People who “do all that AND work full time”. HOW??

[Mickeymackey]

Please share your secrets!

I’ve seen people say stuff like this a few times on threads and I’m baffled. I only work 20 hours a week and I’m pretty much flat out 6am-9pm as it is and my house isn’t anywhere near as clean as I’d like.
For example yesterday
Up at 5.45 with dc 4, stripped bed, emptied washing machine and put another load on, made breakfast for dc 3 and 4, emptied dishwasher, cleared draining board, wiped over sink, cleaned oven (just a wipe over). Hung out 1st load of washing, got dc 3 and 4 ready, got myself ready, wiped round bathroom, made dc1 breakfast. School run for dc3, home, hung out 2nd load of washing, remade bed, dusted one and a half bedrooms, made dc1snack, took dc4 to toddler group, came home made lunch for dc 1and 4, took dc1 to medical appointment, straight on to school run, got home, made dc1 and 3 snack, finished dusting remaining bedrooms, hoovered bedrooms, fed plants, listened to dc3 read, transferred not quite dry washing to tumble dryer, folded the rest, cooked dinner and made packed lunches for dp and dc2, tidied up from dinner, folded washing from dryer and put it all away, got dc3 and 4 into bath, read stories, put them to bed. Finished tidying downstairs, had a shower, made a drink, sat down at 9.15 and watched one episode of something. 10pm made dc1 bedtime snack, straightened up lounge, went to bed.
Today basically the same just different housework/appointments/activities. Tomorrow toddler group in the morning straight from school then a bit of housework, make lunch, get dinner in slow cooker, work for 3 hours (from home) pick up dc3, take them to club and work for another hour in the car while they’re at club. Come home, put away laundry, dish up dinner, go to yoga, come home read stories and put dc3 and 4 to bed, eat my dinner, make lunches for everyone, shower…Thurs and fri usual morning jobs, get dinner in slow cooker do school run and then go straight to work, home at 5.45 straight into dinner, clear up, bath and bed for dc 3and 4…

I must be missing a trick. How on earth do people do it all AND work full time hours. Are you all doing your housework at midnight? Any tips welcome because I’m meant to be upping my hours soon and I can’t see how without letting things slide around the house!

@Dyrne

1) You have 4 children 2) It sounds like your DP does fuck all (you even make his packed lunch?!?) 3) You have insanely high standards

Get the kids involved in some of the chores. Does DC1 really need a snack at 10pm?
Tell your DP to get his fucking act together, make his own damn lunch, and point out that his penis won’t fall off if he picks up a Hoover.
Ease up on the housework - you don’t need to be doing a deep clean every day.

👏

I'd probably stop doing the snacks..

Yes how old are the DC? If number 3 is in school then surely 1 and 2 are at least old enough to make their own snacks, maybe lunches? And chip in as well, it sounds like you do it all?

Single parent here. Work one full time job + 1 day p/w (equivalent) as a consultant. One child.

• the house is clean and tidy but not spotless
• I only clean for max one hour in the evening a couple of nights a week and a couple of hours on a weekend morning
• I don’t bath DS every night (3ish times per week)
• school is within spitting distance of home and I use before and after school clubs
• when family or very close friends pop round and offer to help (eg by hanging out a load of washing or bringing dinner) I don’t stop them - took me a long time to learn that one
• I have one child
• I don’t iron. Ever.

Pretty much it really. Don’t seem to stop from 6.30am to midnight. Have aged about 20 years in the last 5. Fantasise about having a housekeeper.

Also yes. I often clean or catch up on work very late at night/ into the early hours.

I never clean the oven, rarely dust, don't have plants, let alone feed them, hoover/clean once a week (if that), often only change the sheets every 2 weeks. I also give myself a free pass on birthday/Christmas/thank you cards. I don't think it's possible to keep the house up to the standard you are used to and work more - but hats off to you for doing it with four children and a part-time job. You are a better woman than I am!

