Oh dear, you guys. Your comments on my last post about laundry really kinda stressed me out. I need to reply to several of your comments and I need to address one very important issue.
YOU MEAN TO TELL ME THAT SOME OF YOU DON’T LIVE YOUR LIFE BY A SCHEDULE BUT INSTEAD LIVE ON THE EDGE, WITH THE POSSIBILITY THAT ON A RANDOM WEDNESDAY MORNING YOU COULD FIND YOURSELF WITH NO CLEAN UNDERWEAR?????????
I apologize for the ALL CAPS, OMG! but seriously, you don’t have a laundry day? I…I…I just couldn’t exist.
This need to have a schedule truly says a lot about the way my brain functions and what’s necessary to keep me sane. For me, if I don’t have a schedule (and I’ve tried to live my life all willy nilly), I feel incredibly overwhelmed. Laundry piles up, the bathrooms become hazardous waste areas, and I start imagining burrowed creatures living in my carpet.
I schedule my days’ chores around our weekly outings. On “off days” when we have no place to go, I do the most chores, on “busy days” I just do piddly, easy things. I used to do ALL of my chores on one day, but that became too stressful for my already fragile psyche and made me grumpy for three days. Day one of grumpiness would occur the day before “chore day” because I knew that the next day would be filled with doing stupid chores. Day two of grumpiness was on “chore day” because, well it was “chore day.” The third day of grumpiness would occur the day after “chore day” because I never got EVERYTHING on my to do list done, so there’d be much fretting and gnashing of teeth over my inability to live up to my own expectations.
(Wow. That Jennifer has some issues.)
Here’s a peek at my current weekly schedule. Sometimes I’m really wild and zany and do Friday things on Thursday or Monday things on Wednesday.
Prepare to be awed or disgusted.
Daily:
Straighten house
Keep kitchen clean by wiping down counters and cleaning out sink, load and unload dishwasher. (Sidenote: the dishwasher MUST be unloaded and it’s contents put away before any new meal can be prepared or I get a nasty eye twitch.)
Sort mail
Reduce piles (I wish I could eliminate piles, but that is ridiculously impossible.)
Monday:
Kids laundry (if their hamper is full)
Pay bills
Tuesday:
Main laundry day (towels, clothes; sheets every other week) (Honestly, sometimes the sheets only get washed every 3 or even 4 weeks.)
Bathrooms and sweep tile floors
Sweep hardwoods (mop kitchen floor once a month) (Or really, only when company is coming. So, uh, rarely.)
Vacuum upstairs
Wednesday:
Vacuum downstairs
Vacuum stairs (hardly ever happens because of it’s pain in the ass factor)
Dust
Thursday:
Kids laundry (if their hamper is full)
Friday:
Wash towels
Windows and baseboards, but only if they are really, really, really, really, really, really bad.
Sweep hardwoods
So, um, please tell me there are others of you out there like me. I mean, I can’t be the only person who enjoys knowing that every Wednesday, my favorite underwear will be clean and my jeans won’t be crusty anymore.
As for the cleaning, I think it’s pretty obvious from my list that I’m not exactly an ace housekeeper. I *should* sweep and mop everyday, living with two messy children, but I don’t. I like to think of my house as “clean enough.” I believe there are far more important things than a spot-free home. Things like Twitter and kicking Carson’s ass in Mario Kart certainly rank above crumb removal.
Um. Well. I do laundry almost every day. And four times on Sunday. But, we’re a family of 6 and I’m potty training twins. So apparently I deserve a medal or a trip to the nearest psych facility.
Depending on my mood (which of course depends on the moods of the children in the house) I tidy up something every day. Or nothing every day. Today I vacuumed half the living area downstairs, emptied, refilled and RAN the dishwasher, and put away some clean laundry. Tomorrow, probably nothing. It’s how I roll.
.-= Kristin´s last blog ..Sights and Sounds =-.
I’m totally a schedule person, you are not alone. I doubt anything would get done if it wasn’t on a schedule, I’d forget when I did it last and just leave it for another day!
.-= Lisa´s last blog ..Fun Activities for Those Long Winter Days =-.
