Do you keep your house clean?

Maddie&EthansMom wrote: I am really stressed over keeping my house clean. I feel as though it is impossible. I was just wondering how many women who have small children keep their house clean. I try and straighten it up everyday, but finding the time to clean just is so out of reach right now. My DH does not understand at all how I can't find the time to clean. I have talked to several women who say their house is a disaster and it is just part of having young children running around.

If you are one that has a spotless/clean house at all times, how do you do it? What sort of schedule do you put yourself on? My list of things to do seems so long right now that I'm not sure I will ever catch up.

CantWait replied: Before Anthony was born I was a total neat freak. Since though, I don't get the time to clean my house the way I'd like it too look. I mainly make sure the dishes are done before both sinks are full and the floors are vaccumed. I can't wait till DH gets home.

mckayleesmom replied: I can clean well,,,but it will be a disaster before I blink...and its not Mckaylee,,,its dh....I can vaccume and dust and have the house looking nice...then bamn,,,he walks in,,,couch pillows are on the floor,,dinner plate..you name it...Some of it is Mckaylee, but can't really blame her..their just toys.

momma2jenna replied: I've never been a great house keeper! As long as the toilet's clean and the sink isn't grossly full of dishes, I'm o.k. w/ it.
I've actually gotten better since Jenna was born. Now that I stay home,
I have more time and energy to do stuff. 'Course, Jenna's not very mobile
....yet. Her toys stay in one spot...........the MIDDLE of the living room floor!

paradisemommy replied: clean??? what's that??? i surely was a better housekeeper before taven but especially now that he is 14 months and a total whirlwind, i just let it go...dh could care less though as long as ds is taken care of and he doesn't lift a finger to help usually..but that's ok..i figure i'll have plenty of time to clean the house when the kids are grown!!

MomToJade&Jordan replied: I am in the same boat so don't worry. I keep it relatively neat but not spotless. It's just really hard to keep the house neat when you have a toddler. I had my starter show for partylite tonight and I spent the whole day cleaning the house. Everytime I turned around I had to re-clean up a spot because Jade had gone by.

Kirstenmumof3 replied: I must say we are a lot neater since we had our first child. But with 3 children , 2 cats, 1 dog and my DH our house often looks like tornado hit! I try to keep it neat, doing dishes and vacumming. But that is about it. About once a month the floors get a good mopping (I really should buy a swiifer), the shelves get dusted and the grunge that seems to build up on the bathtub and sinks get a good scrubbing although the toilets are kept clean. I look back at pictures of when I was a child and my mothers house was the same way! I think all parents with young children have this problem.

MomToMany replied: It's as clean as can be expected! Sometimes i get stressed over it, but it's the things i can't change; like closet space for all the out-grown clothes. It's not that "dirty", just really unorganized! I'm not good with that kind of stuff. I'll tell DH that the house is a disaster, and he says it looks just fine .

I would rather spend time with my kids than worry about cleaning the house. It's not going anywhere, so it will be there tomorrow if I get bored !

kit_kats_mom replied: Admitted neat freak here. Our place is usually clean...cluttered, but clean. I keep a large basket upstairs and one down to throw all of Katherine's toys in. I "tidy" one room a day which Katherine helps me with, I do one load of laundry a day & I do a few other "chores". For example, today: clean kitchen, microwave, living room/dining room (includes highchair, dusting and splat mat washing), clean out fridge and take out all trash from the house. I have also purchased quite a few of the time savers like a swiffer and the robot vaccum. I have to run that vaccum every day to pick up the random cheerios and leaves that we track in. I run a sinkful of soapy water and put all of the days dishes in there then I load them in the dishwasher at the end of the day. I do hate cleaning bathrooms though and I don't have time to really give the house a good scrubbing as often as I could (Ok, I know I could do it on the weekends while DH is with Katherine but who wants to?) so DH and I agreed to a maid who comes every other week. It works out to about $22 bucks a week but since a dirty house effects me so much, it is really worth it.

I am certianly not perfect though....you should see the inside of my minivan. It's like a rolling dumpster. That thing has gotten to the point that I am afraid to clean it now.

juliajaj replied: I kind of developed my own system based on Flylady. Since I work from home, I can spend a little bit of time (2 15 minute breaks & 1 1/2 hr lunch) each day cleaning. I have Friday afternoons off, so while Olivia is napping (usually 2 hrs), I clean & plan the menu for the next week/write out the grocery list.

