To think there must be more to life than working all week and then spending the weekend doing housework and chores?

[DBD1975]

Please don't get me wrong I watch the news and count my blessings.

I have a roof over my head, food on the table, running water and electricity and, whilst we have a very modest lifestyle, my partner and I can pay the bills and we aren't struggling to make ends meet (unlike a lot of people who are a lot less fortunate).

However, I have a very busy and pressurised job which takes up my time and energy during the week so household chores tend to get left until the weekend.

I have spent the majority of this weekend doing housework as shower room needed a deep clean as did the bathroom and kitchen. General tidying up in other rooms (small 3 bedroom house).

Loads of washing, sorting out the airing cupboard and now faced with a pile of ironing.

The drudgery just seems never ending as, due to some health issues, housework, chores and cooking take me longer to do.

My partner does his bit but works harder than me during the week and also has caring responsibilities for a parent so doesn't have a lot of time at the weekend.

Am I being unreasonable to think there must be more to life than this?

Genuinely interested as well in any labour saving hacks or electrical appliances which have taken the hard work out of housework for you.

My best purchase has been a robotic hoover which means the house gets hoovered every day which has made a huge difference. We couldn't justify the cost of a cleaner as when I last looked into this they wanted £20 an hour, which is roughly what I earn per hour (after tax).

OP a cleaner for 2 hours a week, even just to do bathroom and kitchen would be a very good investment. That is time free to take the DC out somewhere, for you to have a coffee, catch up with friends etc. Time is money and money is time became my mantra once I hit my 40s.

I have a cleaner for 3 hours a week (and Im not convinced she does that much) and I dont touch it in between apart from wiping worktops down and hoovering if I see crumbs. I never mop or wipe a floor. I dont know what is meant by a deep clean

There is dust on certain bits of the house in rooms she doesnt go in, lampshades etc I notice that. I also noticed the other day that the voiles which sit under the curtains are looking grubby so thats another job and its a nuisance to try to get them off the curtain rail because of the way its been hung so that will probably wait forever.

I don think Ive wiped a skirting board in my life. I iron things before I wear them and only shirts and trousers because Ive learnt how much smarter and put together I look if I do that.

I don't iron a thing, and have to look smart in my office job. I hang trousers to dry after washing, so they dry wrinkle free, and my tops and dresses are all jersey or merino and also dry wrinkle free.

Don't iron. Such a waste of time.

I do think the working class have been sold a lie.
Told that this is how life is, but it isn’t for those who are very wealthy is it?
I see more and more people retiring early. None of them regret it.
I won’t be working until state pension age. I will live frugally for a few years instead. There is more to life than working for ‘the man’ then dropping dead.

Re ironing, if you both work from home then that should in theory mean you are not regularly needing shirts / suits etc. I don’t iron school uniforms, I just wash them in small / very quick washes (20 min wash for 2-3 kg), then hang straight up, i hang, pull / smooth out to get rid of the worst creases. My ds has to wear a suit for sixth form, so I bought Next ones, which wash really well (in a quick wash with nothing else on the drum) and then hang them straight up, (jacket on a suit hanger, trousers smoothed out on an airer), and they dry well enough to avoid an iron. I only ever buy non -iron shirts for ds, and they come out of the tumble dryer crease-free (in a small load).

I’m a lawyer and have a busy job, this is what I do to stay on top of things:

• every day jobs: dishwasher, cleaning surfaces in kitchen
• every other day jobs: one load of laundry, washed and put away (put a load in first thing on a quick cycle and then whack in the drier)
• twice a week jobs (so they don’t build up, and I do this tues am & Friday am): hoover all floors and sofas, also invest in a robot hoover (I got mine secondhand off CEX and it’s changed my life)
• once a week jobs (I do this Friday at before work): bedding off and washed, deep cleans of all bathrooms, dusting of all sides

It is very much little and often. Clean before things are dirty so it’s less time cleaning. And declutter. I am not minimalist but because I don’t have hoards of things I don’t have to spend long “tidying” and it’s more about cleaning.

When cleaning one room if there is anything in that room that doesn’t belong there, place it outside the door of that room to move later - don’t leave that room until you’ve finished your cleaning.

I have a friend who outsources her ironing which I think is a great idea. I am personally quite lazy and don’t really iron I just throw things in the drier and then immediately stick them on a hanger when they’re hot. I have a steam iron that I use occasionally.

I also do a big online shop at the end of the month that gets delivered. I have a chest freezer. I meal plan what meals we have for the month. I only need to pop out once or twice for fruit & veg top ups. It saves so much time. I also tend to cook more than we need and freeze the left overs so I have nights off cooking. Small wins make a huge difference for me

I dont know how anyone just does 2 washes a week

We still have washing piled up that didnt make it in the wash over the weekend

Weekly we have PJs, bedding for a king and single bed, my OH's PJs are quite thick and heavy. He also wears quite teddy/thick loungewear around the house. Daily he wears 2 pairs of very thick socks because of the boots he has to wear and neuropathy, then there's our underwear, my work wear, my weekend wear, his work wear which is very thick jeans and shirts andhis weekend wear which are also jeans and thicker items

None of this fits in just 2 washes, its far too bulky. I think we did around 4 washes over the weekend (OH does it) and the bedding is still upstairs so I'll do that over 2 washes today and tomorrow.

