to doubt "my house is messy but clean"?

[penguinbox]

A light hearted one but I always read this on threads about how clean and or tidy you keep your home. People say my house is messy but always clean and I think how? When my house gets messy and it sure does then I can't really keep it properly clean. I need to have a proper tidy up, declutter surfaces etc then I can actually clean!

Aibu to doubt the statement my house is messy but clean?

My house is SUPER messy but clean right now.

I did a massive deep clean at the weekend, but since then it's had washing hung up on airers in the living room, the spare bed is stripped with the bedding on a pile on the floor, there's a pile of washing up to do, the toolboxes are out in the hallway etc.

Seems like an accurate description to me?

I don't count dust as unclean.

Unclean is spills, dirt, food etc.

Our house is messy but clean.

It describes mine to a Tee. This morning it was spotless, polished.

Right now there is juice spilt on the counter. The left over on DDs plate at the sink. DS has the living room floor full of toys. Theres a load at the machine to go in, One upstairs to be put away. I bet DDs room is a mess again, it doesn't take long, and I seen she had make-up on so with DCD it's everywhere.

Though my skirting us clean, internal doors, bins emptied, bathroom clean. So you won't catch anything but could break something on a toy.

Mine is never spotless. I'd have to move out if it were.
I guess to me, clean enough means there is nothing disgusting about. The floor doesn't have obvious grime, there isn't thick dust everywhere, there isn't anything like cat sick or a stinky item left about. There isn't obvious mildew on many bathroom surfaces, the bog doesn't have obvious material in it (not counting limescale). Any unwashed dishes haven't sat there >8 hours. It's easy to walk around the rooms & there are clear clean-looking places to sit down or put one's stuff down onto. You don't wonder if the place is a hygiene hazard.

I have been in many houses that had all those problems constantly.

One time DH went on a rant about the "MESS!!" left by a DC on the countertop. It was literally about 20 tiny crumbs that a mouse would struggle to collect up. I've trained him out of such nonsense.

i dont see why you dont get it.

It's clean underneath, but there is every day surface clutter/mess of family life.

Clothes, toys, papers, magazines, shoes...etc.

Our house is for sale, its spotlessly clean, hoovered, dusted, wiped over...etc because of viewers coming around, however, with 2 kids and 2 dogs, it does get very untidy rather quickly.

Messy as in a tip with crap everywhere, washing piled up, pots in sink, clothes all over the bedroom floor, loads of stuff in the lounge and kitchen to means probably not clean but toys/books out, shoes in the hall and a few bits on the kitchen top is.

My heamth visitor used it to explain my home as she knew I was really anxious about it. She said it is obviously cleaned regularly but it very very easily looks like ww3 has occured within 10 minutes but if you remove the toys/clothes/post/clutter it is still clean

My house is tidy once a week, just before the cleaner comes. Ten minutes after she has left, the twin toddler whirlwinds have covered it in toys. So it's clean, but messy.

The mess is all clean stuff - toys, books etc. Not dirty dishes.

I have a cleaner come to do my house every Thursday. On Thursday it is immaculate once she has gone as I tidy up very thoroughly before she arrives to give her a clear run through. By Sunday there will be half read newspapers strewn all over the place, recycling waiting to go out, Laundry waiting to be put away and probably some hobby bits and pieces out. DH will have probably tried to mend something and not gone very far with it so perhaps some small parts littering up the place too.

On Thursday we are clean and tidy, through to Tuesday clan and untidy, Wednesday pm tidy and a bit grubby.

I'd say my house is currently messy but clean. I cleaned the kitchen yesterday properly, and did a mini clean earlier, so all surfaces have been wiped down, washing up is all done, floor is fresh mopped and bins are empty. Sitting room was hoovered this morning, and dusted.

But DD's shoes and bag are in the middle of the carpet, DH's jacket is hanging off a chair, and I have a pile of work papers and a book piled up on the end of the sofa. Argh! And the papers just fell over to make a nice sheaf of paperwork went flying.

I'll pile it up, but it won't get proper tidy immediately. I don't think that makes my house unclean, though.

Anoher one whose house is very tidy but grubby dirty (blame 3 dogs).

for me it means the bits that get properly dirty or are in regular use eg, toilet, bath, kitchen worktops, cooker top, sinks, do get cleaned regularly and are kept fairly clean but there is a lot of clutter and there may be dust bunnies collecting in the corners eg, bedroom hasn't been hoovered for ages because there are clothes on the floor or books piled everywhere. That sort of thing.

