What kind of help has worked for you?
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Anonymous
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We both work demanding and rewarding jobs, and we have a baby and a toddler.
We have a wonderful nanny 8-5 M-F and she is great about picking up after our kids - we don’t want to ask more of her. We have a weekly cleaner who does cleaning but nothing else (she is also a bit unreliable). Outside of work, we want our time to be spent with our kids, and on special work and family projects - not washing bottles / doing dishes / cleaning high chair / laundry / house work and yard work / etc. (And it would be amazing to have any time for ourselves too!). Those of you who have multiple kids and demanding careers - what help has worked well for you? And how do you not make it feel like you constantly have employees in your home? (Please don’t say we shouldn’t have two kids or someone has to stay home - we like our life, we just want more time. Thanks). |
Anonymous
| No advice. Parenting in modern age sucks. |
Anonymous
Jesus, you have all that help, and still complain you cannot find time to spend with kids? Sounds like YOU are the problem. Both my parents worked 40-60 hour weeks and still spent hours with us and my 8 siblings. Maybe you white Americans are just too spoiled. |
Anonymous
| We have weekly landscapers. But there still aren’t enough hours in the day. |
Anonymous
You need to hire a dog poop scooping up service. There is a thread about it. |
Anonymous
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You can't have hired help all the time and also not have employees in your home lol. Pick one.
Rich people I have worked for have nanny, evening babysitter, cleaning ladies, landscapers, dog walkers, kid tutors, personal trainers. Also instacart of course. Those are the main ones. But I will recommend you spend time with your kids and just have your kids help you clean, even when they're little, they can do it. It build their self efficacy and turn a chore into bonding. Just be a regular person. |
Anonymous
| You have a nanny and housekeeper, beyond a yard person, what more do you need? |
Anonymous
| Nanny and house cleaning twice a week. Nanny launders all kids clothes. We included in our contract we can ask her to do four non-kid related errands per week. Dry cleaning drop-off, post office, farmers market, whatever. Cleaners do all sheets and towels for everyone. DH and I do our own laundry. We live in the city but if we had lawn we would hire landscapers. |
Anonymous
| Washing bottles and wiping down a high chair don’t take much time at all. Remove those from your whine list, use a dishwasher for dishes. Housework? You have a weekly cleaning service, if she’s flaky get someone else. Hire a lawn service. That leaves laundry. Develop a system. |
Anonymous
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I mean, this is just a part of the parenting grind. Are you all perfectionists? Sometimes we had baskets of unfolded clean laundry. Sometimes we had piles of toys. Sometimes one corner of our dining room table had a bunch of mail on it. It’s okay if your house isn’t perfect, I promise. You don’t have to clean constantly, you really don’t.
And it’s also okay to do things WITH your kids. Get one of those toddler towers and have them help soap pots with their own sponge, they can help with little cooking projects in the kitchen, they can help with the cleaning using a rag and water to start. Just put on some music and/or talk to them. |
Anonymous
| You need a nanny house manager - ours does everyone’s laundry, makes dinner for the family, gets groceries, runs random errands, etc. She may not be able to do this now, but as your kids get older and start preschool/elementary school this will be more possible. When we travel, she mostly gets time off, but i have had her also drop us off at the airport, and/or come once or twice while we’re gone to grocery shop and meal prep. Can’t tell you how nice it is to come home to a clean house (when we left it a mess due to packing w three kids) and dinner in the fridge after a long day of travel. |
Anonymous
| What are you envisioning doing with your kids that you can’t because of these chores you want to outsource? |
Anonymous
| I think you just need to come to terms with not being able to eliminate all household and kid chores. You live a good life now with most of the heavy tasks out of the way. Adding more employees to do these tasks is just going to create more work for you in other places (managing employees and such). Just do the work. |
Anonymous
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House cleaners once a week.
Yard work completely outsourced. Handyman-type work completely outsourced. I’m okay with laundry not being perfectly put away every time, and the house not being magazine ready at all times. We don’t have a nanny and our kids go to after school care, and do a couple of classes on the weekend. I have a Peloton and I exercise at home. I take the kids along to grocery shop on Saturday mornings and they hang out in the kitchen while I cook and meal prep for the week. We feel that we have enough time for everything. |
Anonymous
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Hope this help, OP. I have not needed a childcare person because I have been a SAHM since my kids were born. But, over the years, I have employed many kinds of help at home. A few of these people started their gig work after starting at my home.
- Cleaner - Twice a week. - General hourly help lady - All purpose - 3 hour minimum. - Part time chef - once in 2 weeks, 6 hours minimum. Semi-prepped our meals for 2 weeks as well cooked for parties. - Home caterer for a few dishes - as needed. Price per tray of food. Or when having house guests - Party lady - comes to warm, serve, cleanup, cook during parties - 6 hr minimum - Landscaper - lawn-mowing, mulching, leaf removal and other gardening jobs. - Coaches and tutors - at home. I have also employed sporadically the following at home services (word of mouth - gig work). - Hair cuts, shave and pedicure - stylist comes home to cut everyone's hair once a month, takes care of my ILs pedicure and trimming their toe nails - Masseuse - Daily for a few weeks after childbirth - Laundry service - either at laundromat or have a laundry person pick it up and launder it at their own home. - Home car detailing service - Clothes alteration work |