keep ginger whole in the freezer and grate. So much easier to use!

When hanging washing, peg t shirts and dresses so the pegs are pegged under the arm pits to avoid nasty peg marks at the hemline.

I buy the tubes of garlic puree (sold everywhere except aldi/lidl) so much nicer than garlic granules or lazy garlic jars.

A mix of olive oil combined with white vinegar to get stains off wood.

Easiest scone recipe in the world (and also the nicest) self raising flour, lemonade (not diet) and single cream. Mix it all together. Bake.. and voila!

Sorry I missed out a pinch of salt in that scone recipe!

Two from me:

Keep track of bobby pins (& metal hair clips) by running magnetic tape along the inside of your bathroom drawer. Stick all pins to it vertically, so youre never scrounging in corners for them on school mornings.

Batch cooking but not: on the weekend I put on a big pot of water to simmer, with salt. I precook veggies for the week. I add seperate veggies to blanch, then scoop them out to cool. Beans, carrots, corn, leafy greens, etc. Then the next veggie. I keep going with other ‘boilable’ foods like German-style sausages (frankfurters), and eggs (in the shell). In, then out with a net scoop. By the end, the water is practically stock/broth so I finish by cooking rice or potatoes with it or use it as a soup/stew base. Means I have a variety of veg to serve during the week, which can quickly be adapted to baby purée, blandish kid’s veggie sticks, teen meals with stronger flavourings, or gourmet for us.

I grate cheese on foil so can then wrap up what you don’t use instead of grating on a plate/worktop.

Fed up of water inside your rubber gloves? Keep them neatly hung up on the door under the kitchen /bathroom sink. Make 2 for approx £2.00 with plastic hooks and silicone ended clothes pegs.

1. Buy a pack of 2 plastic stick-on hooks from your local hardware store.

1. Clean the door with lemon surface cleaner to remove any grease or dirt so you get a good strong fix on the hook.

1. Stick hook to the door.

1. Loop a new clean elastic band onto the clothes peg,see photo.

1. Hang peg onto hook, et voilà You don't need to unhook it each time, you can easily clip the rubber gloves by pushing against the door! I love that my gloves don't go walkies any more and they're always dry!

I think we need a thread called 1001 uses for plastic stick-on hooks
Subtext: we really really need to get out more

Who would have thought that a couple of quads worth of plastic would bring so much joy to so many

Love the clutch bag rack. I just need to buy more clutch bags, I have a few mainly glam-y ones for nights out once in a blue moon but they are a wardrobe staple!

Tidy your children’s toys occasionally - yep, you. Really well, don’t chuck or only the really broken, sharp edged stuff. Let them find the boxs of tidied stuff - don’t tell them. They’ll be thrilled by the order, and spend hours playing with their “newly found things” giving you time to do ...... whatever. Doesn’t mean the children don’t tidy - in fact I used to find toys were kept a little more ordered for longer and they liked the system and sometimes followed it. Best done before they get too cynical. Don’t know what that age is now!

Use a pair of micro fibre socks on your hands (v cheap ones, the most man made and staticky the better) and just whizz round doing the ‘double wipe’ for your dusting. Use another pair to dry and shine the bathroom taps, sink, glass etc - then just throw them in the wash

Please don’t use baby wipes to clean- they may be ‘Hacks’ but trust me, our children will not thank us for it.

Save empty glass jars and use them for everything- I freeze meals, half used sauces, make overnight oats, freeze opened wine etc in them. Just write in the lid with a dry wipe pen.