How do you manage your time???

[sb34]

Message withdrawn

Like all of you I am totally useless. But here are my tips for sucess

Every morning I try to do one thing before work (ie put a load of washing in, or tidy my girls room as I get them dressed) actually this morning I was up early-ish for me and had to strip the beds (both girls had wet the beds!) and while one was in the bath (stank of wee) I cleaned the sink, loo and windowsill in the bathroom. I feel very virtuous today! Bear in mind this morning chore is a max of 10mins while the girls watch CBEEBIES

Every evening I also do one thing, hoover one room, clean the kitchen or whatever.

I have a rule that only the kitchen, living room and hall are important to keep cleanish and tidyish so if anyone drops in I am fine.

Therefore every week (well at least once a fortnight) every room gets done at least once.

Lastly I don't do paperwork if I can avoid it (everything is paid DD) neither does dh, tax returns wait until the last moment. All papers are piled, shoved into our huge roll-top desk and can be hidden.

However I am really lucky I work full time and have a nanny so I don't have lunch mess or teatime mess to deal with, usually it is all done by the time I get home. Also we have a dresser in the kitchen which is full of kids toys, so I can shut the door on rubbish. My nanny has organised me by buying storage boxes and named them, so we have a 'train' box, a 'farm' box etc, tidying up is really easy.

God I sound like a flylady without trying. However I am a total slut and have very low standards, hence my whole living room takes 10 mins to clean (including hoovering, I only dust when I can write in it!), I am only obsessive about my kitchen, but its brand new!

I agree with Crunchie about only the main rooms need to be tidy. Also a good idea to do things early. I work but if I have a day off with the children I try to get dinner ready (eg casserole, veg prepaped, whatever) BEFORE we go out in the morning (I know it sounds a bit scary but it does make you feel better). I am also a great list-maker but it is important to make them manageable and include things that won't take much time (eg post letters). I think in this day and age we spend a lot more time playing with our children and doing nice things with them than our mothers did, at the expense of the housework. Mind you, I think this is a good thing, so don't beat yourself up about it. sb34, please try to go to bed earlier than that, nothng housework-wise can be so important. I say as long as everybody's fed (ie, shopping, cooking, washing up) and clothed (ie washing and ironing, which I actually enjoy) then the rest (dusting, cleaning windows, steam-cleaning the sofa cushions) can just go hang. But if it's really getting you down, can you go for a cleaner a couple of hours a week? A friend who is a SAHM has one and doesn't seem to feel too guilty.

I keep boxes downstairs, one for each bedroom and bathroom upstairs. Everything gets flung in it during the day and carted to the appropriate room at intervals. This helps to minimise the 'Piles' syndrome where the stairs and living room are littered with various piles of washing, toys etc.

Enid, I have terrible trouble with Piles, lack the self-discipline to make sure they are taken to the proper place and nobody else ever does it of course...and the downstairs Piles (books, papers, catalogues etc) just breed, I start out with one or 2 little baskets and end up with a laundry basket full, and then am completely overfaced by the quantity and just ignore it. Today, Matthew, I am going to be Enid!

We had supper with friends on Saturday, they have 2 children (15 and 12) who never come downstairs apparently, their house is the most immaculate thing you ever saw, even the kitchen looked like a homes magazine feature. They have no Clutter, no Piles, no Dust and no Books. Bit scary really! At least our house looks lived-in...

The parents of another friend were once burgled while they were on holiday. Said friend was summoned by the police who said the place had been ransacked. When the friend got there she said no, the house always looked like that!

Oh, I've got piles too!

Fly Lady is a scary woman, beware! Although I did like her idea that you could just do something like wiping light-switches for 15 mins whereas if I set myself this task it would be wiping light-switches, sockets, skirtings and doors which would take much more than 15 mins so maybe I need to concentrate on that sort of thing more, breaking tasks down and making them more manageable.

from the brief peek I've had, flylady looks a bit like a Gina-like figure wonder if there's a correlation between fly-Gina mums!

Yes, if you don't like GF's "bullying" then you probably won't like Flylady! However, like GF you can read it, take the bits that you like and ditch those which won't work for you.

Wiping light switches???

God, I'm a slut!!

Can I just say - thank god for CBEEBIES ... I wouldn't get half the stuff done without it.

(although every now and then I suffer twinges of guilt from the memory of me saying "I would never let my child watch more than half an hour a day of TV before they were 2.....)

Dear Azure can I add wipes for the floor, for glass, and shame on me, deodorising wipes for when I can't even have a shower!!!!!!

Add to the shame, I am a SAHM, have only one child, who's a nursery 3 mornings a week, have a cleaner once a week, and I still can't manage to do things...(I don't even go on mumsnet that much as my pc carshes evry 30 minutes!!)

This should be enough to make you all feel better!!!!

Oh god, I've just looked at FlyLady... that looks so scary...

... why do I get the feeling I'm going to end up joining it?!

Tissy life is too short.

Come on, no one wipes their light switches, do they?

Um, I do, but only cos the switch boxes stick out a fair way (about an inch) and the dust they collect is horrid (and I only wipe them if I happen to think of it while I have a duster out).

