Drowning in Housework. What have you invested in?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:After going back to work five times a day, I am really drowning in the housework. Work a full day to drive kids to activities, to making dinner, laundry, dishes, lunches for the next day…. And start it all over again the next day.

Kids are 9 and 12, they help. DH is involved, he helps.

But I feel like there is still more to do than all four of us can get done and not go insane.

There are definitely days that I can get it all done but then I am not exercising, I am stressed, I am tired and overall unhappy.

So to my question, what have other dual income, two working parents outside the home invested in to help with housework?

We have a maid that comes twice a week but that’s not enough lately.

Is anyone else getting help with laundry with like a wash and fold service, or have someone come into the home and do more than the biweekly deep cleaning? I don’t know, I just need some ideas because right now I feel like I am constantly doing housework and still not keeping up.

Why do you need a maid 2x per week? How lazy or messy are you guys? No one is home during the day. How is it that messy? Good grief!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Laundry is easy. Put a load in when you wake up. Stick it in the dryer as you leave. Fold it and have everyone take what’s theirs to put away in the evening. 7 loads a week is plenty for a family of four.

These posts baffle me. Do you just wash everyone's sheets and duvets in one giant load? Do you not separate colors and whites? Don't your kids have uniforms that need to be worn? Pets?

We alternate whites and darks. My kids go to public school, so they do not have uniforms. We usually do 3-5 loads of laundry a week so I added a few more to account for sports stuff as they do not do sports. We also wear our outer clothes more than once. It decreases laundry as well as helps the clothes last longer.

How often are you washing your duvets? If it is weekly, then that is where you lower your standards. We do a load of everyone’s sheets on the weekends. How large is your washer? If you have a small one, that could be the issue.

[Anonymous]

If things are just getting cluttered and messy, have a set daily time where everyone drops what they are doing and do a 15 minute pick up and clean up.

[Anonymous]

I buy family meals from a local caterer that I just reheat.

Our nanny does the kids’ laundry (and we pay her well and get it started).

I do the sheets and towels once a week before our weekly cleaner arrives (early morning for me).

Kids mostly get school lunch.

I do once a week grocery Instacart.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Laundry is easy. Put a load in when you wake up. Stick it in the dryer as you leave. Fold it and have everyone take what’s theirs to put away in the evening. 7 loads a week is plenty for a family of four.

These posts baffle me. Do you just wash everyone's sheets and duvets in one giant load? Do you not separate colors and whites? Don't your kids have uniforms that need to be worn? Pets?

NP here but I'm going to be honest, yes. I've been washing everything on cold water for years, no need to separate, costs less money, less wear on clothes. Modern detergents and machines are more efficient and don't require hot water.

This.
I was taught to only use cold water also air dry lots.
In a stickler for laundry too.. honestly my fav task 😆

[Anonymous]

I have 3 kids-
8 year old does dishes
6 year old folds laundry, puts it away, and empties trash cans.
3 year old doesn't really do much, but there are little things like feeding the dogs, clearing the table.
DH cooks, mows the lawn and fixes stuff (there's actually a TON to fix all the time)

We don't have a cleaning lady. I really like to clean so I probably spend 2 hours a day cleaning. It's not easy. Something that helps is getting off work earlier. I work 6-3:30. It gives me enough time to do things before picking up the kids. I do have to go to sleep earlier, but I wasn't exactly full of energy after 10pm anyways.

Zero telework for any reason whatsoever is killing us. I have a $$$ appliance being delivered today that requires signature so I guess I will take half the day off. Joy.

What I struggle with the most is cooking and baths. Cooking because everyone whines about anything we make and baths because they all scream and it takes forever. Wish I could outsource either.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Laundry is easy. Put a load in when you wake up. Stick it in the dryer as you leave. Fold it and have everyone take what’s theirs to put away in the evening. 7 loads a week is plenty for a family of four.

These posts baffle me. Do you just wash everyone's sheets and duvets in one giant load? Do you not separate colors and whites? Don't your kids have uniforms that need to be worn? Pets?

NP here but I'm going to be honest, yes. I've been washing everything on cold water for years, no need to separate, costs less money, less wear on clothes. Modern detergents and machines are more efficient and don't require hot water.

This.
I was taught to only use cold water also air dry lots.
In a stickler for laundry too.. honestly my fav task 😆

Same on all points. Cold water and I truly love doing laundry. I take a lot of pride in my clothes and the kids'.

We do wash sheets on warm and my fancy white sheets for my own bed on hot.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Laundry is easy. Put a load in when you wake up. Stick it in the dryer as you leave. Fold it and have everyone take what’s theirs to put away in the evening. 7 loads a week is plenty for a family of four.

These posts baffle me. Do you just wash everyone's sheets and duvets in one giant load? Do you not separate colors and whites? Don't your kids have uniforms that need to be worn? Pets?

All of my kids and DH do their own laundry except sheets and towels. Those I do in one big load? Why would you do separate loads for this? Nothing gets separated except we do pull out anything red (at least I do-no clue if my kids do). Kid has enough uniforms for a week and does his own laundry on weekends. My dog has no laundry

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Have your kids do their own laundry. Mine started in 1st grade. Let them put it away even if it means it’s shoved in drawers or they live out of the clean laundry basket.

Use delivery services so you can cut back on time spent running to the store.