I am very doubtful about this myself, and that's because I have a load of clutter. That means you can't clean under / round it, hence dirt builds up, hence dirty. I think a lot of people console themselves by thinking 'at least I'm not as bad as those people on the hoarder programmes' - I know I do.

clutter makes houses harder to clean
my theory is that us messy people spend far more time cleaning than tidy people, because we are always having to move things and sort things before we can even hoover or dust. So we get stressed and seem to spend all our time cleaning, AND people tell us how messy our houses are.

Then we feel angry and offended, because we believe we are terribly clean "underneath"

it is a mindset, not always entirely truthful way of looking at ones habits. I try, but the truth is if I cared more there would be no grime and no clutter. I wipe surfaces, I mop floors I clean bathrooms I hooover I do laundry but my habits are not those of a dutch housewife.

I always assume they mean that it isn't tidy, but they do have a good thorough clean fairly regularly, as opposed to people who have the kind of permanent mess that you can't clean behind. I'm sure they realise that their house isn't as clean as super-tidy scrubbed-twice-a-day house. Mine is somewhere between the first two I think

I know what you mean, OP. If a room is permanently cluttered and messy it is hard to get the surfaces clear enough to clean (I'm thinking of when I use a room as a dumping ground for sorting here!).

Some mess is temporary or transient, some seems more permanent and the permanent bits are probably hard to clean.

My house is clean but messy.

It means I hoover, steam the floors, wipe down units/sides/tables, put toys away and other bits and bobs away where they should be, do the washing up and put laundry in the machine in the morning.

But, by the afternoon DC have their toys all over the place, there are plastic cups that need cleaning, the laundry basket is full, ornaments on units/tables have been moved in the wrong places and there are dog toys stuck (visibly) under the sofa.

My house is still clean, because I cleaned it this morning, but it has been lived in today so there is general child and animal stuff everywhere which makes it messy.

clean could be a clean bathroom and clean kitchen surfaces, (visible ones)

clean could be I keep one ring of the cooker clean and a sqaure foot of worksurface.

clean could be tidied, then cleaned and then a days worth of mess?

everyones definition is different.

I think for a house to be actually dirty you have to try quite hard - to get that think greasy dirt layer requires real negligence. I used to live with a girl who kept plates in her room for weeks, probably washed her sheets once every 3 months and had used tampons lying around on the carpet; that was dirty. Crumbs is not dirty. A cobweb is not dirty, it’s been a week since I hoovered is not actually unclean unless you chucked a load of food on the floor etc (appreciate kids may do this).

I also think there a difference between the ‘mess’ of having kids toys out in the living room and the ‘perma-mess’ of the pile of unopened letters by the front door, the ironing pile on the dining room table , the eternal floordrobe etc at that point you’re on the way to dirty but you can still keep the main parts of the house clean.

I don't keep clutter so it helps except when I am searching for something and realise I binned or donated it.

My Parents kept clutter you can not clean around it. I like to be able to see surfaces not stuff piled on them.

So op. Are you convinced now that we can be clean but messy?
If anyone walked in my place this afternoon, and lots of people did, they saw clean but messy.
Lots of mugs used, several packets of biscuits around. Various repair people, a couple of guys from the council, someone from the waterboard all in my place with their tools trying to locate a leak. Oh and the prick neighbour from downstairs who hates me, trying to get in to explain to the above about the damage I have caused and still causing over the years. He saw all their stuff in my hall and tried telling one of the guys how I was disgusting and leave random crap around all the time.

I agree with other posters in that it's all relative. My mum can't help herself from cleaning the outside of my patio door of muddy paw prints. She clearly thinks I'm lazy and ignores me telling her 1) please don't clean my house and 2) the dog is trained to jump up instead of barking, therefore unless I clean it 6-8 times a day, for half the year it will have some muddy smears on. Apart from this my house is pretty minimalist and clean, everything has a home so doesn't take long to put things away.

When I visit her house however, I find it that cluttered and untidy it makes me unable to relax. I don't mention this as it's not my business and would be rude, but I do find it funny. We're talking every available surface covered, half the sofa, even the fridge is covered with newspaper clippings and notes. I guess the world would be boring if we were all the same.

I clean the house a couple of times a week, move all the crap to it's rightful homes and hoover/dust/polish and generally blitz. Then the crap creeps back out of its home and is scattered around again. So clean underneath, but messy.

Bathroom wiped every other day and kitchen daily.