What do you do about laundry that can not wait a week? We’re in the midst of potty training two boys and laundry CAN NOT wait a week at our house. Ideally it gets done on Sundays but if I’m throwing poopy underwear in the wash, I’m doing a full load.
Also I am neurotic and wash the boys’ sheets every week because day care germs? EWWWWW. Just the idea that day care germs can crawl out of their hair onto their pillow. Yuck.
.-= LauraC´s last blog ..Aha! =-.
Oh my, potty training deems any and all scheduling attempts invalid. Laundry? Everyday. Other chores? When potty training is completed.
I do occasionally have some pretty stinky kitchen towels that can’t wait a week to be washed. In that case, I’ll wash on whatever day I need to.
I keep rewriting this comment because I can’t say what I need to say without embarassing myself. I complete roughly the same amount of chores as you do weekly (sans schedule) with laundry being the huge exception. The kid always has clean clothes. The husband does his own laundry. Me? I have a laundry pile that my husband threatens to photograph and post for all the world to see. I wish I could be like you.
.-= Mama Bub´s last blog ..Dear Lazy Neighbors, Thank You, Thank You Very Much =-.
I tried to do flylady but found her standards far, far exceeded my own. Now I have a daily chore system similar to yours. So you are not alone
me, too! Flylady was so detailed…not worth the stress!
Wow, I am impressed that you have a schedule. I live on the edge and do laundry when the hamper is full. I usually do it in the evening while watching tv (commercials are an excellent time to change loads). A schedule always seems like a really good idea. But I am lazy, what can I say? I clean when things are looking gross. Probably not enough. But always, ALWAYS before we have company over. So it’s usually a couple hours of work the day of. But then I feel good having everything nice and clean right before people come over. Whenever things are getting gross I just invite people over! Living in a clean home should be enough motivation but it’s not always enough for my lazy ass.
.-= Shannon´s last blog ..How 2010 is going to be… =-.
i used to have a schedule to clean and do laundry, but that really overwhelmed me, so I try to maintain and do laundry as I need to. Since the washer and dryer are next to the master its pretty easy for me to get stuff done or I can’t get into my bathroom!
.-= Heather-Domestic Extraordinaire´s last blog ..She is at Peace =-.
Literally a schedule has never really occurred to me.
Maybe that would help me be less frazzled and less messy??
But then again, probably not.
.-= ClassyFabSarah´s last blog ..Snowpocalypse 2010 =-.
I used to be on/try to be on a schedule. It worked, NOT. Now I go day to day. I really want to be on a schedule and usually try, this time of year, to start again. The best way for me is to look at my calendar for the week and then schedule stuff weekly.
Or just do it like I usually do. Put out the biggest fire first!
.-= Headless Mom´s last blog ..Wednesday’s Dinner =-.
I used to go by a schedule a lot more regularly before I had my daughter. Since she came along, with 3 kids total, I just kinda goes with whatever I can or want to get done. Some days, that’s nothing, aside from the necessities (dishes, for ex). Sunday is always laundry day though, because I’d hate for my husband to go to work in dirty socks.
.-= C @ Kid Things´s last blog ..Loose Tooth =-.
I WANT to do it your way. I just never am disciplined enough to do it.
.-= donna´s last blog ..UGH =-.
I used to be that way, but I couldn’t do it. However, I am in awe of anyone that can! I need to put myself on a better schedule, though…baby #3 is coming in a few months! For me, it isn’t the laundry, it’s the folding.
I think though if I had a laundry room that I loved it would make the whole thing more fun. That is definitely a goal this year.
I am definitely with you on the kitchen sink. I HAVE to have a clean kitchen before I can do any work or go to bed for that matter!
Um. Interesting. I don’t have kids so maybe that explains why I don’t need a schedule like that. I notice, oh, I’m getting low on socks or underwear and do laundry once every two or three weeks. And the sheets only get washed once every three or four laundry days. But I know I’m gross. I’ve only mopped the floors in our apartment four times in the two and a half years we’ve lived here!! (Don’t freak out – I sweep regularly.) I don’t think I’m a slob, but I know for sure I don’t live up to your housekeeping standards!!
.-= NGS´s last blog ..45 x 365 #273 =-.
I had an even more rigid schedule before kids. It’s an illness, really.
