If you're one of those magical "put together" people...

[overweightcat]

How do you do it?

I mean people that seem to be on the ball with most parts of their life, on time 99% of the time, never forget stuff, organised, in shape, great hair that's usually down and very rarely thrown up in a bun, great skin, well suited clothes, clean house, home cooked meals 90% of the time even if you both work, young DCs who don't look like they've been dragged through a hedge backwards after 5 mins of arriving somewhere, always fairly relaxed and never too frazzled.

I know a few people / couples personally and I'm always really impressed with how they seem to have it sussed out.
Don't get me wrong I know people have issues and can go through stuff behind closed doors and some of the couples I know have gone through all sorts of hardships but they are all generally lovely and you can pop down to see them anytime and there won't be a difference between them in the comfort of their own house or in public IYKWIM?

What magic is this? Are you just on it 24/7? Or are you just very good at organisation?
Do you have tips for a wannabe like me?

Very little down time or relaxation. And ‘help’ of some kind or the other!

I don't think appearances are always what they seem. I knew a lady who always looked very neat and groomed, but secretly her house was a rubbish tip - she was a serious hoarder. I was shocked!
For my part, my hair is always up, I wash it but forget to style it so I'm definitely not one of those blessed people but I am very organised - only because I'm naturally chaotic so I have a strict timetable about which rooms I do which day, meal plan and have my paperwork very organised.

Oh yes another life tip I love passing on to people is to put the following bags in your car-

1. Sleepover bag- a set of clothes for everyone, toiletries and pjs.
2. Beach/swim bag- swimsuits,Google's etc and towels and in my case buckets, spades and nets for Rock-pooling as we live by the coast.
3. Layering bag- extra hats,coats,scarves and gloves.

And I always have wellies, a first aid kit and a wallet with coins/money.

Also I think it's a mindset, if you don't look after yourself and value yourself, put an effort in then you more than likely will feel like shit and then you wont want/feel like making the effort. So it's a vicious cycle. If you put in time, energy and love then you will feel good about yourself and continue doing it.

always have a spare loaf in the freezer!
That made me laugh! Perfect hair, perfect nails.... and a spare loaf in the freezer

I'm one of these magical put together people. My secret - you don't know what my life is really like from the inside. That's always the secret.
What you'd see from the outside: I'm active (running the London marathon next week), I'm happily married, our child is happy and healthy, attends an expensive private pre-school, two gorgeous KC pedigree dogs, own our home with a large garden in a nice location, well-paid job and upward trajectory career etc etc etc.
What you don't see: I'm currently on a WFH meeting where I'm actually on Mumsnet and eating left over takeaway curry. I'm still in pjs on my bottom half. I'm quietly seething about my husband who invited a guest to stay the night and gave me no notice to tidy up or get food in - and I've lost my purse. We're half way between moving house and everything is in boxes. Oh, and I edit every social media picture I put up to make me look skinnier.

We are reasonably well put together and both work full time. One school age dc and very little help (my df picks up dc one day a week).

I have the same work pattern as your friend as in full time hours but only three days a week and 12 hour shifts.

Dp is not a useless man child and actually pulls his weight on days I'm in work. Drops dc off at school (breakfast and after school club). Feeds dc and cooks for me. Makes sure the house isn't a midden heap.

Then my four days off a week I handle the rest. I think if we both worked 9- 5 mon-fri we'd really struggle.

But four whole days, every week, makes life actually pretty easy. So does having a pretty small uncluttered house. I am utterly ruthless with decluttering. So laundry gets done and ironed. House gets kept. Shopping gets done often so fresh food gets cooked with a bit of batch cooking thrown in. I do a couple of exercise classes on my days off. Everything has a home and nothing gets handled twice.

Paper calender in the kitchen and we plan in advance.
My hair hair is decent because I won the genetic lottery on that one. It's long, fine but grows very densely, shiny, soft and generally swishy and all I do is wash and condition it with whatever shampoo is on offer.

My skin was crap but I pestered the fuck out of my gp until it was acceptable. Still looks better with a bit of tinted moisturiser and some mascara.

Dp gets his exercise in walking miles to work in all weathers.

Ds will quite possibly never look well turned out though. He is very cute but he could be fresh out of the shower in brand new clothes and still look a bit crumpled. He gets that from my df, who even looks a bit scruffy in his wedding photos despite wearing a nice suit, hair cut and freshly shaved etc.

I have absolutely no idea how people who have dc and work full time office hours manage it.

