Realistic expectations of keeping a clean home

[JJ1992]

Ladies - i need advice and tricks for keeping a clean home.
I really struggle to keep my small home clean- by clean i mean bathroom, floors mopped , skirting boards etc.

Our weekly tasks like clearing out the fridge , regular hoovering, washing sheets and towels, emptying bins, shopping and never ending loads of washing seem to take up all my time. Im currently on maternity leave and cleaning a lot more than I normally would but even still my floors are grubby, my shower has water collecting and my tiles collect dust. I have a four year old and a 3 month old. What am I going to do when I go back to work??

How often are you mopping floors and cleaning the bathroom?

I think part of our issue is that my partner works hard and we like to spend time at the weekend socialising and visiting family. This means all of the grubby chores fall on me and I dont want to leave my newborn sat in a bouncer for hours on end.

I know that I dont need to stress about the house being immaculate but i would like to keep it to a decent standard.

Any advice on how to do this would be appreciated !

I have a cleaner coming twice a month for 2h each time to help keep on top of things. Skirting boards, cleaning windows, oven etc.

we clean the house every week, all surfaces, floors but also give the bathroom a refresh halfway through the week and clean kitchen as i go along.

1. Lower your expectations. Dusty tiles are not top priority.
2. Your DH has to help - you both work hard, you both need to clean.

Just make sure you wipe down the kitchen sides and wash up as you go. Clean toilet seat once a day with a Dettol wipe. Keep on top of the washing by alternating colours and darks on a daily basis. Put the hoover over when needed. Floors don’t need mopping every day. Change the bed covers weekly.

For context ive been on maternity leave since may and have mopped the floors maybe 4 times ? 🙈 hoover or sweep most days though

I never dust unless it really jumps out at me

I have never cleaned a skirting board, keep reading about skirting boards on here and really cannot fathom what people are doing. Yes if you have building work done, like when we had the kitchen done, I think we had to go round every little surface and crevice, Ive just had some other work done in the house so was wiping the window sills today and some of the window frames, not sure Ive touched them in years (frames), dusted off the tops of the rads where there was dust and will do the bannisters later. Wont do much else

Mop the floors when I feel like it.

I wipe round the sink with my hand in the morning in the bathroom.

Beds are done weekly

Squirt of bleach down the loo each day, wipe round with a anti bac wipe round the rim and seat.

Thats about it really

I do have a cleaner once a week, she mops the hard floors, hoovers rugs and cleans the oven top, cleans the bath and shower screen.

I havent cleaned inside the oven for years.

Like someone else suggested get a cleaner in twice a month. that will really help

You never cleaned your skirting boards or your oven? Well that’s filthy

Well Im looking at my skirting boards now, they're not dirty. What would I clean them for?

Inside oven, well, I dont look in there and it doesnt affect the functioning of the oven, so again, why would I be bothered?

I know! Skirting boards? Not important

This sounds like you’re doing okay. 4 times is once a month. If your partner also did once a month you’d be doing it every 2 weeks which seems reasonable to me.

Really tough to juggle children and house cleaning.
Have just bought a robot vacuum cleaner and it's a game changer! Some also mop bit haven't tried that yet on mine! It just takes one job off your hands and makes everything feel and look so much cleaner!

Agreed, I’ve never cleaned my skirting boards either. We moved in a year ago, I’m sitting in my bedroom now and just went and ran my finger over the skirting board in here. It’s clean. Why would it get dirty?

I do clean the ones in the hallway where my children take their shoes off. I do it when I mop in there.

Her DH doesn’t have to ‘help’ he has to ‘do his share’ language matters.

It doesn’t need to be hours.

I wipe the bathroom over most days.

kitchen is cleaned every time I use it.

hoover and dust daily.

if everything is tidy I can do the whole house in 20 minutes.

I do the washing over the weekends (my kids are older now) and basic daily maintenance is enough.

Fair enough 😂 won’t be me but if that doesn’t bother you then you are good!

Thank you - all sound realistic responses ! It's so hard living in a small home with kids - feel like there's clutter everywhere ! But we are lucky and I love our home - i want to keep it nice !
My partner is very helpful and he either cooks or cleans the kitchen every night ( we take turns ) its just hes not physically here to help through the day and at the weekends we use our time doing other things - cleaning doesnt come high on our priority list when its not the essentials.

I do think we need a cleaner but its not really in the budget at the moment

I'd love to hear what robot vacuum cleaner you have. I've heard mixed reviews about them, but vacuuming is my most dreaded household chore, although the stairs are by far the worst bit and I haven't yet seen a robot cleaner that can do stairs. I'm sure it will come one day!

Cleanova w9 - it doesn't do stairs, which would be good!! It does need emptying after each use/day.
Haven't tried the mop facility yet but once you get the sweeping sorted on your phone it's pretty good!

I clean my house top to bottom once a week, 4 bed 2 bath townhouse. DH and I divide and conquer, when dc were small we had a cleaner twice a month. I absolutely lowered my standards when dc were small, now they’re older I have the time, energy and storage to have the home of my dreams. We’ve not had a cleaner since Covid but we have a good routine and it’s easy to keep on top of when it’s done weekly, it’s really not a big job.

A cordless vacuum changed my life ! I used to absolutely despise hoovering. We got a Samsung hoover for about £200. It's amazing- had it 3 years and its still going strong. So easy to click out and use

how long are you spending on any job ?

And how much effort will your other half be putting in once you are back at work

fridge - a quick wipe of obvious muck just before reloading only takes a few seconds

bins take about a minute to empty and that doesn’t happen daily

vaccum - once a week, 10 mins for the whole house , only do a deep clean occasionally

washing - we don’t really sort and such - stuff it in and turn it on and walk away - not a minute. Takes 5 to hang and 5 to bring in and put away

mopping floors - quick swipe during the weekly clean - don’t worry about the corners and such most weeks

if you keep basically on top of things then the extras - the bells and whistles- can be done occasionally

I’ve got a Q10 Pro. It’s great for vacuuming. Maps all the rooms and you can choose which rooms to do and when, and also level of suction and if it goes over the carpet once or twice. Can also take upstairs and it does up there too as you can save 3-4 different maps. Stairs don’t take too long when it does the rest of the house. Mopping function isn’t great but I bought it for vacuuming. Very happy. Quite a big house and took 1-2 hours vacuuming prior to this and hard work. Now gets done much more frequently.

On a day to day basis I wipe down the kitchen, once a week the hob ( its a gas hob ) hoover every other day, dust living room surfaces once a week- sometimes once every two weeks, hoover stairs about once a fortnight. Clean bedsheets constantly at the moment, bins are emptied whenever they need to be, entryway tidied about once a week. Fridge tidied weekly - not cleaned enough though !

It's jobs like wiping round the windows , cleaning windows, cutting grass and weeding, mopping floors, cleaning bath/ shower, wiping bathroom down , cleaning mirrors - all these type things that I am definitely not doing enough. But literally when can I do this ? 😂 I do have chill time eevey evening- tend not to do much after dinner except maybe hanging / putting away washing. Magbe I need to do more at nights ? Although the idea of this devastates me 😂😂

Yuk. That is not nice.🤑

What is your husband doing? If not helping, get a cleaner