I have tried schedules similiar to you but it stressed me out when we had a busy day and I didn’t get things done and then it would overflow into the next day. Now I wake up and jot 2-3 chores that I try to achieve that day…in regards to chores.
Back to the laundry…I am all over getting it washed. But I am terrible at folding and putting it away. I could probably set the world record for how high you can pile your clean laundry on the couch…
By the way..I LOVED your blogging advice…are you going to post more ideas?
.-= Sarah´s last blog ..Jelly Belly Love =-.
I failed to mention anything about the laundry getting put away. Sometimes it stays draped over chairs or in the basket for days. It used to stress me out, but I decided that merely having clean clothes was good enough.
And yes, I’m trying to have something ready to post for this Saturday!
I actually enjoy doing laundry & folding…but putting it away is a whole ‘nother story. It usually stays in baskets till the weekend!
We seem to have created a system which inadvertently forces us to fold the laundry. I usually only do one load a day so we aren’t overwhelmed by volume. Our laundry room is upstairs & the cat litter box is in there, so I don’t let clean laundry get piled in there. (though I may leave it in the dryer until the next time I need the dryer! Once it’s out of the dryer, it gets dumped on our bed, and I fold it if I find a moment. If not, before we can get IN the bed, we have to fold the laundry. Other than the floor, and a tiny nightstand, we don’t have anywhere for a pile of clean clothes to be piled. A pile on the floor sometimes happens, but not too often. By the time I’ve pulled mine out to fold, and tossed his on his side of the bed, it’s just not that much folding to do for either of us.
If life is going badly, we have enough underclothes to go at least two weeks (the length of a cold…) or a bit more without doing laundry. We both were raised to wear day to day clothes twice, at least, so that cuts down on the generation of laundry.
Is there a mom rule that says you *should* sweep and mop every day? Because then I am failing miserably at this stuff. Although maybe I earn some extra credit due to the fact that I do at least one load of laundry a day…
I used to have a schedule for cleaning but then I realized I would just get stressed out when the stuff on the schedule didn’t get done. And, um, I was too lazy to stick to the schedule so that system didn’t last long.
.-= Jen´s last blog ..A hygiene question =-.
I don’t think there’s any rule. At least not in the book I received when Carson was born. Of course that book was written in an extinct Chinese dialect.
I”m so glad I”m not the only one who doesn’t change sheets once a week, or mop every week. Sometimes I wonder how everyone else does it, and if I’m the big slacker I think I am. Thanks for validating me.
I spread my chores out throughout the week, but I don’t have a schedule, per say. I just make sure that everything that needs to get done, does. I know that if I don’t get it done I’ll be working on Saturday, so that keeps me going. I’d rather play on saturday when I have that extra parent back up, allowing me some ME time.
.-= coffeemamma´s last blog ..Learning new things =-.
I agree, I like my weekends to be relaxing, with no chores! (Except grocery shopping, but I kinda like grocery shopping so it’s not really a true chore.)
I’m amazed that you can do laundry once a week. I need to average two loads a day just to try and keep even…usually it’s more like three.
I love your schedule though. I’ve been looking for something like this, I just can’t get my stuff together regarding a house-cleaning schedule.
I hope Tate appreciates you.
.-= Mom24@4evermom´s last blog ..365 Project–Week 1 =-.
I don’t do laundry once a week…the kids laundry usually has to be done at least twice a week (of course I only have 2…w/ 4 I’m not at all surprised it has to be done daily!)
Nope, no schedule here. I tried that, but it just made me feel like a loser when I couldn’t stick to it. I always have clean underwear, though, because I do laundry every day.
I sooooo wish I was that organized. I have tried and failed so many times so I guess I am in the “living on the edge” group and yes I did run out of underwear on Sunday – Thank goodness for Speed Wash and Speed Dry!! But I do clean the kitchen every day, because that does stress me out! If my kitchen is clean, I feel like I have accomplished something
!
.-= Cortney @ Evan Has Landed´s last blog ..A Campin’ We Will Go (A Coleman Gift Card Giveaway) =-.
