Housework

[drugfukkdrockstar]

What works best for you? Do you do all of your house work in one day or do you keep on top of it all through the week?

I am sooo over house work, especially since i work full time and so does the hubby. Funnily enough i seem to still be the one doing all/most of the house work since he works longer hours than me and has to face a lot more stress than i do. I am sympathetic, so therefore willingly take on the house duties - including all of the cooking and lunch making. I enjoy feeling that i am taking care of him.

But i just can't seem to get into a on going rhythm! I will spend pretty much half of a day on my precious weekends to clean the house, but it always slips back to messy and unorganized during the week because i just get so tired.. and yeah, i sit on bl after i have cooked dinner to relax

Anyways, id like to know about how other households operate and how/if people keep on top of it or if it's normal to just let it all go to shit and deal with it on the weekend.

Maybe i should get a cleaner once a week or fortnight (im not joking)

But then again, no job is done properly unless i have done it when it comes to cleaning my house. So that's why a cleaner probably wont work for me. Ill be too picky.

Opinions, suggestions and general input needed!

 

[Miss Peks]

I hate housework. But then again I've got it pretty good considering I live in a 1 bedroom shoebox, and my fiance does the cooking for me. I'd get a cleaner except I live in a shoebox and I don't think it'd be worth the money but when we decide to move into a house then it'll be something I'd definitely invest in as we want to actually enjoy our weekends, rather than me doing the housework.

As for what works for us, well probably him doing the cooking and me doing the housework works for now. I have to work late sometimes and I hate cooking in a hurry so I've opted to do the cleaning side of things.

 

[Northside]

I am OCD clean about the bathroom and kitchen, pretty much clean the bathroom every time I shower and wash dishes as soon as I'm done with them. I make my bed every day and do general picking up and wiping up - Everyone always says my house looks really nice and neat and I feel good about that.

Dusting and vaccuuming- not so much. That gets done on my days off.

I smoke , and I detest my house smelling of it. If the AC is on I take my smokes outside and if not I face the fan blowing out the window and sit by it so the smoke goes out. I burn scented oil in the house just in case any smoke lingers, and it works pretty well.

I guess I prefer to keep up with the chores and do a little on a daily basis so I never have to spend precious hours of time off on my cleaning.

Edit: I love to cook , it's not a chore to me it's a hobby.

 

[n3ophy7e]

Growing up with my mother, who is a house-cleaning extraordinaire, PLUS the help of a weekly cleaner (there were 5 kids in our family and both my parents worked full time), I always felt compelled to be completely OCD about cleaning the house. When I moved out at the age of 17 in to my own unit, I kept it spotless. And I mean S.P.O.T.L.E.S.S, even despite having 2 kitties.

But over the years my standards of cleanliness have very gradually declined, out of pure necessity to retain my sanity. My boyfriend is one of the messiest people I have ever come across, and I have 3 cats, a dog and a lorikeet (for those who aren't aware, lorikeets are a species of bird that SPRAY their shit everywhere, all the time. It is literally a spray, I'm not even close to joking).

But I love them all dearly, so if this hideous mess comes with them then I would not trade it for anything.

Now, to answer the question, I can't help but reserve a single day per week to clean the whole house, otherwise all of my free time would be taken up by cleaning. I usually do it on a Saturday morning, and it usually takes me 4-5 hours. And that doesn't even cover all the jobs. Some of the more time-consuming jobs I will leave to do every 3 or 4 weeks, and some of the easier jobs like cleaning the kitchen I can do mid-week.

I have been forced to become comfortable with living in a certain level of mess, perhaps when I am a mum and am not working at all I can clean the house to my level of satisfaction. But for now I have to compromise

 

[lostNfound]

My house doesn't do any werk.

 

[HippieChick]

Well, my husband works at night and sleeps during the day. My 4 year old little boy loves to 'help' (which mostly means I do it twice) I dont work anymore, highly over-rated. Hubby makes a lot and my Mom is our landlord so we don't pay a lot of rent. Ok, I'm spoiled and just now realized I don't do much of nothing. Huh? I think I got it made. Wow. My house is sometimes clean and sometimes not so much, husband does not complain at all. Heck we barely see each other. I make sure his clothes are clean and we have food for him to take to work ... he grew up on cheap crap and had crappy parents so he thinks everything is great.

 

[lostNfound]

In all seriousness, I'm not a neat freak but nor do i sit at the other end of the spectrum.

I clean as I go.

I dont make dinner, sit down and eat; then get up and feel surprised there's a mess in the kitchen. I wash, dry & putaway each pot/pan or whatever as I use it.

This goes for everything; I have a laundry bin in the bathroom. When it's full I put a load in the washing machine.

It's not that hard to keep a clean house without cleaning becoming a chore.

 

[n3ophy7e]

^^ That's just for one person though
And a neat one, at that.


I admire you cleanliness though!! That is awesome. It makes life so much easier, in my opinion.

 

[malakaix]

I currently live with two male housemates, so i can't say the flat is ever entirely clean at any given time, but we all pitch in.

