To not understand how people have an evening.

[Littlebittiredoflife]

My children are 8 and 12 and we've not had an evening for basically that long. 8 year old is in bed by half 8 and older one up later but sorts themselves out. We're always washing up, prepping lunches, putting washing on, unloading dishwasher, until at least 10pm at night. I mean at least one of us is (obviously not me tonight as I'm writing this). I saw someone who said they watch TV together then one of them goes and reads and the other plays video games- are they getting in bed at midnight? Obviously when they were younger and needed more help with sleep and eating I accepted we wouldn't have much time to ourselves, either together or apart but we still don't seem to be getting any.

Also I'm aware we do have an evening but it seems to be spent on routine and never pleasure!

Do your DC have to do the chores daily?
If they're tired after homework and dinner then surely they should go to bed earlier? Catch up on chores over the weekend?

I hope you don't live to regret those words.

My kids thrived on a bit of neglect

Cool. Ask them about that when they get older.

Filling the dishwasher at 5? You do have to adjust pots to fit everything in. Yes they could pop a simple plate or cup in at 5 but realistically they are not properly filling a dishwasher at 5 and putting it on 😂 After dinner, we do the dishwasher, wash things that cant or wont fit in there, wipe down all the sides, hob, wipe down the table, hoover kitchen/diner. I would rather my 8 or 12 year old be getting on with homework/having a shower etc (or doing whatever any family does after dinner) than doing the clear up. Me or DH are happy to do that. Im not against kids helping with little jobs but an 8 year old is not going to do a proper kitchen clear up.

We both work full time so we leave all laundry to the weekend. Dinner is usually slow cooker or something quick in the week and we eat as early as possible. Homework is done before dinner and usually while I’m cooking. Dishwasher is put on overnight and emptied first thing while feeding the dog and eating breakfast. Dog is walked before the school run and going to work. Packed lunches are made by my kids and have been since they were 6yo. All cleaning is done at the weekend, although sometimes I do the bathrooms before I go to bed, but most of the time we sit down usually from
about 8pm otherwise we would burn out. My suggestion would be to give everyone a job in the evening to help reduce the workload.

We normally sit down for an hour or so at night together but my house standards are pretty low.

I totally get it though - we’re often not home from work until 6 then it’s a manic couple of hours of homework, cooking, eating dinner and bedtime then washing up and a bit of a tidy up / packing bags for morning etc before sitting down at about 9. We get up at 6:30 (have to leave the house at 7:30 for school run) so only get an hour of down time before our bedtime routine starts if we don’t want to be completely shattered.

I don’t have children yet (am pregnant currently) but I am worried about this when I go back to work purely because my husband and I have busy, stressful jobs. Something will be giving, as I currently get home from work / finish earliest 7pm most nights and am knackered so rarely get into bed post 9.30 and am up again at 6:30. I do a lot of batch cooking / meal prep at weekends to save time on lunch and onerous dinner prep.

Your titting around is other people’s wish to not replace a perfectly good washing machine nor spend on drying when it’s easy enough to hang out.

Exactly - it was sunny from March to September in our area of the SW last year (yes its not always like that). It would have been completely ridiculous to use a tumble dryer. There was another post this week about washing and as most said, you can get it dry even when its -2 outside if its bright and breezy. 5 mins in the tumble dryer if necessary.

Without sounding patronising, sorry if I do, enjoy this stage. No one warns you that mid primary onwards they might have clubs and will start staying up later. My 11 year old can’t get to sleep before 9:30/10:00!

I have a rule that I will not start cooking until the dishwasher is empty, then all used pots / trays go straight in as you cook and then finally the plates and cutlery after you’ve eaten - takes seconds.

But more broadly I think cooking from scratch every day and sitting at the table - for 2 courses - is not what most families are doing. Certainly not the kind of cooking from scratch that needs a recipe book. It’s all a while ago for me now but I don’t think I ever did more than 30 mins cooking on week nights - recipes (and for that matter, hoovers) are for weekends!

We have a 10 yo. We do family dinner before he goes to bed, cleaned up and dishwasher on before bedtime or by the adult not doing bedtime story. Then after bedtime storys (before 8.30 weekdays, later on weekends) we can chill with tv plus cuppa or glass of wine.

I do laundry first thing (1 hr wash) - put the wash on as soon as i wake, potter about making breakfast, drinking tea, making beds, get dressed, hang washing up before i go to work. 10 yo pretty independent in the morn.

Well I have listened to the advice on here and tried to be more efficient, kitchen all sorted but I’m still up with my 7 year old who is upset about some school stuff! Then my 10 year old will want a bit of a chat and story before he goes to bed ! I wanted to watch the traitors tonight, don’t think that is going to happen now.

They are older 😂

And all very happy, competent young people.

I was a child in the 80s/90s and back then parents didn’t do any of this kind of drudgery. I’m now a very capable and resilient adult with lots of practical skills and I thank them for not mollycoddling me.

Children have to take risks, problem solve and, within reason, fend for themselves - it’s a vital part of growing up.

Do you think it’s a coincidence that there are so many threads by parents exhausted and burnt out?

Hours of sleep I can only dream off :)

I manage very well on 5 hours sleep - often less

Why do you have crockery in use that cant go in the dishwasher?