One thing that has really helped me is a cleaning list that I have in a Word document. On the list, I have written down all the rooms in our house, and then I've broken down everything that needs to be done in that room (dust furniture, windowsills, vacuum, clean mirrors/glass, etc). When I'm done with a task I check it off. I try to split the house up into sections (Mon - living room, dining room, family room, Tuesday - kitchen, Wednesday - first floor hallway, laundry room, Thursday - bedrooms, office, Friday - bathrooms, upstairs hallway). My goal is get my weekly cleaning done before the weekend, so this way I can focus on family time. I still do a quick clean on Saturday & Sunday (wipe off counter tops, vacuum, put things away). We have a cat, so I vacuum quite a bit. Also, before I go to bed each night, I try to make sure everything is put away. DH is picking up on the system (I haven't even said anything to him). This is silly, but I get a great sense of completion when I see all the items checked off of my cleaning list. Also, it helps me out to do a little bit each day instead of trying to tackle everything in one day or the weekend.

Have a great day!

ediep replied: My house is kind of cluttered, but not dirty. We have a cleaning lady that comes every 2 weeks and she does the major stuff...bathrooms, carpets, windows, etc. I do daily stuff like dishes, sweeping, laundry, and of course the toys.

natchie replied: i am a clean freak once i get started

MomofTay&Sam replied: I was completly anal before Sammy. Everything had a place and in it's place it better be. LOL Now I am still pretty bad, I cant stand dishes in the sink at all! My dh is the villan here to. Yesterday I scrubbed the whole kitchen. I made his dinner and put it in the fridge(he worked late). So he ate his din din and left his plate...glass that was sweating and fork on the table..Pepsi bottle on the counter, empty ice cube tray in the sink. UGH I get sooo irritated! The cheerios are driving me insane to, they are everywhere! I have my 11year old trained, he see's a cheerio and he doesnt dare walk past it. I am having to shedding dogs over starting tonight for 8 days!!! (wont have to worry about cheerios) LMAO

Maddie&EthansMom replied: Thank you all for your replies. I know I am normal now. And those of you who are neat freaks have really inspired me to start my own schedule. I feel so much better when the house is clean and so does DH. It just isn't my priority most days, but drives me crazy when it is dirty!! DH would like to hire a maid to come in every other week to do the dusting, mopping, bathrooms, windows, etc. I think I could do the rest. I hate clutter so it isn't really cluttered. I actually think I spend all my time cleaning out closets, cabinets and drawers. I am constantly throwing things away and 'trying' to organize this place. That is really all I have had the energy to do since becoming pg.

Well, I guess I better get to cleaning. I would love to see DH's face when he walks into a sparkling clean house tonight! He has tomorrow afternoon off and we want to go to the state fair. He won't want to go unless the house is clean.

Linda replied:
I try to keep the house clean and it's clean most of the time.
Its just the finding of the time to get round to do it.

coasterqueen replied: Well, mine only gets cleaned now that we have two cleaning ladies come in every two weeks to do so I haven't cleaned a bathroom since the end of August. It's great! It tooks months of convincing DH that we needed to do this because our house was always a mess. I finally did and he thinks it's great, too. It's fairly reasonable priced since they come every 2 weeks.

The only thing I do is *try* to keep the house picked up every day. I did well the first few weeks after we hired them, but then I slacked off. Now I only pick up on the weekends, lol.

jen replied: I had to read this post!! LOL! I am not a Mommy yet just pregnant with the first lil' one now! First I must say you all sound amazing! I will say this after reading all the posts!!! I WILL BE GETTING A MAID!! I am known to my friends as MRS. CLEAN and I get a lot of jokes about it! I don't have a system of any kind and I am not overly organized I just clean 24/7/365 and if someone is coming over it is put into mad crazy OVERTIME!! I know this is not going to be realistic when we have our baby and my dh is going to have to start helping me out instead of taking what our house looks like for granted! ha ha LOL! We seem to be a halfway house for stray animals we adopt out when we can which doesn't help either!!! LOL!

Thanks for the inspiration I never thought of a maid! HA!