How to find the time...

GreenFairy

I clean mostly in 20 minute bursts. It's as long as it takes to clean my bathroom or hang a load of washing, put the dry stuff away and put on another load or unload/reload dishwasher, wash pots and put out bins or wipe down kitchen counters and fronts of presses and appliances or strip bedding and remake bed with clean sheets, etc. Generally I'll do one or two of these bursts a day, but no more.

I'm not minimalist by any stretch, but I found that having less "stuff" makes cleaning up much, much easier. If all your clothes fit in your wardrobe, then there's no stacks of clean laundry looking for a home. Nothing on the mantlepiece means cleaning it takes one swoop of a cloth. Only having so many toys that can fit in a toybox means that everything can be dumped in it quickly. If there's less stuff to tidy up, less tidying up is needed

[Deleted User]

My youngest Dd has five children ,four of them still at home between 8-17 all noisy, messy boys.She has a very helpful OH, who also works full time .and me who takes the youngest to school in the morning and looks after the four boys after school every day .I usually do the prep for dinner at night for her when I get home to their house after school at around 3.45.p.m.The boys help out by running the Hoover round or taking their stuff to their rooms. I have instilled into them all over the past couple of years that Granny will look after them, but not wait on them hand and foot, so when they come in I make them a snack as their dinner isn't until usually 7.00ish.They do their homework if they have any, and I make sure the dishwasher is emptied, and one of the boys sets the table for dinner, they have a cooked meat and two veg meal most nights.Sundays its roast Mondays bangers and mash,Tuesdays left over roast made into either sheps pie or chilli, Wednesday roast chicken and veg Thursdays left over chicken, and Friday night is pizza night, I knock up the dough and the boys choose what they want on it,Its their fun night and sometimes gets quite hilarious when they want an odd topping.
I help by making sure the spuds are peeled, or the meal is part ready so DD only has to finish it off.
Her OH does the ironing ,bless him and DD does the heavy cleaning.I whizz around the downstairs bathroom during the week, when I pop in to let the dogs out which I do every day at lunchtime .The whole thing would collapse without planning .She has a list of meals on the fridge which she puts up on a Sunday night so I know what to get out of the freezer, if anything during the week.We all work as a team, and I don't mind as I am only three roads away from where she lives.DD and her OH have to work full time to cover the bills and their shoe bill for four growing lads is like the national debt :) but it works for us, and she is lucky that I am around to give her a hand .I did the same for my eldest DD when her children were younger, they are now 22 and 19 so capable of looking after themselves.
The boys all know that without Mum and Dad working they would not have the stuff they do(although they are in no way spoiled) As a family unit it works for us all. I am kept on my toes by my smashing lads whom I adore and DD knows that her boys are looked after and cared for as if she was there with them.She still has time to play and talk to them in the evening and the boys all know that grown-ups aren't there to wait on them.
I think they will turn into caring young men as they all know how hard Mum and Dad work for them.Me, I get lots out of what I do, and the boys and I get along great with very few fallings out.They are happy well-adjusted lads and I get lots of hugs and cuddles especially from the youngest Mikey who is the apple of my eye :)How folk get on without family help I can't imagine.We are a close-knit family and in the summer we all go away on holiday together.
I have a week off in the spring when I go away with my oldest friend for a weeks holiday.We have done this way of life for the past 4 plus years and if the house gets a bit dusty its not that important having happy children who know they are loved and cared for is mush better than having a shiny table .My DD always says when the boys are grown and gone they will have memories of being cared for and will not remember if the furniture was polished or the windows clean (although I do all the inside windows down stairs at times as I enjoy doing them.One of the boys stands on a chair outside and we see who can clean the quickest :))She lives in a three storey town house and I keep downstairs tidy and presentable I don't do upstairs as thats the boys domain and they have to look after their own bedrooms and make their own beds.All the washing is brought down every day by the boys or Mum and Dad and the machine is on when I get there at 8.00 with the first load I usually put the second load on at lunchtime.The whole house runs usually like clockwork with very few problems at all

valk_scot

I have to say if the whole family is out during the day all week and you're still cleaning 2-3 hours per day, you're perhaps getting a bit OCD about things? If you mean 2-3 hours of housework including cleaning, laundry, ironing, cooking and tidying up well, yes, I can see that, but 2-3 hours a day just cleaning? I've got a massive old house and a dodgy back and I'm a SAHM but even so, I doubt I spend half that amount of time just cleaning things.

good_advice

Jackie O - you sound like a great help to the family.

I think I tried all diffrent ways of coping when my kids were growing up. Have you a Oh that will help a bit?
I use to put the washing machine on every evening, it winter had to hang on clothes horse and summer = Oh was in charge of hanging it out and bringing it back in.
I had to come home and cook the family meal. On Sunday I would cook something like casserole, lasagna, cottage pie. Then eat half on Monday.
Big clean every Saturday. change sheets and bathroom.
One thing I have learnt is when you go up or down stairs = STOP and think? what needs to go up/down. Like take bin down to be emptied, washing?

LameWolf

When you start your 2-3 hours per day cleaning, are you starting in the same place every time? That's the mistake I used to make; I'd try to do the whole place in a day (we only have a tiny bungalow, but I'm disabled) and I'd always start with the lounge, then the kitchen, then the bathroom, by which time I'd run out of time and energy, if indeed I lasted that long.

Now I have a weekly schedule:
Monday - kitchen
Tuesday - lounge and hallway
Wednesday - bathroom
Thursday - bedroom
Friday - spare room (which is actually used for storage)
Weekends we do the tasks I cannot do by myself due to disability (things like lifting the bathlift out of the bath for a good clean).

I also have a list of tasks for each room, some of which are appended "IF NEEDED" (eg cleaning the windows).

I keep all this on a Word.doc, copy and paste the day's list to a separate part, and delete when done or if not needed.

It may sound a bit OCD but it works for me, the whole place gets done during the course of the week, and if anything gets missed, it comes round again next week.

HTH:o

gibson123

Don't prioritise cleaning, get up and out at the weekends, do the housework when you get back home after having fun with the family. Putting anything off until the housework is done will eat up you family time and drain your energy.

savetosave

Hi
My kids are grown up now, and when they were little I was lucky enough to work evenings, but even then I would focus the time I had on them.
If you Hoover today, tomorrow you will need to Hoover again!
You need to decide what is the absolute minimum cleaning and tidying you could live with, then if you get anymore done it's a bonus.
Now that I work full time again, if I do get a day off work I begrudge wasting it on cleaning, so like some others have said I clean in short bursts. I can Hoover the whole of downstairs and put a load of washing on in not much more time than it takes for the kettle to boil.
My kids always had little jobs to do, collecting and emptying the bins from upstairs, dusting, matching up socks and if we needed to get the house tidy quickly, we would have a 10 minute tidy.
We would put a cd on and I would direct everyone and clean the kitchen, you'd be amazed how much you can get done!
Try not to stress, there will be plenty of time for an immaculate house when the kids are older.