What I found was scary was a parenting class I went on and they suggested you got your child helping you to clean a door as an example of an easy chore/responsibility you could involve your offspring in. Wiping doors?! But, but ... they're vertical, they don't get dusty!!!!!!

Panelled ones do but it only shows if they're painted. We had ours stripped

DS1 & 2 like cleaning things with baby wipes but they can't reach the light switches.

Fly Lady does.

I find they do get quite grotty after a while but would probably do them with my once every six months (but probably nearer a year) wipe down of all the woodwork etc, I tried Fly Lady's technique last time I did this (pregnancy nesting mind you) and it made the job seem less daunting, just a little bit at a time rather than trying to do the whole lot in one day. Maybe this is why my house is a tip mind you.

GeorginaA, your kids must be ever so good, DS1 sticks boggies on my doors and that's not to mention the chocolatey fingers etc, DH is not much better especially if making a sandwich and a cup of tea in the kitchen with the nice crusty bread that has flour dusted over it, every cupboard he opens ends up with big floury handprints on, grrrr!

I guess when it comes down to it, you just have to lower your standards. I was always a complete slut housewise (and possibly other ways as well, but that's another story)

I do dishes once a day, in the evening. I work on the premis that if I have a clean cup for my morning cup of tea, and enough bench space to put it on, I'm happy. I wash the kitchen floor using the washing up water from the dishes if it isn't too greasy.

Ditto dd's highchair. I clean it after she's gone to bed. I only pick the toys up twice, once during her lunchtime sleep and once when she's in bed at night. I have a little toy trolley in the living room. All loose toys get heaved into them. Washing gets put on before work, hung up/put away while dh baths the sluglet. I don't iorn. The bathroom is cleaned before I have my shower. Rinsing off the bath is so much easier while you're standing naked in it.

As for the rest, I have the excuse that the sluglet is frightened of the hoover (possibly because it comes out so rarely) Every now and then I deposit her with her ever doting grandparents or ban her and her father to the park and run around frantically vacuuming and cleaning surfaces.

Mind you, I only have the one child and very very low standards.

I find it really difficult to let the housework go (although this is what happens!), so my rule is to give the house a really good clean whenever someone comes to stay - and as lots of our relatives/friends live miles away, this happens every few weeks!

Day to day cleaning kind of gets done when ds is asleep - thank god for long day time naps!

I just about get time to cook him something to eat by putting on his favourite video - buys me 25 minutes of peace!

Would love a dishwasher + cleaner, but no money (although keep meaning to advertise for a cleaner anyway - I'd find the money if it meant the place got hoovered more than once a fortnight!).

But there's no time at all (it seems) to do the extra stuff - like write Christmas cards (aargghh!) and phone people - I'm either entertaining ds, at work or asleep!

Dp and I have recently made a BIG decision - to get a regular babysitter and go out once a month -time for each other - yeah!

Not particularly good, Demented, ds (18months) just hasn't worked up to a full scale damage yet That and I choose to ignore a lot (I have a lot of low level glass windows that have lots of sticky fingerprints on them which I conveniently ignore, but at least I know I'm supposed to clean them regularly even if I don't - never occurred to me to clean a door!)

this is a fantastic thread, and i thought i was the only untidy person in the world - whenever i go to someones house its always tidy. but as well as piles of washing clean and on the table that never seem to get upstairs and the pile that looks at me when i go into the kitchen waiting to be done i have piles of guilt to about the stuff that doesnt get done so i have an imaginary list that goes.." i must wash the curtains, wipe the light switch, wash the doors and skirting boards and i must clean behind the toilet and wash the windows and weed the garden, clean the car, get it serviced ....." oh dear the list seems endless

I'm going to show my dp this thread as we had yet another row about the state of the house yesterday. He thinks I'm the only person in the world not to do housework and to not like doing housework. Even though he leaves his tools everywhere and every room in the house is half done it drives him mad that I leave books everywhere. Instead of having a go at me over the lack of housework being done why doesn't he get on and do it himself? He finds ironing therapeutic but its hanging out of the basket, he's complaining he's got no clothes to wear but rarely does he take the laundry basket downstairs to wash, as for the dust well .... dusting has to be the worst job ever, you do it and then 10 minutes later its dusty again cut out the middle man I say and leave it. For the record I work 4 days a week and do most of the care for ds. I think he wants a 1950s housewife who'll do the housework, have a kid who makes a noise only when asked to do so and have his dinner on the table every night when he wants it. Me thinks he'll be waiting a long time lol.

megg, can't remember the exact length of time but Quentin Crisp (The Naked Civil Servant) reckoned that after a given number of months - maybe 18!!!! - the dust never gets any worse.

Not sure that line will impress your DH though.

Every once in a while, I crawl around the house on all fours, it's horrific !!! You suddenly see all these yuky finger prints and encrusted food, at child level, on walls, doors and door frames.

What you all need is a nice big cupboard under the stairs !!! God knows what's in mine - but Hey - the house looks tidy enough !!

As for wiping light switches and doors - ROFL - I only wipe faces, hands and bums now !