We don't have a gardener, or a cleaner, or a nanny.

We are both bloody knackered all the time though and often don't sit down until after 8pm. Hobbies are in the evenings after dc is in bed.

I really really can't stress how much of a difference compressed hours makes though. Yes those three days are hard I get very little done then, but dp keeps it ticking over and the four days off I have can be used to smooth everything else over.

@Lucylivesinamushroomhouse

I think perfect hair is just getting lucky in the genetic lottery.

I genuinely do too. It’s only since around my mid-40s that I’ve had to pay any attention to it at all. I’ve always just washed it once a week, air-dried, teeny bit of serum/anti frizz after washing and that’s it. I don’t even brush it. Always had compliments galore.

Middle age and ill health are taking their toll now but I genuinely never gave it a thought previously. It just grew like that.

I like being organised and having a clean, non-chaotic house, but spending much time or money on beauty regimes, grooming and accessorising or curating my wardrobe... not so much. Perfect hair is not high on my priority list, especially since the first thing I do after getting ready in the morning is go for a (frequently muddy, windy and rainy) dog walk.

I think that you can't be perfect at everything, you have to choose.

My house is very clean,
I'm always made up and well groomed,
I am successful at work and very organised,
I am very good at organising things with and seeing friends.
I exercise regularly and am slim.

However;
I don't cook, I don't do any household organising (dh does that) and I don't have kids.

If I had kids I imagine it would be a totally different story.

No one is perfect. Absolutely no one. But some people are better at looking like they are.

One thing I do think is really key though is having a supportive partner who pulls their weight with childcare and housework. If you have someone beside you who genuinely pulls their weight, it leaves so much more time for other things.

I don't think I know anyone like this, not that ticks every single box including good skin and hair.

I do know one person who seems "perfect" in terms of clothes, demeanour etc, they and their husband have comfortable, well-paid-but-not-too-senior, flexible public sector jobs with lots of leave. They've had these jobs a while so will have banked up the cash. They only have one child, and have family help. Money and flexibility/support definitely help! If you have plenty of money, you can pay someone else do to your cleaning/ironing/laundry.

I seem well organised and on top of everything, and I am mostly, I also never go out in public looking really scruffy, unless I'm going for a run. Then I look hideous I'm sure but the fact that I'm going for a run hopefully makes people think I'm more together than I am

My demeanour is anything but calm and non-flustered though, I get very flustered at lots of things.

I don't think I now anyone like this. The people I do know who's children are always clean and neat, spend their lives ironing washing and chasing their kids around wiping them and telling them not to get dirty.
I saw a little girl about 3 in a restaurant the other day get an absolute blocking and told she was going home because she was a fucking disgrace now, because she spilt a little bit of chicane ice cream on the bottom of her top. The poor wee sound was howling while her mother very roughly wiped her down. There were 3 other adults at the table, one of them was very likely dadd and then an aunti and uncle. It was really sad. If that had been my family, I hope one of them would have given me a slap and told me to get a grip.

Chocolate ice cream

Poor wee soul, not sound!

What magic is this? Are you just on it 24/7? Or are you just very good at organisation? Do you have tips for a wannabe like me?

It's not magic. I suspect it is all about NOT being impulsive ie you have the energy and self-discipline to NOT do the immediate easiest thing, and do the thing that will benefit you in the long term. It is also about being mindful of long term consequences in that moment and not blindly "going through the motions".

Eg tonight after work I will not mindlessly flop on to the sofa and watch Netflix in a messy room while snacking on chocolate, instead I will make the effort go out and exercise even though I don't feel like it, then come home and eat an apple, and then tidy up the house and lay out my clothes for tomorrow before bed. And only if I have time, will I watch Netflix for 30 mins (obviously there's a balance to be struck here, you need to relax too).

Maybe making those small decisions for one or two evenings would be neither here and there, but over months and years they would make a significant difference to your life.

Or, I will not chat to my sister on the phone for 30 mins, instead I will check all my appts for this month and find and arrange all the paperwork for them in a file in date order. Again, on one occasion this may not make a huge difference to your life, but over time it will become an engrained habit and then you will app!y it to bills, birthday cards, school paperwork.

Same with housework: don't get up and immediately look at your phone. Get up, make tea, have a "mindful" 5 mins, hang up washing that you programmed the night before to come on early, ditto DW (or whatever your routine is), sort that day's supper out so there is not a 6pm stressful scramble ...then you can start your day properly. It's all about developing productive engrained habits.