I only have a slimline dishwasher, so pots and pans dont go in - they are washed as I go. Last night it was a steak dinner so the only pan waiting to be washed by hand after dinner was the griddle and an air fryer drawer. Wipe down the work tops , hob and table - 5 - 10 mins

I work, kids are grown now and we have grandkids, but we always had butts on chairs at 7:30 pm to have the evening to relax. Id pop into the kitchen before bed to see if the dishwasher was full enough to switch on or stick the washing machine on , maybe sweep the floor but seriously, stop putting pressure on yourself . Pick easy 1 or 2 pot meals to cook, take daily dessert out of the equation and sort the washing more sensibly so you dont have to have a wash on every day . I might have hot whites sat in the basket 3 weeks till I have a full load of those, same as a gentle wash

One thing I have learned is - keep the decks clear.

Dont be having piles of shoes, bags and toys on the floor - doubles vacuuming time

Dont have a load of appliances that you dont use daily on the work tops

And keep the wardrobes and drawers only filled with what you actually wear

Keeping the " decks clear' keeps everything so managable

45 minutes to eat dinner

9.43 and kitchen still to tidy. Sigh.
I did just go out for a nice walk though so…….

Tonight we got in at 6:15pm, oven on to warm up. The oven was warm by 6:30pm, dinner took just over half our to cook, we unpacked bags, unloaded dishwasher and draining board, loaded it with the days plates- oldest showered. Sat down to eat at 7:15pm finished by 7:45pm. One parent supervised youngest with bedtime, he was ready by 8:15pm, other parent finished loading dishwasher and put wash on. Sat down by 8:20pm to watch traitors but washing up wasn't done so one parent did that. Definitely had more of evening but no hoovering done (which I do once a week because I stupidly bought an unwieldy hoover two years ago that is a bit of a faff getting in and out the cupboard so I'd rather stick to once a week faff than every day) and dinner was pretty much a ready meal/beige frozen thing.

Will update how tomorrow goes!

We have lots of pans and crockery that can't go in dishwasher because we only got one last year. We have to use it because we don't have enough plates to not use them! Obviously anything that needs replacing is now bought as dishwasher safe but I don't have money to throw away.

So I spent the rest of the evening hanging out in the kitchen with dd12 who decided she wanted to make Brookies…we had laughs and chats. Baked and cleaned. DS10 came in for a while too. They had a yogurt/fruit snack and then he watched some tv with DP. All in bed now. Night night all. I know when they are younger the evenings are not completely yours but it will change. I would give anything to have a moment with mine as cute little toddlers again 🥹 with their fluffy hair and tiny hands. How blessed we all are to have our wonderful children ❤️

You can learn from this thread that if people aren’t doing jobs in the week, they are doing it either at the weekend or have a cleaner. Some people have said standards are lower (also ok). If people batch cook, thats most likely going to be the weekend (I cant think of anything worse but not a huge fan of cooking - some might enjoy that).

If you do daily washing, like your house clean and want to enjoy family time at the weekend, something has to give. Its the evenings for some of us. It has to give somewhere in the week for working parents. Everyone is juggling.

Also, it is only the very basics mentioned in this thread- if you live in a house with a garden, there’s a ton of other jobs to do every week (not quite so many in the Winter). If we left everything to the weekend - housework (we’re quite a large house), laundry, ironing, gardening and thats without any DIY (we’ve done a complete renovation), paperwork etc, our weekends wouldn’t be how they are now.

Youd be surprised what can go in there! The only thing I don’t put in is metal water bottles and wooden stuff. Even stuff the kids have made at pottery places survive it!

That’s good you have managed to watch some tv tonight though and sit down

Your kids are up too late. I make my 16 year old go to bed at 10am as he loves his sleep.

Get your kids to do jobs. My kid has emptied the dishwasher every morning since he was 5. He had a step stool in kitchen.
he made his own packed lunch from y3 because he didn’t want to have school dinners

put your washing machine on a timer. Load it in the morning to come on before you get home so it finishes when you walk in the door.

Check out FB marketplace for crockery. You can also get cheap-ish stuff on Amazon that’s dishwasher safe (pots pans etc). And TK Maxx!

i can also recommend multi-cooker / air fryer instead of an oven - no need to
wait for it it heat up and cooks faster (improved our time in that exact scenario you are describing when everyone gets home at 6-15 hungry and we still need to cook). Again they don’t have to be expensive (and they are cheaper to run than an oven).

I also can recommend cookbooks on one sheet pan cooking which is quick, tasty and again less washing up (The Quick Roasting Tin for example. I love it).

and we do lots of batch cooking and heat up leftovers (i so Do not have capacity to cook from scratch every day!)

good luck! You’ve got this!

I’d be off to big Sainsbury’s for set of dishwasher proof pots pronto and ditch the old ones. After dinner tidy up takes me 10 mins and that includes mopping the floor. All your tasks are taking a really long time. Could you possibly have dyspraxia?

Any supermarket will sell bog standard utility wear for less money then its taking you to wash up by hand

I chose years back when I got my dishwasher that it was there to save me time. So my lovely dinner service, coffee and tea service are stashed ( will end up in a charity shop eventually ) and I buy bog standard plain white porcelain. So I drop something, not a problem, just buy from where ever.

Ikea do a bloody good range of plain glasses, cutlery, pans and crockery for very very little money

It's not throwing money away - you are complaining you dont have time. How much is your time worth?