Where is the Magic????

[potteryclock]

So we've recently become a two parents working full time household.
DD started school in September and since then both of us have been working. Prior to that one of us was always at home.
And our house has gone from more or less fine most of the time to feeling like the wheels are coming off!
We have two DCs (5 and 9) who need the usual amount of after school ferrying. DS 9 starts school at 8am and then it's full speed until everyone is fed and home (from clubs and swimming etc.)- about 6 or 7 most evenings.
So when do we clean???
We're very even about jobs around the house - DH has been the sahp for years and is better than I am, but between laundry, hoovering, mopping, etc etc it feels like something we just get further behind on.
To the point I'm thinking about taking a day off each month to dust 😂
There's soooooo much dust!
We do have "stuff" but we're not hoarders. There's clutter here there and eveywhere- it collects in drifts. That get dusty.
DH was bemoaning the situation the other day - we think there must be magic that we haven't found yet - how do you:

Work - well and on time - even sometime over delivering?
Support your children for after school activities and enrichment
Talk (let alone more!) to your spouse??
Feed/dress everyone?

AND have a lovely home?

So I guess the AIBU is:
YABU - just get your arse in gear, throw away all of the extraneous shite and don't sleep...
YANBU - it's all an illusion - (basically) no one who works full time, has kids, doesn't have a cleaner has a perfect house except for visits!

After a while the dust doesn’t get any thicker. Not worth worrying about as long as the kitchen and bathrooms are ok.
Either get a cleaner or lower your standards. That’s basically it.

By visits I mean friends coming round.
I have been known to actually invite people JUST so we have to everything sorted out 😂

Get a cleaner

YANBU.

I have recently reduced my hours down to 4 days pw because I’m fed up of rushing around everywhere and never getting anything sorted at home. Jobs like weeding just fell by the wayside and weekends were a toss up between spending time with the kids or cleaning.

Cleaner. Low standards.

You sound like you have too much stuff!

Get the kids involved, 30 minutes each on a Saturday morning, that's 2 hours worth of time between you all. Kids can sort their own rooms, unloaded dishwasher, just the easier tasks that free you up to do the other bits.

Or The Organised Mum Method, that's 30 minutes every day in 1 particular area of the house so over the week, the house is cleaned.

Or a ruthless declutter and get a cleaner!

I'm a single working parent. I clean in the evenings. 1 evening is the kitchen, 1 evening the bathroom, 1 evening dusting and polishing and hoovering, 1 evening ironing and changing beds, then 1 evening for the shit jobs that only get done every so often like the oven. Laundry is done whenever I need to do it. Surfaces wiped daily. DS tidies his own toys.

How messy does your house get when it's empty all day? Mine doesn't get messy. It gets dusty but dusting is a 15 minute job.

Thanks all - we probably do have too much stuff, but also I like the house to feel like it has "spirit" but maybe you can't have both 😂

A cleaner is something we've considered, but currently there isn't really space in the budget for it.

I do think we waste time sometimes as well, shifting clutter rather than getting rid/putting away.

I've put some recurring jobs in the family planner today - like mopping the downstairs and stripping/remaking beds.
Im hoping that will help - if it's in chunks rather than one huge amorphous looming cloud of undone things.
Also, yes the kids could do more... they're just either slow (5yo) or moany (9yo)
Might try bribing with pocket money...

I don't dust really, use the brush hoover nozzle when needed. We run the hoover round weekly and wipe bathrooms down when needed. We do laundry every day and hang it on airers to dry and wash up and wipe the kitchen every night, but I rarely bother to mop floors, just a quick so! I get the kids to do a 10 minute tidy up of toys etc every couple of days. Buy some big baskets they can lob everything in their rooms/the lounge into each night as a quick fix. Do a couple of nights of easy dinners like fish and veg and new potatoes or make a massive spag bol and freeze half so you've got a quick meal another night. Sometimes I ring my DH at lunchtime at work for a chat!

You are all out of the house all day long by the sound of it, there's not much time for your kids to make a mess. Also this stuff doesn't really matter that much. When your kids are grown up you'll have all the time in the world to clean and tidy.

Thanks - that's the kind of discipline I think we need.
And you're right - now that the house is empty it does stay better once we get there. It's just getting there!

What does your routine look like? Do you really need clubs etc every night ? What are weekends like ?

kids do a room tidy every weekend and make own beds etc
laundry - put it on before you go to bed and hang up in the morning, five minute job whilst the kids eat breakfast
De clutter - things like coats and shoes, consider if you need them all out or if you can have one coat and one pair of daily shoes out downstairs, and tidy the rest away. We are guilty of having ‘too many coats and shoes on the go’ and it makes the house untidy. Now it’s summer I just have a denim jacket and a pair of Birkenstock’s downstairs- work shoes go on the shoe rack with my work pass and if I want to wear other trainers or nicer shoes at weekend I get them out and put them away again. Just a small decluttery tip.

Don't allow anyone to touch the dust. Once you touch it then it's two-tone and glaringly obvious!
Is there definitely no scope for a cleaner? If you've gone from 1 income to 2?
Definitely get the kids involved in cleaning. Mine don't get pocket money for doing jobs around the house, they do chores because they live here too.
And I agree with others, lower your standards. If it's messy then just tidy what you have to to maintain your sanity and get by. So what if the carpets need vacuuming? They'll be there tomorrow.