Flylady is good for this. She advocates small set routines for every day involving laundry, decluttering, zone cleaning, quick bathroom wipe-downs so that nothing requires huge deep cleaning. I find one of the most useful aspects of the system is allocating a day for different tasks:

Mon - main clean 7 main 10 min tasks in an hour and a bit
Tues - planning (holidays, med appts, menus)
Wed- anti- procrastination (eg do the horrible thing you have been avoiding) plus we made it board game evening
Thurs - errand day (kill two/three/four birds with one stone by booking all your appts and running errands on one day)
Fri - clean out purse, handbag & car + date night (in normal times)
Sat - family fun
Sun - do something to relieve your own stress

Roughly that anyway - you can adapt it to suit your own house and family life - but whatever habits and systems you choose it's all about doing it consistently.

I am not that organised btw because I am not that self-disciplined or "kind to my future self" whichever way you want to frame it...but one of my sister's is and basically it's because she does what needs doing BEFORE the things she wants to do.

I also got my hair washed and blow dried at a salon in my lunch hour.

You did WHAAAAT????!!!!!

I have NEVER heard of anyone doing this before. How often?

Ah, "le brushing". Women on the continent do this a lot. Someone I used to work with rarely washed her own hair.

Nope. It's an urban myth that doesn't exist in reality. No one is perfect and even those that 'appear' to be are not. Also, why does great hair and skin = that you are on the ball with life?!

I think on the outset I’m probably very ‘put together’. On mat leave now but even when working I’d be very organised. My top tips:

• a lot of it is personality (I’ve always been v organised and tidy never had a messy teenage phase). It’s very natural to me to be tidy and I pick things up and sort them approx 1000 times a day after 2 kids but don’t really notice as I do it.
• find a hairstyle and make up that is super quick. On hair wash days I’m 30 mins from stepping in the shower to made up and ready. Non hair wash it’s 10. I wear make up daily but my routine takes 2 mins (get my brows done whenever I remember) so I always look ok.
• organised for kids: packed lunch night before, clothes laid out ready. 4 year old gets herself dressed (often back to from etc but good habit!) so I only sort me and baby.
• food I batch cook for kids every so often or make extra for DH and I and freeze for after school meals. Always have eggs and beans etc in for quick but healthy meals
• cleaner once a fortnight! And a cordless vac so hoovering is super easy and quick in between times
• doing things while waiting for stuff! Eg unloading tumbler and folding while kettle boiling for tea, hoovering which baby naps and before I sit down on Mumsnet etc. Making good use of time!
• do things as soon as they arrive. Bills- money transfer immediately. Email- respond straight away. If not I forget.

I think it’s a personality thing! I’m not perfect and house is lived in but tidy, I hope I’m not a complete bore either!

This thread amuses me. I love the posters who have only one child and only work a few days per week. Must be a doddle to be completely organised/up together!!

I think people think this about me, though there is always room for improvement. My main organisational tips are to do things in multiple where possible - so I never cook one meal, I always triple it and freeze. If I book tickets for something I’ll book them at the same time for a future date, which keeps our lives busy without much effort. I have lists for everything - packing, Christmas, lunchboxes, and I have no clutter which saves a lot of cleaning and sorting out. Someone commented up thread that organised people are dull. I don’t feel that. Because our family life is well organised it leaves lots of room for spontaneity and change. It’s the dull stuff that is done efficiently.

@Pumpkinnose yes that's exactly my point, one child and full time work compressed into three days does make it a doddle.

Have no idea how we would cope with multiple children and both 9-5. Something would have to give.

Some people literally have extra hours in their day because they have the gene for short sleeping ie they need less than 6 hours of sleep a night. One of my close friends is like this as is one of her children. If I had this extra 2 or 3 hours a day I could fit more in.

I used to be organised like BestZebbie but DH changes plans and springs things on me so I have given up.

Things like a picnic, I would plan it exactly like you BestZebbie but now that we are back from living overseas he will speak to his sister, she suggests meeting up the next day, he says yes then tells me and asks what food we have for a picnic.

I still organise things like gifts, but only for our DC and my friends. He panics on Dec 23rd/24th that he hasn’t bought anything for his family.

I’ve also given up ironing, DH does his own.

Yep. I am. It's to do with being organised in a working environment and carrying that through to the home. For the 830am school run, I am showered, good clothes on, make up done and hair curled with the wand. Discipline.