How do you keep your home clean or tidy? I really really can't do it?!

[smugtandemfeeder]

There is dirt on the dirt. Everyone except me and DH has weed and pooed on the sofa and all the carpets. The laptop hard drive has broken for the second time due to DS being rough with it. We have mess everywhere. As soon as I put stuff away DS sort of rolls it all back out again. There is a pile of clean nappies on the sitting room floor which DS has 'sprinkled' flour all over. There are numerous little bags full of random shit which DS has collected and stored throughout the house.

I can't keep on top of it.

And don't even get me started on the washing.....

Is there any point getting a new sofa or new carpets?

It's utter chaos and madness here.

I've been looking at cleaners Ben10 and found one who also tidies up and helps you declutter. She is totally booked up though so I have.sent her a desperate pleading email.

Extreme I did have a nice serving dish until yesterday. For some reason it was on the sofa for two days then finally DS who is 3 cracked it clean in half headbutting it having a melt down. Urgh.

My cleaner will tidy but obviously it will reduce the actual cleaning time and this house definitely needs seriously cleaning despite only being a small 3 bed terrace with 3 people in it

I also spend dd's DLA on a cleaner. They don't tidy up, well they arrange the clutter in straight lines, sometimes in ascending height, (do I have and ASD cleaner??) but dd is so paranoid about the cleaners doing something with her toys that she can be coerced into tidying away before they come. (I'm still working on dh to do the same with his stuff....)

When the house is tidy she is calmer. we have less meltdowns about missing/damaged stuff. she settles better at night. she's also (so far) had less bugs (but it has been the summer)

I'm slowly getting it sorted so that everything has a place to live and that the stuff I don't want her getting is out of reach. It's a slow painful journey and my house is still a bit of a sty compared to most people that I know but it's come along way already.

Oh and we had a pee on the bed incident (ironically caused by the cleaners shutting our kitten in our room) and we hired a professional cleaning company to sanatise it. it only cost 20 something quid for a king sized bed. I think you can get sofas cleaned the same way. It was steam cleaning but way beyond anything I could do with my mum's (expensive) home steam cleaner.

Good for you Ben10 you deserve it and it takes the pressure off you. I would hire a cleaner but the trouble is its a small town and the thought of someone I know cleaning my house would make me cringe.

Its daft I know but even though I know I am in a pickle I detest anyone helping out as it just makes me worse feeling that I should be able to do it. My MIL attempted cleaning it once before DS was born right down to me coming home from work and finding completely different curtains in my kitchen! It didnt look like my home and I felt horrible because she managed to do it in a day. Boy I went scatty when DH got home The only one I dont bark at is my Mum. She is OCD at cleaning and always has been since we were little living at home. My brother also has OCD. You would dare not lean on a cushion for fear of creasing it and starting her off all over again. But as I am used to her ways and understand why so there isnt a problem. Funnily enough DS actually loves cleaning with her and is a dab hand at pulling cushion corners so I so wish she lived with me

As for pretty things. The only fragile things I have out are Tpots that I collect but they are ceiling high!! Everything else is wrapped up and never to be displayed which seems such a waste. My fruit bowls live in the fridge lol so DS doesnt think of throwing them as they are not within sight

Well I have just paid DS 50p to help me clear out his room and we have a whole crate of stuff to either freecycle or chuck. There is no way that he would be able to tidy his room himself as would make more mess being distracted and finding other stuff so seems a good compromise

Coff I have had to get used to others helping me as have been off work sick since November. As I have no option as I can't do it myself, it takes the embarrassment away. Also I have never met this lady before and she is through an agency - I never see her around town :) Sometimes we all just need to accept a bit of help.......

This thread is great. Apart from the dirt and several crates of accumulated junk our living room is ok. But there's loads of mess in the kitchen and bathroom, the bedroom floor can't be seen for laundry and the kids can't play with any toys cos they're all shoved into the spare room along with all the clothes that actually might be right for the season or even fit them properly. Luckily the lack of play skills and dislike of wardrobe change go some way to mask my neglect. and this really is pretty good, cos before I used ds's dla for a cleaner it used to be much much worse.

Yes it is a great thread. I came on here today when DS fell through the rabbit cage because he decided it was a mountain and dragged rabbit poo through the house, spilt a pot of salt because he had gloves on (I know....its summer) and it slipped, decided to use DDs bodyboard down the stairs didnt break his neck thank god but on crash landing upturned the phone table at the bottom and a cloud of po-puri shot up in the air. He then ran for it and stuck his foot in the cat litter tray (clean ) and yes you could have dont a sand dance in the extension sigh....................

I got them together closed the front door and went to the park. THEN came back and cleared up. No swearing.......honest

Maria, I also have a spare room that the cleaner can't doesn't clean as there are all of the clean clothes still to be put away, piles of books and random stuff shoved in there.

Coff I guess at least you don't have cat and rabbit poo all over the house

YOu know what? This is the BEST thread I have read in ages.

I never feel good enough when trying to keep on top of housework but now I am NORMAL - YAY!

Proud I started it

It has cheered me up no end and made me realise that just because friends with NT children can keep their homes tidy does not mean we can. Its yet another thing which goes unnoticed they just think im a dirty bitch which is caused by the level of stress our lives are under.

Ben10 - can I add duck poo to the national collection?
I had opened all the doors to air the house, got distracted and all the ducks waddled in.

Does anybody else child keep 58 million projects on the go at the same time?

Hama beads, moonsand, painting, drawing, gibber.

Duck poo! yay! we have quite a collection going now

Well our trip switch went early hours of the morning and my alarm didnt go off. Soooo I slept in and guess who didnt AHHHHHHHHHH!

ohhhh what a beautiful mor........ning, oh what a beatiful dayyyyyyyyyyyy

I've just found this thread and its such a huge relief.

