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!

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

I’m exactly the same. Throw some lifts in the mix and it’s game over.

From reading your first post I was already thinking it… reading more posts this evening it’s a done deal.

GET A DYSON.

A cordless, wall hung, at the ready, stick vacuum. LITERALLY LESS THAN A MINUTE must be my average use of our Dyson.

Keep your bulky heavy duty thing too, but a quick grab of the Dyson will change your life.

And what the heck is this dessert every night thing? Is that taking time?

A petit filous after dinner till they hit late primary school. Then pudding became a weekend/special occasion thing.

Mine are 12, 3 and 3 months. I get absolutely nothing done in the day beyond keeping us alive. DH gets home at 6pm and has his tea (I eat earlier with kids.) I handle bed time for toddler at 7pm and husband cleans kitchen with baby either in bouncer or sling. I have a shower then come down and tidy the lounge, make lunches and make sure everybody has uniform/clothes ironed and ready for tomorrow. I then take baby off husband and he goes for a shower while I get baby to sleep. We aim to be on the sofa either watching a programme or reading by 8:30. Maybe my standards are much lower than yours!

If it helps, Asda have an offer on scoville never stick pans at the moment - 5 pans for £34. 2x saucepans, a milk pan and two frying pans. I love my stuff and it has a good guarantee if you register it I think.

Do you have an airfryer?

Those jobs would take me 25 minutes maximum. How are you three times slower? You need to get quicker. I keep my house clean with maximum 30 minutes housework a day. The dishwasher takes five minutes to unload, the same to load. Washing up is another five minute job. Putting a load of washing on the same. Hanging out up to dry is longer, 10 minutes. But none of those are long jobs (and many can be done simultaneously while cooking dinner, while things are simmering).

I guess you have time because you finish at 4, which is very early. We live in London and on a good day we finish work around 5:30, then have a 45-minute commute back, pick up the kids, and we’re never home before 7pm. After that it’s cooking, showers, tidying up, etc. I’m usually exhausted by 9pm and go to sleep—there’s no time for TV or anything else. Sometimes I leave work earlier to pick up the kids, which means once they’re in bed I log back in to finish work.

Sorry to be that person but they do specifically say never to leave your washing machine/tumble dryers on when you’re out and especially overnight. The message has been drummed home by the fire service. Mine goes on 6am in the week, abit later at the weekends. I know that wont suit some with work hours etc, but no load of washing or drying is worth putting your family or home at risk.

We’re pretty much at the stage where the kids can stay home whilst we work (in the holidays) but I wouldn’t leave either appliance going with sensible kids and wired in smoke alarms that alert our phones.

gettign my kids to tidy their room is minimum 20 minutes. They would take 10 to start as they get distracted then be arguing in 3 minutes, 5 minutes to get them back on track only leaves 2 minutes of tidying… the other stuff I don’t understand how it takes so long but I couldn’t get my kids to tidy their room in your time frame much less start the others….

My child is 10 but we've always had an evening. Even now, he's in bed by 9pm but before it was earlier. I don't do lunches at night.
Everything you've mentioned that you do at night can be done anytime of the day, morning, after school etc. I make lunches in the morning. I out a washing on whenever, the machine washes the clothes, takes minutes to shove in clothes and hang up.

I have a eufy omni e28 (worth the cash - its changed my existence, no more hoovering or mopping and I have 2 dogs and 2 children under 4). I have oak stairs which i sweep once a week and a smaller robotic hoover upstairs. The dishwasher and washing machine is an endless futile battle - and i moan like sin about it but it takes me max 15 mins to load and unload each of them (everything bunged in the same wash - i dont colour sort but also dont buy white!), dishwasher i wont buy anything thats not dishwasher safe now

Most of those tasks take 10 mins each and can be coordinated. Additionally at 8 and 12, one could wash and one could dry or put them away post dishwasher. Again theyre old enough to fold some laundry.

I wasn't talking about the kids rooms, I would tidy those with them at bedtime, do it every day it should take five minutes each as well.

The tumble dryer is the least trusted appliance in the house!

I hear you. If they ran in and speedily tidied it would take 5 minutes. But after years and years of trying, that is still not what happens.

I only put ours on when we are home and never at night. There’s been some horrific fires recently in the news and just not worth the (known) risk.

Do people not eat dinner with their kids? So many replies where they’re cooking & eating after the kids go to bed, surely cooking once & eating together would be so much more productive?

You don’t wash your shirts after wearing them all day?

I wear deodorant but that’s not so I don’t change my clothes.

Our plates and bowls are in a low cupboard next to the dishwaher by design.

Batch cooking doesn't have to be a special activity. Just cook double on the days you have time to cook something "proper" and then you have a frozen version for the days you don't.

But if you’ve gone to the expense of buying a dishwasher (presumably to save you time) surely it’s a false economy not to use it fully and still have lots of washing up to do. You can get a set of two sizes of plates and bowls for a family of four for £20 from Ikea. That’s not throwing money away it’s being efficient.

I can understand not putting hand painted plates in the dw but are you sure that the pots and pans that you hand wash can’t go in? Practically everything is dishwasher safe now. The only things I handwash are our expensive kitchen knives and my chilli water bottle.

Totally understand. I don’t get home from work till earliest 6.15, then by the time got dinner, sorted school stuff, clothes etc for next day, helped with homework then DD has a bath. She’s not ready for bed till at least 9 by which time I’m in the bath and bed ready to get up at 6am. I have absolutely zero time for TV unless I watch it on an iPad in bed between 9-10. 10pm is lights out.

Can you get up earlier and do some of this in the morning.
Make lunch in the morning, quick whizz around with the hoover?
Batch cook so you only need to heat some meals up so less washing up?
If eating dinner together and chatting with desserts is what you want to do thats fine but thats how you're choosing to spend your evening. We only do that at weekends. During the week we eat dinner together but 20 mins tops and everyone has put their plate in the dishwasher.