Secrets of Naturally Tidy People

[Seabird]

Calling all naturally tidy people - pleease give me some tips! My house is always such a mess. It seems to me that this is inevitable with 2 under-2s, but everyone else's houses always seem to be tidy. How do they do it????

The children are at my mum's this weekend and I spent 3 hours blitzing the kitchen but I know that within minutes of their return it will be back to its usual state. My sitting room is full of piles of papers to deal with, mail order catalogues I'm intending to find time to look through etc - what does everyone else do with these? (Look at them immediately they arrive? If I tidy them into a pile I never find them again.)

The weird things is that when I worked as a lawyer my office was always immaculate! (I'm now a SAHM.)

Do I need a System??

I will be sooo grateful if anyone can help!

Sorry, although I said I prefer some mess to lack of cleanliness, I failed to clarify that my house is actually both untidy and dirty.

and bozza, it's easy, you just lift things up and clean under them, or simply push them to the floor.

My one and only genuine tip is to label your cloths for different purposes, with a permanent marker pen or stitch of coloured thread. I hate the thought of mistakenly using a cloth I have used for the bathroom anywhere else.

I'm surprised at talk of bins (plural). I have one-in the kitchen. Everything that needs throwing away comes downstairs,even if it means hurling it down to the hall from upstairs which i do regularly. I cringe at those bins under people's sinks full of hair,used cotton buds,and claggy tissues. Particularly if they are a wicker thing with an old carrier bag in as a liner.

Yuck! Yuck! Yuck!

(Good grief,can't even believe I'm writing this.....used to have a life..)

i have 4 bins for all of my recycling, to separate into. no bin in the house

(beat you MD)

Oh you would NP!!!

(Actually,I do have recycling ones in the garage,just hate grungy bins in house.

Have you started your new job? Anyone pinched your bum yet?

i LOVE my new job. i get loads of gossip and meet loads of old and new faces. lots of tips too (must be doing something right)

PLUS a life out of the house (what a relief that is)

i have to curb my desire to wipe the bar/tables every 5 seconds though, i hate ringmarks on the tables or dirty ashtrays (boak) although it is smoking outside only

the owner is delighted i used to be a nurse (god knows why)

kelly1978 - i think you are me

We have small pedal bins in bathrooms plus one under sink in kitchen (my Mum has them in every room in house). Nappies all go directly into outside bin. I have perfected the angle needed to throw them from knelt by the changing mat in DDs bedroom, over the stairgate and down onto the hall without them ending up on the landing. Recycle stuff gets piled on worktop in utility by back door and gets taken to bin from there.

Excellent np! Bet you're a right flirt (and the news that you were/are a nurse must send them all a-tremble. You know how simple blokes are.

I tried that once Bozza and the bag split on the stairs . It was a particularly nasty nappy as well

Wow I am SO inspired by everyone that my house is already looking better! I have received 32 emails from flylady who seems like a lovely lady (though I'm not sure how I'm meant to find time to shine my sink once I've finished reading them).

Caligula I have often fantasized about inventorizing my food cupboards. ROTFL about your Bree aspirations - I think that's the best tip of all.

Did someone already say - Hire a Cleaner??

almost40 I have a cleaner but I think what I need is a Life Launderer!

Which reminds me - Easy, LOVE your cleaner stories! You must update us if you ever find out what she thought the shoehorn was for.

I looked at flylady once,but it all seemed so complicated. Surely the time you spend reading the e mails could be spent whizzing around the house???

Yep, the e-mails... they were so many and so long that I doubt I would have had any time to do any cleaning if I spent time reading them. I just used the trick of the timer and then...lost the timer...

i never bothered with the flylady e-mails etc. it is more about planning my day and keeping a 'control journal' for me. i have a cheap folder from tesco which has 4 sections (routines, calendar, budget and addressbook) with printouts i've made on the pc. this keeps everything organized. i have a notepad for a daily to-do list and shopping lists. paperwork is filed straight away. bills go into the budget section, junk mail goes straight in the bin.

Here's a good tip for those of you who use sponge dish cloths.

