Worried about our house and socialising

[kva]

Hi everyone,

I’m feeling a bit anxious about how our home might impact both our daughter’s and our own social life as she starts reception next year. I'd love to host playdates and invite people over, but I’m embarrassed about the state of our house – it’s in serious need of some TLC. The conservatory is falling apart and needs a good clean, the kitchen is outdated, the garden is overgrown, and a few doors don’t close properly or are broken. It just doesn’t feel like a space we’d be comfortable hosting in right now.

We recently decided to put our savings this year into overpaying the mortgage, so there isn’t much left for home improvements. Unfortunately, we can’t tackle big DIY projects either, as we both work full-time and don’t have family nearby to help out.

I’m really worried that not being able to host could affect our ability to build friendships, both for our daughter and for us. We don’t want her to miss out on forming those early connections with her new classmates, and we’d love to socialize more with other parents too – it just feels challenging with the house as it is.

Has anyone been in a similar situation? I’d love advice on how to make our home more inviting on a budget, or ideas on encouraging socializing outside the home. Any reassurance or tips would be so appreciated!

P.S. We live in an area where it seems like most families buy homes for over £1m (ours is much less) and borrow to do major renovations before hosting. Inviting people over to our place, as it is, feels a bit intimidating!

Thank you so much in advance!

It's really important to recognise that it isn't your house that is stopping you from hosting playdates. It's the way you feel about the house that is stopping you. Unless there is something actually dangerous or actively unhygienic about your house, it's your own sense of embarrassment or shame or whatever it is that is potentially standing in the way of your children having the enjoyment of playing with their friends in their own home. Is that really what you want? Do you want them to pick up on the message that their home is a source of embarrassment or shame? Or would you rather set them the example of warmly (and unapologetically) welcoming their friends?

I'm not saying that in a critical way BTW, I'm just suggesting a different way of looking at the issue.

Have a bit of tidy up, make sure the bathroom and kitchen are presentable, and throw open your doors. Most kids would rather visit a relaxed, imperfect home than a perfectly curated one where they are walking on eggshells anyway.

I was lucky enough to live in a beautiful home, but as a result, I noticed the difference between my home and other people’s, even as a child.

I appreciate this sounds terribly spoiled, but I still remember from my childhood some homes I hated visiting/didn’t want to stay over.

My takeaways from these experiences are that (hopefully) your home should always be:

Clean (doesn’t need to be tidy but needs to be CLEAN, especially the bathroom).
Smell pleasant - not smelling strongly of food, pets or damp.
And finally, this seems like a small one but still bothers me even as an adult - have a clean and dry hand towel in the bathroom. There is really nothing worse than trying to dry your hands on someone else’s smelly wet towel.

If your home is clean and welcoming, guests will feel happy there. Try to relax and enjoy yourself, as happy hosts make for the best atmosphere/experience.

well they aren't broken then, are they?

Some of your posts are a bit misleading/confusing - I honestly can't tell whether your house is actually completely fine and you're seeing things that most people wouldn't even notice (when you say "outdated" kitchen, for example, what does that mean? Just not in the current style or properly 1980s decor?) Or whether it actually is a bit of a state.

In either case, if it bothers you then fix it, if it doesn't don't and let your dd's friends take you as you are.

If you stopped overpaying the mortgage for 6 months and saved that money and/or took a week off in the summer to do what you ca you could probably make it look at least 50% better quite easily by paying someone to do the fence, pressure washing the conservatory, trimming hedges/trees, (if that's what you mean by being overgrown to the extent you can't do it yourself). A brand new kitchen might be out of budget for now but as a pp said depending on what it's like they can be hugely refreshed for a very small amount - if you aren't confident in your DIY skills then there are companies who rewrap doors/counters etc for you.

Our house was a student party house before we bought it, and is only semi-renovated, with a temporary kitchen (cement floor, yawning hole where there used to be a range, units from the mid-1980s, interspersed with bits sawn out so we could fit our fridge in!) and the garden still a building site. I just think fuck it and have people over anyway. The people we've invited come from anything from temporary rentals (DS has a few Ukrainians in his class) to minor stately homes, but no one has visibly flinched and refused subsequent invitations.

No, we don't have these issues thankfully.

I don’t think people are judging, it’s that if it’s bad enough that you’re ashamed of it, there is an option to do something about it instead of restricting your social life because of it.

But, if it’s safe and clean, just invite them! If they’re judgy, then congratulations, you’ve identified someone to avoid.

You can arrange park play dates. They work in terms of encouraging friendships.

Being totally honest, my DC has a friend who has only invited him over once, when he’s been to ours a dozen times or more. My impression is that his mum is embarrassed at the state of their house. I don’t care, and my child cares even less, but he does care that he never gets to go to his friend’s house and doesn’t understand why the mum always says “we’ll have to have you over soon” but never actually follows through. Her son also constantly asks for mine to go over. I find it very frustrating, and while play dates don’t have to be precisely reciprocated, a reasonable amount of give and take is expected.

That's nice to hear that you have such circle of friends.

Not a native English speaker here. In my language 'broke' would mean anything from a hard to push to falling down on you. In any case, the house is safe.

OP it seems like you made this post just expecting people would tell you it’s nothing to worry about and your house is fine the way it is. But you’re the one who come on here and said you’re worried, anxious, and embarrassed by the state of it. You have money (the overpayment) that can go towards this, why wouldn’t you invest a bit into sprucing it up?

You’re worried people will judge well sorry but yes they will. You’re not taking the judgement well here so I doubt you’ll take it well when it happens in person or your child’s friend makes a comment…

If you're not using the conservatory, why would visiting parents see it? You just show them into another room, you're not doing tours.

If it's the back garden that's a state, same deal , you're not doing tours.

Little kids aren't going to give a shit or notice.