Apart from dropping your cleaning standards, what about school dinners for the kids? And having a 'brown tea' (oven chips and fish fingers or frozen pizza) once a week instead of using the slow cooker.

I live in chaos, dust and mess and just ignore it. Buys me oodles of time.

My house is pretty much spotless and tidy everyday..... I have one child. I have a cleaner who comes once a week for 5 hours. I have a husband who pulls his weight. I work from home.

I assume the don’t have kids under the age of 5

I have two kids.
Work FT. As does DH but his hours are longer (he’s a physician).
DH does his share of chores. Empties the dishwasher. Does the laundry. Batch cooks on weekends. Makes breakfast and packed lunch in the morning.
I get my kids to clean up their toys every single day. They don’t go up for bath/stories unless the downstairs and their room is clean.

I have a cleaner who comes once a week.
I do chores as I go along.

Yesterday:
DH made breakfast and packed lunch. I sorted laundry. DH fed the kids and I got them ready. He did the dishwasher. I dropped off to school and went to work.
Came back, supervised homework and music practice. Heated up dinner that I had batch cooked on Sunday evening.
When the kids were eating I put away laundry.
Sorted out school clothes for the next day.
Kids tidied up their room.
DH came in and supervised bath/bed/stories.
I did an hour of work. We had dinner.
Both worked a bit more.

Changing sheets etc is left for the weekend.
We have amazing tumble dryers that don’t require clothes to be hung out.

Our house is pretty tidy but as I said, two kids, cleaner, DH who pulls his weight, kids who are made to do chores.

You have 4 children so more than average and they sound young so naturally they need more attention and help. Less children less work.

I have a cleaner once a week. I launder all week long but its not a big task. Just keep on top of it. With 2 extra dc it would just be a few more loads. It doesn't need to take up the day. I don't dust at all. I suppose if I see a dusty side or a dirty window ledge I give it a wipe but it doesn't take long.

Do you have a huge house?

I don't garden, I don't iron unless absolutely necessary and I don't DIY.

I batch cook on my day off. I online shop but only recently started that and its now freed up 2 hours of my day off that I do more work.

Part time is the hardest as you're there enough to make the mess, but not to tidy it. When mine were small they were at the child minders from 8-6 so really it was 2 hours a day they were around to make a mess.

You're doing it all. You've got 4 kids. Give yourself a break

1 child
A weekly cleaner
Lower standards of cleanliness than I am entirely comfortable with

If someone's at work FT, then they're not in the house making it dirty/eating lunch there, and kids aren't there trashing it either.

It's the fact you have pre-school aged children, and four kids in total..plus no mention of Hubby doing anything? Also, cut your standards...Don't bother with dusting, or give one of the older kids the task of dusting in return for a treat/pocket money?

OP I hired a cleaner recently. It is literally the only way we can both keep on top of everything throughout the week, work full time, take the kids to their millions of activities, be pregnant and fit in some time to actually just sit down and breathe for an hour. We do both part WFH and do some of the chores in the day, but that depends on how the week looks!

You have FOUR kids and all that going on without the benefit of WFH. It can all wait. No one is going to come to harm because there are crumbs on the floor because you only hoover twice a week, or you only dust once a week, or the washing didn't get done exactly when planned, or you only change the sheets once a month (seriously, who the fuck has time for this every week, as nice as it is!). You also literally seem to do a full house clean every day which isn't actually normal, on top of all the things that come with raising kids!

Cut yourself some slack. You don't have to do all this cleaning every day. Dishes, even one load of laundry, fine. But what you do is excessive and you could use that time to actually sit and spend some quality time with your kids watching a film or relaxing yourself

I am a single parent with no other parent around ever, with two teenagers.

I am tired a lot and always on the go but...

I have half the number of kids, I now have a cleaner again which gives me back 3 hours a week, I change bedding every two or three weeks not weekly, I use meal boxes so I don't have to think about what to prepare...

It is relentless though!