When a cloth is being retired from wiping dishes and surfaces ... to less wholesome jobs (the lavatory springs to mind) simply snip the corner off that cloth so it'll never be mistaken for a dish or surface wiping cloth.

DH believes that if the kitchen table and counters are clear, and there are no toys on the floor - then the house looks 100 times cleaner. So that's what I try to tackle first.

Wouldn't work with me spider as they are all permanently scrunched up and also are hacked out of old babygros and teatowels and occasionally knickers.

(As my mother once said 'You could at least have cut the gusset (foul word!!) out!'

I agree almost40 my kitchen table was one of the things that was getting me down, always piled up with piles of washing to be put away, papers, ds's bouncey chair etc. For the last 2 days it has been clear and i reckon if I can keep it that way I will feel a lot more in control. Also having no toys in our line of sight while watching tv in the evening.

I haven't read the whole thread as I just came across it. I grew up as an untidy person and since getting my own place I'm suddenly naturally tidy. My parents house always was a complete mess, so perhaps i was a naturally tidy person all that time just waiting to come out.

I'm a SAHM with only 1 dd so it's a million times easier for me, but it's simply routine that keeps my flat tidy. I wash up after nearly every meal, and that nearly always includes cleaning the kitchen surfaces. Breakfast-time I use to do bigger jobs like cleaning the floor, fridge etc, because it's the time dd spends longest peacefully in the high chair. The living room gets tidied up as part of the bedtime routine, just before bath. In theory dd helps me! In fact the more involved you get your children the more possible it is, though it is harder & takes more time, and your 2 are still rather young...
Oh and on a thread I started about bathtimes, it turns out a lot of people use bathtimes as an opportunity to clean the bathroom!

Magazines etc are all in a magazine rack rather than in piles over the flat. No answer to finding time to get through them, i can never be bothered in the evenings!

Have now read whole thread
A few thoughts:
Re fun mums vs tidy mums. My mum is the culprit in my parents' house, not only untidy but a big hoarder as well, drives my dad mad. But I don't particularly remember her as being a "fun mum" who spent loads of time with us doing fun stuff either... Looking back, like i said, I think I was a tidy person desperate to come out and subconsciously the mess drove me up the wall! It certainly does now, when I visit. And I find it really difficult to tidy up after me & dd there because it's already a mess, but my dad complains if i don't!

Re Ladymuck's comment about babies staying where they are and therefore you have more time to tidy, well, I've found the exact opposite. DD wouldn't let me do a single thing when she was a baby, it wasn't till she started going down in the evenings that i could cook/clean/do the washing... I'd be up till 11pm getting stuff done every night.

Socks - I have a shelf (well, one of those canvas thingies) for odd socks too! Glad to know i'm not the only one!

Hoarding dd's pictures - i have a scrapbook where I put all the really special stuff.

Am I the only one who does not believe in making beds? I am actually opposed to it.

Cant believe i have just spend 20 minutes reading this whole thread!

My routine for a semi-tidy house is as follows....

Get up and have breakfast.... cant do anything on an empty stomach these days!
Turn on washing machine
Empty dishwasher
Wipe surfaces
Play time
While Jess naps - load tumble dryer or hang out washign depending on weather
Lunch time
Load dishwasher but do not turn on
Play time
Jess naps - empty tumble dryer/bring in washing - sort into her stuff and our stuff - 2 seperate baskets
Play time
Tea time
Finish loading dishwasher and switch on
Load washing maching ready to go on in morning
Tidy toys away
Relax

Once/Twice a week we will CLEAN as in dust/polish etc and is done between me and dh therefore taking no time at all.

Hoovering gets done 3 times a week.

DH irons as and when we need something ironed!

Paperwork - i deal with as it comes in, and is filed in a metal fireproof box!

almost40 -why? are you trying to start a fight

must admit Im a bed airing enthusiast, so I never make beds until theyve aired at least an hour. If at home, I put the blankets out of the window on good days, french style.

almost40, it's supposed to stop the bed from airing properly and thus encourage dustmites, so I never make ours, either.