I really struggle to keep on top of my house. Not helped by the fact that it is in fact the size of a shoe-box and there are five of us and two dogs in it.

My biggest thing is that I never seem to get around to doing the floors. There's just so much stuff that needs shifting first and that combined with dealing with the every day disasters and chaos - particularly in the school holidays means I just never reach a point where its feasible.

Visitors are strictly by appointment here as well, with the exception of my Mum who is a) used to it and b) very short sighted so doesn't notice the worst of the dirt.

A month ago I did a major spring clean, cleaned everything from skirting boards, to picture rails - every bit of paintwork in the house, sorted every cupboard and cleaned every surface within an inch of its life. This was because the trustees of the house (it was inherited jointly by myself and my sister in trust) were coming for an inspection. Four weeks later and you'd think it had never been done. Its so frustrating I could scream!

Gentle otter, all three of mine do that - the boys currently have drawing and car designing on the kitchen table, a half built den in their bedroom and are in the process of using every single gogo they own (and there are hundreds) to design a massive picture on their bedroom floor - oh and ds2 has about 20 lego projects on the go as well and ds1 is reading two magazines and three paperbacks which are scattered throughout the house.

I do have to admit that the gogo picture is pretty amazing though - they've sorted gogos into colour groups and then used them to do trees, the sea, the sun etc. I suspect ds2 is the one who 'designed' the picture and ds1 helped with the colours etc though as ds1 is unlikely to have been able to see gogos as anything but gogos. I am currently ignoring the chaos this little project has created because it has had them working together without fighting for an hour and a half now.

Almost forgot dd (age 2) has a massive mega-blok tower, two jigsaws, a train track and a pile of musical instruments out on the living room floor as well.

Oh .... spoke too soon - ds's are now having a full on scrap. It was nice when it lasted.

Cheap fleece throws (Ikea, Primark) for sofas or leather replacement sofa

Replace carpets with laminate where possible. If not invest in a good carpet cleaner.

Make your own deodoriser/antibac spray out of aromatherapy oils (fill spray bottle with warm water, add a squirt of shower gel and 10 drops each of Lavender, Teatree and Rosemary) Safe, doubles up as cleaning fluid too.

Child locks on cupboards, stairgates on every room.

Babywipes are a good quick-fix cleaning solution. Just have a pack on you at all times, wipe up any mess you see. Cheapie basics range is best.

Adopt a "fuck it" attitude to the mess during the day, then whizz round for an hour in the evening armed with 2 bin-bags,wipes and spray. Anything broken, obvious rubbish, poo, food debris in one, clothes, toys, invisible pets etc in t'other. Souse rooms liberally in spray, use wipes to remove stains, spills. Chuck clothes, dirty throws in washing machine, toys back in box, invisible pets back in basket.

Use stairgates to create zones in your house, reserve one area for mess. Bathroom, kitchen are no-go areas.

The stinkiest thing that ever happened to our sofa was when both ds's decided it was funny to pour milk liberally all over it! I only turned my back for a couple of minutes and the pair of them had managed to sprinkle milk out of their cup and bottle all over the cushions and base.

Nothing we did could get rid of the smell and we seriously thought we were going to have to ditch our relatively new sofa. In the end it took a liberal dose of biological cleaner (the sort you use for puppy accidents) the cushions being put outside in sunlight every day for weeks and a thorough clean with tea tree solution followed by several bicarb vacummings. The smell as gone, but after all that scrubbing and cleaning the poor sofa has never been the same since.

I am just about to start toilet training dd. So I'm sure we'll be having plenty of mess to clean up over the next few weeks.

Yesterday was a bad day in the life of smug and her sofa. DS had a very very bad day and decided to wee and poo all over the sofa. On the bare cushions while I was washing the covers he had also weed on. The puppy then weed on top of his wee. We decided the sofa has to go. Foul Foul Foul. Whilst out at church the cat weed on the DS/puppy wee. Triple wee pile. It's really not funny is it.

It has to be leather smug......... wishing you a better day today

sounds like one of those poncy restaurant menus, " a trio of wee, served on peeled sofa cushions, with a side order of child poo".

(I don't think its funny, just thought that might make you smile...)

The only thing we can do is laugh. It's beyond serious now. Grrrrr

THat make me giggle Sign sorry Smug

Put the old sofa outside in your garden for a bit it might encourage them to wee outside because of the scent. (The animals not the child )

I did that with my stainless steel bin. Its now the dogs lampost outside lol

Oh My GOD. That was the most embarrassing experience of my life.

I invited a cleaner round with the enticing line "we really really need help to clean and tidy our house"

Welcome to our home. Can you climb round the two prams in the hallway and the bag of washing?

his is the kitchen, and these are the dog biscuits thrown across the floor and pile of washing covered in wee.

This is the sitting room, sorry about the sofa, my son has pooed and weed on it and the dog has just weed on it three times in the last five minutes. Please ignore the lunch and supper plates on the table.

This is the downstairs loo with wee everywhere and four tea tree oil soap bars on the floor that DS has had OCD opening and washing his hands all day. We are potty training [embarrassed grin]

This is our bedroom, sorry about the pile of clothes on the floor, my DH has been refusing to pick his clothes up and we are having a stand off.

This is the ensuite bathroom, sorry about the poo in the shower, the cat is uncontrollable.

This is my sons bedroom. I know you cant see anything because its so pitch black but he doesnt sleep well so we hang duvets over the windows because the balck out blinds dont quite make it dark enough. I can assure you the the beds are not made.

So when can you start?

I'll let you know if she comes back tomorrow.

It sounds such an enticing job, when can I start?