I have to say I do all my chores one day a week then I redo some of them again later in the week. My week is typically
Monday~ All chores, dust, vacuum, windows, mirrors, baseboards, cobwebs, sweep & mop all floors, bathrooms, sheets, rugs & all other laundry
Tuesday~ shopping & laundry
Wednesday~office, vacuum & laundry
Thursday~ errands, reclean bathrooms, volunteer & laundry
Friday~ vacuum & finish anything that went uncompleted through the week
That is in addition to cleaning the kitchen after each meal, keeping this picked up and other daily tasks…I am with you the dishwasher needs to be unloaded and put away before anything else is started.
I am crazy it is genetic.
I like to call that OCD…husband wants to put together a schedule. Both of us wear uniforms for work. Yes, we’ve had days where we’ve had no shirts or socks. Yes, I’ve possibly been up till 2am doing laundry. Meh….more things to worry about.
.-= Angry Julie Monday´s last blog ..Mama, can we go to Pretend City again? =-.
I think my blog has more of a schedule than my housekeeping. *priorities, yo!*
.-= DesignHER Momma´s last blog ..Confessions of a Social Networking Cheapskate =-.
Are you kidding me?! You are awesome! I would LOVE to be on a schedule like that again. It used to do wonders for my sanity and general sense of accomplishment.
But like C, life’s been a huge scramble since my daughter was born earlier this year. I hope things get back to “normal” soon.
I don’t have a schedule – washing gets done several times a week though but I just pick a sunny day so the clothes can dry on the line quickly. Sheets get done every week. If I get all my cleaning done before lunchtime on Saturday (the theory being it leaves me with a whole day and a half of a weekend to enjoy and not do chores) then I get a bunch of flowers. (I haven’t had flowers for a while.)
Can’t imagine not doing sheets at least once a week but then it is high summer here and my other half is a real sweatbucket.
.-= 12ontheinside´s last blog ..Bad Timing =-.
I do laundry on Sunday. Because I need to be watching Desperate Housewives to fold.
And I think that your kids need a bigger hamper.
.-= Marinka´s last blog ..Bag Check =-.
I agree – get them a bigger hamper. =)
.-= Cathy´s last blog ..Run more. =-.
Why didn’t I think of that?
Oh my gosh, I am SO jealous of your schedule! I wouldn’t say I live on the edge; it’s more like I live in the midst of a disaster area every day. By the time I get home from work and eventually get my daughter into bed, all I want to do is exactly what I’m doing now: eat dinner, watch TV and veg on the internet! So chores get done when they absolutely HAVE to be done – and sometimes even after that. I really NEED to get myself on some sort of a schedule…but two years into this full-time working (outside my house) mom thing, I still haven’t figured it out!
.-= Mary @ Giving Up on Perfect´s last blog ..Looking back on the memory of . . . 2009 =-.
If I worked outside the home, I wouldn’t be as “organized” or scheduled! It would drive me crazy, but so would not having my evenings for vegging!
Tuesdays used to be my laundry day – and then – I don’t know what happened, but I stopped following that schedule (and honestly, that was the only thing scheduled – except for sweeping and steam mopping the kitchen floor on Monday nights). And then I hated life without scheduled laundry day. I’d do a load here and a load there and NEVER felt caught up. So now laundry is on Thursdays and it works out well. I do as many loads as I can with towels being the last, so if I leave them in the dryer – no big deal. Our work clothes are first so I’m sure to hang them up right away. Also – I stopped washing the kid’s clothes seperately. I split my laundry like this: (OMG – do you really need to know this – what is MY problem?) Anyway – like this:
all underwears (Mike hates that I say underwears) – this includes undies, t-shirts, and socks and sometimes washclothes and kitchen towels
light weight cold water stuff – my workout clothes, the kid’s shirts, some of my shirts, some of their pants, some pjs
heavy weigh cold water stuff – sweatshirts, some pjs, heavier kid’s pants, etc.
work clothes – Mike’s dress shirts and pants, button up shirts, my dress pants – sometimes this gets split into two loads – pants and shirts seperate – and sometimes not all of Mike’s gets done because he doesn’t put his pants in the hamper. THAT is not my job.
sweaters – probably gets down every other week – and is a pain in my butt – hand wash setting and then trying to figure out where to dry them all. But I love my sweaters.
towels – I can skip this once a week.