It does get pretty horrendous at times, and at the moment we seem to be in a phase where.. we let it build to an unmanageable point, clean everything, and the cycle repeats. I usually try clean as i go along, i can tolerate mess.. but im not one to live it in constantly. I usually try avoid that 'spotless' goal, because i know if im living in it, especially with other people its not going to be spotless for very long and ill quickly see all that work been undone.

When i was 19 i lived with two cousins of mine who would never clean the house, im talking a year passed and there's mess everywhere. The only thing they would clean was the dish's and that was probably every 3 weeks? But i guess some people can do that.. *shudder*.

 

[lostNfound]

^^ That's just for one person though
And a neat one, at that.


I admire you cleanliness though!! That is awesome. It makes life so much easier, in my opinion.

Thank you m' dear, but i do not live alone.

And believe I'm not a neat freaq.

I make an effort to ensure that when people come over they feel at home.
I hate going to peoples houses and feeling like i cant sit on the couch in case i mess something up.

 

[n3ophy7e]

^^ Ahhh I see! Cool, I completely understand that

 

[flat line]

get a house cleaner...worth the 60 bucks a week.

 

[lostNfound]

 

[cletus]

I work away from home for weeks at a time & you get quite regimental & clean up everything as you go & take a pride in your cabin. I then come home to a wife who has no understanding of things having "a place". Her idea of tidying up is to ram it into the nearest drawer or cupboard. When I cook, I tidy up as I go along, but she leaves it all at her ass & then tells me that it's my job to clean up because she cooked it!

I also have 2 kids under 10 years old & you would think a depth charge goes off each time they enter a room. We do try to keep on top of it, but it's a losing battle. If the Drug Squad were to raid us they would tidy up the house instead of fucking it up.

 

[kingme]

i hate house cleaning days and usually postpone them until visitors are inevitable...

but when i do get round to it i try to make it the best way i can and then work at keeping it that way.

worst days are when others in the house decide it is time to put "things in order" and though i admit the clothes look like they are piled up randomly and books and stuff seems just thrown there, i DO know where everything is. just because they pile things up nicely does not order make!

and the very worst? when someone reorders my kitchen....

 

[koneko]

I like living in a fairly tidy and clean environment - it does my head in otherwise. Saying that I don't think I'm OCD about it, and I'm happy to let it slip so I can do something nicer.

I tend to do it as I go along during the week, laundry when it's needed, pick things up and put them back in their home ( I'm a stickler for everything having a place) and can't stand dirty dishes after cooking / eating, so they get done straight away and I make the bed up daily.

Proper deep cleaning gets done once a week or so - bathroom, floors, fresh bed linen n' the like.

My other half does his fair share when he's at home - though he's pretty bad at leaving things lying at his backside - he's definitely getting better and I'm getting less uptight about it and having a lil mess about :D

Cannot stand ironing

Recently took on a gardener to help out there as it's so huge! It's nice to just do the bits I love like growing and nurturing the flowers and leave the grass cutting etc to someone else.

 

[Coolio]

What do you do to mess up your house so much that it takes more than an hour or two per week to clean?

The inside of my house could be plastic wrapped and I wouldn't notice. Besides sweeping/vacuuming the floor, nothing ever changes or gets dirty. I do my dishes as I make them, never leaving them for the next day. I wash my clothes every time there's 3/4 to a full load of dirty clothes.

Are you like obsessive and dust every surface of the house or something?

 

[koneko]

I work away from home for weeks at a time & you get quite regimental & clean up everything as you go & take a pride in your cabin. I then come home to a wife who has no understanding of things having "a place". Her idea of tidying up is to ram it into the nearest drawer or cupboard. When I cook, I tidy up as I go along, but she leaves it all at her ass & then tells me that it's my job to clean up because she cooked it!

She says it's you!

 

[Busty St Clare]

If you think things are tough with just the two of you, wait until you have kids. Having said that I do run a tight ship and any mess has to be tidied up before going on to the next. Despite the rules when they leave for their mum's there seems to be enough washing to take a week to clean.

We get a cleaner once a fortnight. It costs $49 and she mops and vacuums all the rooms, cleans the shower, toilet and bathroom, then wipes down the kitchen benches and dusts. It takes her less than 2 hours and often if she finishes early she'll find something to clean for 15minutes.

I don't find cooking a chore. When I get home at 6pm I don't mind grabbing a beer and preparing dinner with the news or music on in the background. We eat well but I rarely prepare anything that requires more than half an hour. It helps having a dishwasher and it does seem petty when we both complain that we have to load or unload it. Sometimes if we can't be bothered cooking we can drag something we have cooked and frozen earlier. We resort to take away perhaps once a fortnight.

I don't consider the garden a chore either. It helps that I have designed the garden over the years to be relatively low maintenance. Currently in winter I only need to spend one Sunday month keeping things under control. In summer it might be an hour a week to mow and weed. For me it is a hobby and a time for solitude and reflection.

 

[cletus]

^^Yeah, sure she does kate :D

I'm not entirely faultless, but she will definitely admit to being a lot worse than me. Just wait until we visit soon & be amazed at how much stuff ends up on the fucking floor!