Also consider either prepping food in foil containers at weekend -I sometimes do a batch of a lasagne, an enchiladas and a pasta bake - that’s three nights dinner sorted and it saves energy. Or do one dish dinners at least two days a week. Saves washing up and putting away a million spoons pans bowls etc

A good robo vac with navigation that also mops will remove floor cleaning off your list of chores for ever. Seriously life changing stuff. You can dust off crumbs and everything else onto the floor and let it hoover them up. It's easier to keep on top of cleaning if the floor is always clean. You have to keep the floor clear of debris so the robo vac can do its thing but I find this makes me tidy as I go along which means nothing is allowed to pile up on the floor. Some kind person had a thread about robo vacs last year. I took the plunge and it has transformed my home. I have 2 now, one cheaper non-navigational one upstairs and the navigational mopping one downstairs.
Also giving the shower glass and walls a squeegee down everyday keeps it gleaming for longer between cleans. It is a bit of a faff but worth it for keeping the bathroom always looking clean.

Honestly I know mumsnet loves to say 'get a cleaner' or 'lower your standards' but in the real world it takes 20mins to dust.

You said everyone is home and fed by 6 or 7pm, (which is normal return from work time for many people!) so what do you do after then? You've hours there even allowing for bed routines - you can spend 10mins each doing jobs to keep on top of it during the week.

A good old de clutter is your friend!

my new motto… declutter, don’t reclutter 🙂

my house is a work in progress 😁

*Work - well and on time - even sometime over delivering?
Support your children for after school activities and enrichment
Talk (let alone more!) to your spouse??
Feed/dress everyone?

AND have a lovely home?*

You don't, in my experience. You just do the first 4 things and the house and your own leisure time go to bottom of the pile. We both work FT too with 2 DC and it's near impossible to do it all. I've massively lowered my standards with housework. It's actually liberating. 😂

Well you have less time but (presumably) more money now.

So the choices are either lower your standards or spend some of the money on outsourcing. Cleaner makes a massive difference and IMO is worth every penny.

Alternatively some other stuff has to give. Usually it’s a bit of everything that gives - a bit less sleep, a bit less cleaning, a bit less “spirit” aka clutter to tidy, a bit less time spent on kids’ homework or “enrichment”, a bit less effort at work (not ideal with a new job mind), a bit less cooking from scratch, a bit less exercise… 10% less of each of these rather than ditching any of them entirely.

Also what do you mean by Magic??

you didn’t think life was meant to be enjoyable did you

I def do this
I realise that there are jobs I haven't done in ages

@minipie

10% less of everything is actually great advice. You're spread more thinly so you have to reduce effort in all areas. Makes sense. I'm going to try this myself instead of striving for the best of every part of my life and then failing miserably 😫

Have a big clear out and then stop buying crap.

Like buy nothing at all unless you absolutely NEED it.

And also, lower your standards. My house is only properly clean for guests too!

Thanks again all!

Re a cleaner, we don't have the space in the budget at the minute - although the extra salary has come in, it's also been wiped out almost completely by a new expense as well :(

So, I think we need to
A) de clutter/storage.
B) storage for the kids rooms
C) one job per evening - we can do this. We definitely need to mop the downstairs a couple of times a week. I like the idea of a robot mopping hoover ALOT!
Maybe for the first couple of weeks the evening job is decluttering one room each. We have quite an empty loft which will help with stuff we can't bear to part with...

Also maybe don't sweat the small stuff. I know we're both happier when things look/smell clean and clear though.

Your children do not need to do so many clubs and activities. A quieter life for them = a quieter life for you.

Plan weekends carefully with fixed amount of time for chores, then family time for fun things.

What works for me is having a structure military precision.

#1. When you walk in the door, do not sit down until you have done exactly 20 minutes of housework. You won't do it otherwise - or you'll start doing something else that makes even more mess, which you will also leave.

#2. Delay start timers on dishwashers and washing machines are amazing, as they mean you can set them to finish just as you're coming in from work. All you have to do then is unload them when you come in.

#3. Clean up as you go along. By the time you're ready to eat, the only things left to add to the dishwasher should be your plates and cutlery and the surfaces should be clean. And cooking time can be talking time.

#4. If you see something that needs wiping/putting in a bin/away, do it straight away so you don't have to think about it again. This gets mugs into the dishwasher rather than being forgotten, random items taken upstairs, bits of paper into recycling with minimal thought and the day's little packets of evil from the litter trays despatched to the outside bin before the wee furry shites stage a dirty protest about having a less than pristine toileting environment and DP wearing his most martyred expression whilst making furball-like sounds as he cleans up said demonstration of discontent

#5. Before you go to bed, spend ten minutes getting things ready for the morning. Kettle full of water, clothes ready (so no searching for matching socks at 5am), clothes from the day + towels (Psoriasis means very regular washing of towels) in the washing machine and set the timer on 18-20 hours delay start so you don't have to think about it in the morning.

#6. Clear spaces give you peace to think. 'Spirited Children' are right pains in the arse when you have to deal with them along with 25 other kids, 'Houses with Spirit' are equally annoying, as the clutter shouts at you demanding your attention, whether from just looking at the pile of shite on the side/floor/chair/table, from smelling the frankly dodgy odour coming from the overfull kitchen bin that's going to split and need picking up, mopping and washing out, or because you've got to shift everything out of the way multiple times before dropping half of it and having to clean it up anyhow.

It works like magic for me. No faffing, stumbling, 'where's my - ', overwhelming piles of crud, spills that take effort to remove - and it means just doing a bit extra (like stripping beds, maybe cleaning a windowsill whilst the plants are having a quick shower in the bath) on a Saturday or Sunday morning, rather than spending hours chiselling bean juice off the hob and cupboard doors when it would have come off with a single wipe at the time it was spilled.

Once you get into the habit of doing small bursts of activity without thinking about it, it doesn't feel so much like work.