There’s me and DH (both full time although I changed to compressed hours so do 4 long days) and toddler DD in our house. I used to spend all weekend catching up before DD and I just wasn’t prepared to do it any more. DH cooks, does bins and garden (just an hour or two max) and tidies up after himself. Rest of it is my domain (although he mucks in if I ask). I manage with:
1 load of washing a day - in first thing so I can hang it up to dry before I leave if it’s nice, otherwise on a timer, then in the drier / on the airer when I get home. That way there’s no build up of washing to do at the weekend.
Ironing - all in a basket with a lid. Iron what I need the night before first thing if I was too lazy. Do a bit more if I can be arsed. If not. Lid on. What ironing pile?
Every morning make bed, 2 minute clean of sink and loo, few mins tidy and put away of clean laundry.
Every night before bed dishes are done, benches, table, high chair / surrounding floor and hob wiped. Sitting room tidied by both of us doing a 1 minute blitz as we go up to bed.
The rest of it gets done in two one hour chunks, one before breakfast on my day off and one on Saturday while DH takes DD out. If I was sill working 5 days I would just do two hours on a Saturday morning - would be done by 10:30 still leaving the rest of the weekend so I think it’s still achievable. This includes bathroom clean, hoovering, dusting and cleaning floors, plus a deeper clean in one or two rooms or a job like cleaning the oven. I do it with a timer to make me go faster. Because we generally clean up after ourselves through the week it isn’t a major task to clean. We used to be really lazy on work days, plus DH used to be a bit of a slob so cleaning at the weekend was a big job. Now it’s so much quicker.
Sunday mornings I change the beds and do a bit more ironing in the evening. Otherwise just the basics.
Shopping - one big shop to last a month for dried stuff, tins, freezer stuff and meat / fish to freeze. Then weekly we buy fresh stuff locally while out for a walk so it doesn’t feel like it’s eating into our free time.
I definitely find it’s helped me to have a schedule / an allocated time slot. I’d also say drop your standards a little bit. Once the allocated cleaning time is up, stop. Anything you didn’t get done start with the following week. My house is never absolutely perfect in every room but I’m never too worried about someone dropping in unexpectedly. And the weekends are now mostly our own.
Of course, the better option is to get a cleaner, and when my childcare bill goes down I’m definitely tempted!