And then we start again!!

Lower your standards. It saves so much time

I don’t wash jeans every time I wear them. Usually I wear them at least a week. If I don’t sweat much I wear tops more than once. I don’t wear PJs, so that helps (sleep naked).

Loungewear is washed when’s it smells! Again if it’s just for round the house it’s probably a week.

Bedding is sometimes weekly, sometimes fortnightly.

@DancingLionscould you share the details of your electric scrubber? Sounds brilliant!

I dont know how anyone just does 2 washes a week

I do.

There's only 2 of us. DH is in a trade and wears high vis clothing and is outdoors all day. He wears a tatty tshirt underneath and will only wear 2 in a week (it doesn't matter if he smells - they all do, and noone is around to smell them as they work in remote locations!)

I work from home and wear jeans and a sweater and don't wash them when I take them off. I just wash items occassionally (and I wash t shirts after one use in summer). I'm sitting there, not moving a muscle and certainly not sweating, so they don't need it. All of my clothes are cotton, wool, linen, silk, so nothing creates odours.

I have a cleaner who does 2 hours once a fortnight. Not sure what my hourly rate is but my overtime rate is only a bit more than the cleaner charges. It’s the one thing I wouldn’t give up! If you can afford it, you work hard, give yourself a break and do it.

I have friends who are in couples and are child free. Both work full time. They seem to have plenty of leisure time and houses which are clean. They are always going away for the weekend or going out for dinner or socialising. They certainly never mention they are doing chores all weekend. I think we can sometimes make ourselves busier than we have to be. Today I have a day off work...my windows are a bit grubby....and I have lots of them. I won't be cleaning them though...I will however sit down with a coffee and some daytime TV and ignore them!

We also have a robot hoover which is used on hard floors and does do quite a good job.

Lower your standards and make a plan to do something enjoyable each weekend, an outing somewhere, doesn’t have to be expensive

He wears his jeans for 3 days, then a fresh pair for the other two, he is in and out of vacant houses which are often damp and dirty etc, he is on public transport which is also quite dirty.

Then a pair for over the weekend.

I dont wash my clothes every wear but we do change bedding weekly, it gets pongy if not and makes the room smell. luckily we dont have thick towels, we have very thin linen turkish towels and so they dont take up a lot of room in the machine.

Loungewear wouldnt last him a week, it gets smelly and he hs very clumsy so there is often food spilt down it unfortunately

Tea towels? Bedding? Any cat bedding? No thick jumpers and cardies, certainly in this weather? Normal towels?

Dont you ever wash jackets or coats, I have to chase OH to do his, they get pongy round the collar

I just dont see how it all fits in together.

You could try to approach this the other way and decide what other things you would like to do- hobbies, evenings out, whatever. Then schedule that time in your diary and treat it as fixed, just as you would an important appointment.

Tasks expand to fill the time available. If you give yourself all weekend to clean, you’ll clean all weekend.

I don’t wash jumpers very often. I would say I wear them quite a few times, weeks maybe. I hang them up after wearing.

Jeans don’t get that smelly, even on public transport.

loungewear- I’m really clumsy. But again I’m wearing them in the house so it doesn’t matter if there is a coffee stain on them. They definitely don’t smell after sitting around house in them!

Towels once a week (ish!) I drying my clean body in them and hang them up to dry. I do aim to wash bedding every week, but it doesn’t stink if I don’t.

I don’t remember the last time I washed a coat or jacket. Surely if your neck is clean the collars don’t get dirty?!

Do you need to declutter? If you do then perhaps you could prioritise that? During lockdown I decluttered steadily just one box at a time. It changed my life.

Now I clean a little all the time. Like one window, one windowsill. And 'never put it down, put it away'. Once everything has a home it's easy.

So I do all the normal stuff and then yesterday the 'deep cleaning' was the bathroom windowsill and window and the sink. Today I'm doing the living room windows. Another day will be skirting boards.

It means you're never doing more than 20 minutes 'deep cleaning' in a day so it's not too boring. Maybe even break that down to 5 minutes at a time.

I have a dog. I wash his beds if they get particularly dirty. But not in a regular basis.

Ive never washed a coat in my life.
My thick jumpers are all made of wool - I don't own any that are synthetic, so I rarely wash them.
Tea towels are only used to dry clean dishes, so I'm not washing them several times a week.
We don't change our bedding weekly - we shower daily and sleep with the windows wide open, even in winter, so we don't sweat and the bed smells fresh for a couple of weeks. We've got 2 sets of bedding, so we can change the bed without immediately needing to wash the bedding anyway.
We rarely wash the dogs bedding - it doesn't smell as she isn't an oily dog. My mum's brutal and would certainly tell us if the house smelt!

Do you have a tumble dryer? I find that 5 minutes in the dryer and a good shake before hanging an item up to dry is enough to get rid of most if not all the creases.

@TattooStan I also have a mum with a super sensitive nose who would definitely tell me if anything smelled!

I also sleep with windows open all year round, wonder if that helps?