Paint up your kitchen to freshen it up (or start with a few colour testers on the walls and say it's a work in progress 😂).

Watch Stacey Solomon Sort Your Life Out.
There’s an episode about a family whose children were affected by not being able to invite their friends over.
I really recommend watching it. It may give you some helpful tips and insight.
I can’t remember the exact episode but they had two daughters.

Watch it

You could do small things as pp said.
Clean the conservatory. Tidy garden etc.

Check out the kitchen make overs on tiktok using paint and stick on tiles.

I get it's busy working full time. Both DH and I do too but sometimes you just need to set aside a weekend and sort shit. That's just life unfortunately.

We also worked full time, parented 4 children, and with no ‘family help’ managed to completely renovate and build on to our tatty (previously rented out) 30’s home as and when we had a bit of spare cash. It takes dedication and hard work. But we had no choice!

Well it's up to you OP if you want to prioritise paying off the mortgage then that's your choice. I don't know how "bad" your house is and whether it would be unsuitable for a play date but it's not a deal breaker. We have a lot of play dates at our house even with friends who don't invite us to theirs if there are reasons such as we have more space, we don't have pets, and it doesn't bother me. I do think it helps if you can invite people over but it's not a necessity.

You do understand that these situations are not coming from nowhere, right?

Even if not yourself, but someone made here feel uncomfortable/ashamed about her home, maybe sometimes in the past. Where I live, people do the full reno before hosting for a reason - because people judge. I know quite a few people who specifically waited a long time until the work is fully finished before hosting.

You might judge the op but please don’t speak on behalf of all Mumsnetters! I wouldn’t judge and the dc couldn’t care less.

If you are a kind and welcoming person and your kitchen and loo are basically hygienic, that’s all that matters to me.

Op I would advise you to spend some time and energy on cleaning and organising and cutting back the garden. Buy a few nice plants for the conservatory and make sure the glass and floors are clean.

Make sure everything is uncluttered, clean and tidy, including the windows. Then paint a few squares from tester pots on the walls and leave out some paint colour catalogues. Stick a drawing of the floor plan on the fridge door. Visitors will get the message that you are planning to renovate.

It's a very prudent to overpay the mortgage so hold your head up high and invite friends in. If they judge you on your decorating standards then they are not worth bothering with.

As long as it's clean and safe people won't judge you on it. They will judge you more, however, if they have your child over to theirs and if you don't reciprocate.

I don't think you need to be embarrassed, I'd just concentrate on it being clean and tidy.

How about being outrageous and stopping trying to keep up with the Joneses?

Are gigantic snobs really who you want in your life?

This is bullshit. I hosted before we were able to Reno and extend our house, it was properly shit before. But I managed to make lunch for people, we had to eat off our knees on the sofa and couldn’t roast meat and have roast potatoes because the oven was rubbish but we made an effort.

The majority of families both work full time and have to manage maintenance or diy. You say you like getting out of the house at weekends, well take a few weekends to get some jobs done and you’ll feel a bit better about your home.

I live in a fairly mixed social area where we've had playdates with 4 kid families where the single parent or some of the kids sleep in the living-room/kitchen. We've also been to some beautiful houses. Ours is ok, maybe a bit on the small side and somewhat tatty. We happen to have become something of a "playdate" house, I presume since there are lots of toys, I don't mind the kids running riot upstairs and I put out loads of snacks for them. We probably have at least 5-6 playdates at our house a term, which feels like a lot!

My advice would be:

• Sort your garden for next summer. Unless it's actually hazardous, you can probably ignore it for now.
• Kitchen (including fridge) and bathroom need to be clean.
• Make it clear your bedroom is out-of-bounds and consider a lock/high bolt. If you're going to let kids upstairs, put away anything precious that you don't want them to touch.
• Deal with obvious hazards such as trip hazards, any exposed wires obviously and the broken doors.
• I'd recommend door guards (just the foam ones) on the doors to avoid fingers getting trapped. Although reception children are not toddlers, they often behave like they are during playdates.
• Toss any obvious clutter in a box in the shed/loft/your bedroom just before the playdate.
• Best thing you can do to smarten up your house on a budget is a lick of paint though personally I'm waiting until my younger one stops drawing and smearing food on the walls so we'll just have to be shabby until then!

I don't apologise for our house, it's where we live and it's fine for us. But I'm honest that at the moment living in a beautifully kept pristine home isn't a priority for us or something we can manage. I find people don't really care tbh or they enjoy having a general chat about property or home decorating.

Window cleaner will clean a conservatory for a bit extra on top of the normal clean. Think ours charged us 10 or 20 quid. Roof and all. With the right equipment that's a small job.

Not at all. I just made a few points to someone saying the people don't judge - they totally do (even on that thread). Definitely in the area where we are.

I don't need reassurance but mainly ideas on how to improve it on budget and have playdates outside our house - that's on the post!

Don't need a financial advice on what suits my family - i.e. not to overpay the mortgage, that out of question!

Got some nice ideas here! I.e. hiring a jet wash. That was very helpful, thank you!

People come to see you not your house. If they they judge you on an older kitchen then they are not people you need to be friends with!

No idea where you live but it sounds like an area/country that is very judgemental (& I'd hazard a guess and say affluent?) nearest example I can think of is my friend who lives in the North London 'set'. They all seem to live in show homes and yes I can imagine some of her friends do judge a house that wasn't insta-worthy. It's tedious and I couldn't think of anywhere I'd rather live but presumably you choose to live there with some idea of the area?

A bit like others, I'm struggling to work out whether your home is just not show home-like (ie normal!) or genuinely awful but either way, as long as it's clean and safe stop fretting or use your extra money to do something about it. Accept that this is your home if this is how you want it and please don't let your children suffer because of your shame & guilt.