And sheets? Uh, I’m so bad about washing sheets. Probably gets done once a month. Unless somebody pees in their bed.
Okay, so yeah, maybe I should have just written my own darn post. =)
.-= Cathy´s last blog ..Run more. =-.
We have incredibly similar laundry sorting methods! I do mix in the kids’ clothes w/ ours on Tuesdays, theirs only gets washed separately on other days. Tate totally doesn’t understand my sorting system, but obviously it’s the right way since it’s the way you and I do it!
Also, yes. I DO need a bigger kids hamper. Shoulda thought of it myself!
Of course it’s the correct way. Mike totally doesn’t understand the light-weight vs heavy-weight loads. And that I mix my colors. He would do white, darks, lights with no regard to the thickness of the material, which, come on, if you don’t wash like weighted materials together they don’t dry well. Right???
.-= Cathy´s last blog ..Run more. =-.
true, I sort my laundry more by the drying factor than the washing factor, as I wash almost everything on cold. Whites, darks, colors, jeans, towels, sheets.
Last semester, I decided it was so worth it to pay the $1.25 to take my husband’s dress shirts to the laundry. They iron way better than me, and use starch too. As a professor, he only needs 2 or 3 a week, so I take in half a dozen every week or so, then pick them up before the next teaching day. He looks way spiffier now.
oh yeah, and I wash jeans too. Duh.
.-= Cathy´s last blog ..Run more. =-.
Oooh my. I am a loser. I don’t have any kind of schedule like this. I work out of the home during the day and what gets done on a particular day gets done. More gets done on the weekend….I’m sad to say I spend more time with my kid at night..oh nothing sappy…I mean keeping him from destroying the house is what I mean. Actually, I admire you for your schedule! I think it is very commendable!
I do it willy nilly style.
Of course, I clean up the kitchen, dishes, & floors daily, but laundry is done all week long depending on what basket is full. Bathrooms are cleaned once approx every 2 weeks (but there’s daily Clorox wiping on/around toilets). I vacuum when there’s stuff on the floor, sweep daily.
It’s the clutter that kills me. Oh and the constant trail of toys all over the house.
.-= kj @ Where my boys at?´s last blog ..2010 resolutions =-.
The only set date I have is that every Friday I put clean sheets on the beds. Something about starting the weekend (even though it is no different from any other day for me) with fresh sheets is so appealing. If I’m really with it, I will shave my legs that day, too, because Clean Sheets + Just Shaved Legs = Heaven.
.-= Shelly´s last blog ..Orange Bowl Champions, Baby! =-.
Freshly shaved legs and clean sheets are lovely, however I purposely DON’T shave my legs on clean sheet day. Tate thinks that when I shave my legs it means “I want s-e-x.” (It doesn’t.) I don’t want to have sex and mess up my fresh, clean sheets!
(Hoping Tate doesn’t actually read this comment!)
I’m with you – don’t mess up those clean sheets!
.-= Cathy´s last blog ..Run more. =-.
I am so impressed with your schedule! I SO need one! I have started a *small* schedule…I need baby steps. Monday is change the sheets and towels in our bedroom. Tuesday was going to be the day kids got new sheets but they have bunkbeds and it’s just a pain in my ass to do the top bunk. So the monkeys get new sheets maybe every other week.
Other than that things get done when I am motivated or my husband has nagged enough for me to get it done.
I solved the underwear crisis by buying everyone about 20 pairs. (Or maybe that’s just because I never throw things away…)
Mopping floors? I’m not even going to tell you how infrequently I do that.
Oh, and if you’re ever going to stop by my house, I need to know about a week ahead of time.
.-= Brigid´s last blog ..magnetic north =-.
I have considered buying more underwear. Seriously, I wear Fruit of the Loom! It’s not like I can’t pick up a package of 6 (+1 free!) anytime I’m at Target. I don’t know why I don’t.
I do chores every day. Scheduled. In my Google Calender. And laundry twice a week (one load, each day), scheduled on the days that I don’t have other chores scheduled. Also, every week when I, say, clean my kitchen, I choose one really DEEP cleaning thing to do in addition to the usual cleaning. This week was bleaching the grout between my counter and backsplash tiles.