Have kids pack their own lunches or buy. They are old enough to pack.

Set aside 15 minutes each evening to put things away so the piles don’t build.

Assign age appropriate chores for the kids to complete on weekends. They can definitely dust or vacuum and straighten up the family room.

Agreed!

However, 9 and 12 yo can do much more than "dust or vacuum". They can help with just about any part of cleaning the home. They can clean their bathroom (and require it to be done well), clean the kitchen, etc along with decluttering/putting stuff in their proper places and vacuuming.
By 12 I was cleaning the entire house weekly

[Anonymous]

OP it’s the laundry that absolutely kills me. 3 of my kids are in multiple sports so between school uniforms, practice and game uniforms, I feel like I’m drowning in it. We had someone do the laundry (I would wash it and have it ready, sorted by family member, and she would fold it and put it away), but she got a better offer at $45/hr for 2 days a week. I was already paying her $32 and just couldn’t compete. I so wish I could find someone to come and do laundry for one or 2 days a week. What has helped is we redid the laundry room and put in 2 sets of machines. I can wash everything pretty quickly now. I fold it and put it in a basket for each kid. They put it away for the most part. Sometimes their baskets stay full for a bit, but it’s on them.
For lunch, I switched them all to school lunch. They look at the menus, and the picky one will bring something on days she doesn’t love it, but that’s all on her.
For dinner, order delivery twice a week. Another maybe two nights, I essentially instacart something easy, like wegmans family meals or Costco stuff.
For everyone saying the kids should do more, at least in our house, they truly don’t have time. My older ones get home from school sports at 6:30 and either have a travel sport or homework for a few hours. My younger one gets home at 4 and then has a sport each day for a few hours. I don’t want to cut into their sleep time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I buy family meals from a local caterer that I just reheat.

Our nanny does the kids’ laundry (and we pay her well and get it started).

I do the sheets and towels once a week before our weekly cleaner arrives (early morning for me).

Kids mostly get school lunch.

I do once a week grocery Instacart.

Which catering companies do you use? Great that you can outsource so much!

[Anonymous]

To start, you really need a reset.

One time only -
-Begin with sending out a biggest load of all your laundry for washing and folding. Include your towels, bath mats, bed linen, table mats etc.
- Send all winter outerwear for dry-cleaning so that you can put them away. Invest in the vacuum packing bags from Amazon and vacuum seal and store all your outerwear. The volume decreases quite a lot and it is easy to make space.
- Get your carpets deep clean by chemdry. It dries pretty quickly and is baking soda based.
- Pay for one or two deep clean by your cleaning person and her team. Ask her to also top up all the hand soaps and lotions etc.
- Replace the smoke alarm batteries. Get the fans and electric fixtures cleaned. Get windows cleaned. Get your dryer ducts clean. Change filters of all the exhausts, fridge water system, RO etc. Get your HVAC maintained. All of this can be outsourced.
- Hire someone to spruce up your yard. Get rid of old and tired flower pots, chairs etc.
- Declutter a bit. As much as you are able to.
- Clean your fridge, freezer and pantry. Throw away food that you will not be eating.
- Inventory of all meds and throw away what is not being used and stuff which is expired.

On a daily basis -
- Run dishwasher every day. Maybe even twice or thrice if need be.
- Launder clothes every single day.
- Take care of your paperwork as soon as it comes. Bills or school paper.
- Play a game with your kids - everyone gets to pick up and put away 20 things within 5 minutes.
- Empty out the lunch boxes, water bottles, school bags and set it up for the next day to the best of your abilities.

On a weekly basis -
- Do grocery twice a week, so that extra food does not get spoiled.
- Write a menu, use that to prep ahead and shop. Use ChatGPT to get organized. Easiest way to create schedules.
- Weekly cleaner.
- Weekly lawn maintenance
- Join a car-wash club and get the cars cleaned weekly.

[Anonymous]

Subscribe and save for non perishables…. Backstock goes in basement pantry. Good thing for my boys (same age as yours) to drag downstairs, put away, break down boxes.

All three men in my house drag laundry down two lights of stairs nd back up two flights of stairs. They help sort and put away. I fold DH’s and the boys are starting to learn to fold theirs.

I run the dishwasher at least 1x, often 2x per day. Yes it’s less full each time. Yes I will put pots in there if they’ll get clean. So always run it before bed and DH empties in the am when he makes coffee.

Order groceries in the Harris teeter app. They load in my car. DH and boys unload and bring into house. Will put anything that goes in the basement freezer or downstairs pantry away.

I wash all fruit and lightly prepare anything on Sunday afternoons we need for the week. Fruit always out and available, healthy snack bin restocked, will chop cucumbers, wash grapes and berries etc. I do this while watching a couple shows on my iPad. “Me time” lol. May also pre a big Sunday dinner in this window

We usually double up dinners to have for leftovers later in the week.

[Anonymous]

I do laundry often and sort it to nth degree. I have found that doing daily laundry is the way to stay on top of the laundry. I also know my washer-dryer features very well. I have clever hacks to do small loads at shorter cycles, using less products etc. My clothes last for years without fading or looking worn out.

[Anonymous]

Sorry but it’s crazy with two helping kids, full time jobs (ie you are out of the house all day) and a maid twice a week, that you are still drowning in chores. Something feels really off about this!