Argh sorry everyone I though I had explained about dc1 in my initial post (was rushing to get it posted while waiting for them to come out of appointment). They have been very poorly and so are not in school. Has to take meds with food 6x a day and needs a lot of calories (hence the snacks). Most of their day is spent in bed either watching tv, doing school work or on phone though so I don’t need to provide much physical care other than the meals and snacks and medicine.

I have one other teenager, one in ks1 and a toddler. They all tidy their own rooms/stuff from around the house, help clear up from dinner, put own clean clothes away (apart from dc4), put bins and recycling out etc. I sometimes bribe dc2 to do extra eg mopping or hoovering if I’m struggling.

Dp works 6 days a week, 4 out of the house. On the days he works out of the house he gets up at 4.30 and is gone before 5.30. He gets home between 5.30/6 and does help clear up from dinner, helps the smaller ones tidy their stuff, sometimes does bathtime, takes dc2 to activities. He also does most of the household admin stuff (bills, insurance etc) because my head is full of kids stuff and dc1 medical stuff. On the days he wfh he gets up at 5 or 530 and works solidly until 8.15 when I hand over dc4. He then juggles work and childcare until dc4 has a nap. He does a lot and I don’t begrudge making his sandwiches!

@RedskyThisNight this is me trying to spread it over the week and keep on top of it . Housework is more heavily weighted to Monday and Tuesday because I don’t work those days so Mondays I clean bedrooms (not dc1and 2 they do their own) and Tuesday I clean bathrooms and all the downstairs floors are hoovered and mopped. Then Wednesday I just hoover the stairs and dust the hall and stairs if I have time and Thursday I only have to dust the living room, Friday the family room. So wed-fri is only 20 minutes of actual cleaning but the daily basics still take time! The kitchen is kept on top of after meals. Cleaning the oven is literally just a quick wipe over once a week so it doesn’t get too bad and the daily wiping over the bathroom is just wiping over the loo to get rid of wee drips (boys 🤮) and the sink to get rid of toothpaste etc. Not full on scrubbing or deep cleaning! It might sound like a lot of cleaning/laundry but it’s just enough to keep on top of things.

Hope that answers everyone’s points, sorry if I missed anything.

Meant to say with 4 dc no matter how free range and self sufficient that's a lot of work. If you're also cleaning your house alone that's hard. My cleaner gets round in under 3 hours. It would take me all day but I'd probably do a better job. I'd get knackered and not do it all in one day. Beauty of a cleaner is its all clean at once.

The simple answer is I don't know.
I have 3 DCs
Work full time (albeit from home)
DC1 has to get a lift to and from work each day as we don't live on a bus route and she isn't old enough to drive yet.
DC2 gets a bus to and from school.
DC3 has to be walked to and from school.
We also have a cat and tortoise.
My house isn't as clean as I'd like it to be, the washing gets washed, dried, folded but rarely put away and that annoys me.
Dishwasher is on at least once a day.
DH will do any housework as its needed and takes his fair share (also works full time).
I'm up daily from approx 6 am and go to bed anytime between 10pm and midnight.
We cook every day, and the chores seem never ending.
I'm actually sat typing this and reading other posts almost in tears as I just don't know how we do it.

Only read your OP (and not all of it)
I work FT. I have a cleaner / housekeeper, a DH who does a lot and only 2 DC who are tweens. That’s how!

Not sure if anyone else has mentioned it but have you tried the organiser Mum method? I would find that helpful in your situation I think.

@LovelyLupins

What’s jumping out at me is that your DP and DC1 (who I assume is mid-late teens if they are snacking at 10pm) are not making their own lunches or snacks. Why are they not doing this or doing more around the house?

This? You're making a lot of snacks?

I've only got 2dc so the laws of washing mean I have about 10% of the amount you have also have never dusted in my life, no intention of starting now.

DH does about 75% of dc related stuff like breakfast, ironing uniforms, school runs etc. I suspect the FT working parents split stuff a lot more equally than you appear to.