PLEASE help me to accept that my house gets trashed every weekend

[BalloonSlayer]

I am getting to the point where I hate weekends because the three of them (DH plus the two school-age DCs) seem to spend the whole time covering every available surface with utter CRAP.

I don't consider myself to be particularly clean or tidy; there are always piles of papers in various places, open a cupboard and it all falls on you, and I can't remember when I last dusted. But when the house gets this bad I become agitated and very snappy.

The kitchen table is covered, plus are all the kitchen worktops. And we have quite a big kitchen.

Yeah some of it is mine. About 5%.

It's Monday morning so most of my day will be spent tidying up. The rest of the week I will be fire-fighting, trying to keep the junk at bay, and I will lose the battle - as I always do - at approximately 10am on Saturday morning.

So, given that I know IABU to mind so much - what's a bit of mess in a loving family unit? - how do I stop myself from minding so much?

Any ideas?

My mum went around one day with a black bin bag and chucked everything out. It was very effective, we stopped leaving things lying around so much.

Tbh, I don't think we should be helping you minding too much, but finding ways for you to make your family tidy their junk away. It is obviously bothering you.

You are not their slave.

Do you tidy their things away or just leave them a pile to put away themselves?

This seems like a mixed message to me: is your house "trashed" or is it just "a bit of mess"? If it's the former, YANBU. If it's the latter, YABU. If the former, you need to train dh and dcs to put their stuff away. Or designate one area for "mess", and make everyone responsible for clearing up their own part of the mess.

Hmm - if your children are school age, they are old enough for you to explain that you do mind this, this is your home too, and that when they have finished with something, they put it away . . .

Our house is also far from perfect, which iw why there is no more room for weekend crap. Get them onside with you. You can always bribe them. Food or sport works for mine. I'm getting us a snack in a minute. Of course, if you help to tidy the table up, it will be quicker. Let's go swimming - as soon as all of this is tidied. You can have X for lunch if everything from the lounge disappears back into your bedrooms in the next 5 mins.

I had this conversation with dh yesterday. He seems to think there is nothing to get worked up about and gets cross with me getting cross iykwim.

Eventually I said ok but the toilets have to be cleaned every day. (I am very anal about clean toilets and we have 4!).

Really don't know the answer tbh.

our house gets very messy every weekend as well.
Could you instigate a half hour tidy round on a sunday night? the kids need to take stuff that is theirs from downstairs into their rooms you and your DH do it as well.
it won't CLEAN the house but it may make Mondays a bit easier for you.

I'm exactly the same balloonslayer. I hate it. Problem is that DH is just as bad as the DC. If a grown adult behaves that way how do you get the children on board? And he simply can't see that it matters. Genuinely. And tbh why does it? It's just mess, it's not life-threatening or a health hazard. So in the end I am left feeling it's my problem so I do it.

i did the same sort of thing as MmeLindts Mom, I went round one Sunday night and swept everything into bin bags and put by the front door, told them if it was still there in the morning it was going out to the bin men (bin day is Monday)

They didnt believe me, it went to the bin.

Following Sunday I did the same, this time they sorted out the bags.

After a month I didnt need the bags as they actually started to put things away.

If your children are school age, it shouldn't be entirely your job to tidy up - they are capable of learning to tidy their own stuff.

I'd try it in 2 attacks -

1. Have a serious conversation with them (maybe DH first so he's on side) about how you should not be having to spend so much time on this, and allocate a slot each evening, or just Sunday evening if that's the worst point, when everyone will tidy their things away. It shoudln't take long if everyone does their own.

1. If after a few goes of this they still won't pull their weight, tell them that from now on you will move the stuff into their rooms (on their bed works well!) and its up to them to sort it from there. That way the mess is at least not where you have to see it. I guess with DH you'll have to pick somewhere other than the bed though

let me know if you find out
mine are 3 and 1. Oh, and 38
it pisses me off sooooooooooooo much. especially on weekends where I have to work, like the one just gone. grrrrrrrrrrr

Alternatively, you could decide which particular surfaces are the problem - I can see that the kitchen ones must make it very difficult to prepare meals - and concentrate on those.

I too have this problem

Usually Friday's is my 'housework' day, where I 'blast' the house, so it's tidy for the weekend.
Come Monday I have to do it all again.

So...from today Monday is 'housework' day, that way as everyone else is out of the house the majority of the time it should stay tidier.

I work from home, and like the house tidy before I sit down to work, but just lately the houseworks been getting in the way, so hopefully my new routine may work!

My sympathies on this one - the weekends are starting to become a real problem here too.
I just seem to spend the whole time either clearing crap, cooking, preparing bags to go to various activities, clearing pots or getting annoyed at dh for NEVER taking the initiative on any one of the afrtementioned tasks.
I've had numerous meltdowns about it, throwaway comments, sarcasm you name it, does it ever filter into his brain that it's not just my responsibility on a weekend?
No.
I feel like I'm the grumpy stressed out one, whilst they are all having a ball.
He will help (sometimes) if asked, but is it too much to ask that he just sees the crap and deals with it, without wanting an effing nobel prize for emptying the dishwasher. I don't have time to massage his ego too on top of everything else.

I am going to sit down with dh this week to discuss - we had a bit of a stand off on sat as I did the usual of getting both ds's ready for parties, made breakfast, got ds1 stuff ready for dh to take, all he had to do was get himself ready and walk out of thedoor.
NExt week, big change dh is responsible for getting EVERYTHING relating to ds1 ready (epi-pen, inhaler, drink, change of clothes for football, football boots, hat, scarf, gloves, snack). I'm not going to life a finger. I'm not even going to remind him of the time, which he apparently needs in order to get just himself ready in time.

Sorry, hijacked for a rant but we're probably singing from ths same sheet aren't we?

God, our house is like this - I often do a tidy on friday so that its "tidy for the weekend"....HA!!!! Saturday morning its trashed.
I have started getting a bit more cross, and instigating a qiuck tidy up on staurday and sunday mornings.

I too resent having to spend all monday clearing everyone's crap.

Every saturday and sunday morning we spend the first hour tidying the house before anything is done.
I do upstairs and DP does downstairs.
The DCs do what jobs they are allocated.
I would be fuming if I was expected to clear up their mess from the weekend during the week.

BalloonSlayer, I'm the untidy one in our house. I collect magazines and scapes of important paper work that I haven't touched. Give them task to do. I told my DH on Saturday to put his washing in the machine. Its his clothes, I know he going to wash some of my stuff at the wrong temp but if I moan it will never be done again so I shut up. We also tidy up before tea/dinner then can't watch TV until dinner stuff is tidy. I'm happy to do a little bit more than DH as I'm sitting here in the warm while he is a work in the cold. But he needs to get up early to a cleanish kitchen. I have other problems he mountain of toys but that's for another thread!

just checking I did not write the OP...

I have tried AmuminScotland 2 steps method may many times. I put everything in their bedroom and they do not mind the least I think my DCs are immune to mess, they simply do not see it!

I am not ready yet to bin everything when the day comes, there will be a few faces arround the house.

Thanks everyone for their ideas. Reassuring to know I am not alone .

I do try to get them to tidy up after themselves. But it seems to be one more battle resulting in me looking across as the nagging mother from hell going on and on again. Other battles include: you're-nearly-nine-you-shouldn't-need-me-to-remind-you-to-brush-your-teeth, and my particular bugbear at the moment - turning lights off (WHY, when they are taught all this environmental stuff at school can't they have ONE lesson on turning off lights. I turned off NINE before leaving the house with them the other day.)

Another problem I have is that the stuff that tends to get left around downstairs is mostly stuff they have made. Either at school, or by their own creativity at home. So I am a little nervous of barking "get that upstairs" in case it comes across as not valuing their efforts. I dread it most when one gets the idea to make something out of a shoebox, then the other one has to follow suit and then you get the place cluttered up with blardy shoeboxes you can't move an inch nearer to the bin without "Nooooo, that's my computer!"

Then there's parties and frigging balloons (seem my nickname for details).

It's all compounded by DS2 being at a high-maintenance age which means I can't just nip upstairs with a pile of junk without reducing him to a heap of injured, anguished grief at the bottom of the stairs.

DH is good by the way, he encourages them to tidy and washes and irons. But always leaves one sock on the stairs, one wet item on a polished surface, erects a clothes airer to dry three socks, etc. Doesn't help the mess but at least he does it.

The good news is I am half way through my tidying and feeling happier already

I cannot stand mess either and like you dh is as bad as the dcs.

With dh, I put it in a big basket down his side of the bed which (a) means he hits his head trying to avoid it when getting in to bed and (b) can never find what he wants. I only do this when things have been lying around for a week or more. It has never made dh tidy up more but does give me a small feeling of revenge!

I have this problem - during the week my house just get's full of crap and my weekends are totally full up with gutting each room out, it really makes me and to think of the time i spent at the weekend tidying and even now it's only monday and i am sitting i my front room and it packed with the kids shit.

You gather up all the papers and stuff left on worktops into a huge pile. Dump it down in the living room and tell them that unless they pick out what is important and put it away properly, it's going in the fire.

Give them 10mins, then go in with a box of matches.

Set up a new rule. That if clutter is left lying around, it gets thrown away. So if it's important it's just tough.

You have to do that though.