I think my illness might be worse than yours.
.-= Zoeyjane´s last blog ..On division =-.
I forgot to mention that my chores, in my Google Calendar, are colour-coded and sub-titled so as to ensure they pop out as to-be-done-or-life-will-end. In a soothing blue.
.-= Zoeyjane´s last blog ..On division =-.
Color coded, in a calendar! I bow down to your awesomeness. The pop out as to be done or life will end in a soothing blue is truely something I may only be able to aspire to, Sensai.
Goodness, you are organized with your household chores. I am in a little bit different scenario as both my husband and I work full time, but this is how we get things done.
#1 – house cleaners come every two weeks. The $85 is worth its weight in gold and what they are able to accomplish in 1 hour, would literally take me, well…it just wouldn’t happen.
#2 – with regards to laundry, I am just constantly pulling clothes out of the laundry baskets in the bedrooms and sorting them in the laundry room. When a bin gets full, I run it if I have time and feel like dealing with it. It starts to stress me out when the bins in the bedrooms are overflowing.
It is funny how certain things stress some out and other things stress others out. When I get stressed I am a list-making freak!
.-= Alecia´s last blog ..aStore =-.
Big progress around these parts is that I am trying to do one load of laundry a day (as opposed to eight over the course of a weekend). Also, Hubby has promised to empty the dishwasher every morning if I run it before bed.
I envy your schedule and plan to establish one when I grow up!
.-= mep´s last blog ..BeFOUR you know it . . . =-.
My house cleaning habits are nearly the same. I have certain things I try to do each day of the week – and mostly they get done – although I don’t mop the kitchen nearly enough.
The one thing that is consistent is that Tuesday is Laundry day – and I wash EVERYTHING – sheets, towels, clothes, etc. I LOVE having all the wash done… even if it takes me a few days to fold it all. And there’s nothing I love more than a freshly made bed with nice clean sheets.
You’re not alone!
I LOVE having one day where ALL the laundry is done! This is why I can’t do the “do laundry everyday method.” It’s just too thrilling to have everything clean at once, even if it only lasts a few hours.
I have not schedule. Perhaps that is my problem. I did about three months worth of laundry while I was home on vacation last week.
I do a good cleaning of the house every Saturday morning – get it done and over with- then we spot clean the rest of the week. The kitchen gets cleaned religiously every night. Dishwasher loaded or unloaded, counter/sink/stove/fridge wiped down, and floor swept. That is the only room I am really neurotic about. Floors get vacuumed about every other day (messy toddler, messy husband, and two cats), and well, laundry, that gets done when it gets done. Madaline is the only one that gets her laundry done on a weekly as needed basis. Oh..and I get an hour for lunch, so I usually do my grocery shopping on my lunch hour. Actually, come to think of it, I am more organized about my grocery shopping then I am anything else. *weird*
I *think* the reason I don’t have a schedule and wait till the weekend, might be because I work outside the home. I am gone, at work, 10 hours each day. And, I decided a long time ago, that the time in the evenings was better spent building towers, coloring and mashing play-doh then making sure my house was picture perfect and that it was silly to give myself an ulcer over it.
.-= HaB´s last blog ..Good Intentions =-.
I totally think you have a schedule, it’s that you do the most cleaning on Saturdays. If I worked outside the home, I wouldn’t spend valuable time in the evenings doing things like dusting or cleaning a toilet.
When Carson was a baby and crawling, we had two dogs and I vacuumed every single day. If I didn’t, he’d be covered in dog hair. I was totally neurotic about it.
I want, so badly, to have a cleaning schedule. It’s one of my resolutions, but I never got around to making the plan.
I don’t have a scheduled laundry day, but do a load every day, sometimes 2. We have sorted bins in our laundry room, and I just empty clothes in it daily and wash the one the it tallest. Easy.
As far as the other things – I think I need to be one of the ‘clean the whole house once a week’ type of gal. I get stressed out when I don’t have downtime, and having something that I’m supposed to do daily would drive me to the point of not doing anything! I was thinking 2 days per week of chores. Then NOTHING, well, except laundry and general picking up, the other days.
I avoid this whole stressful situation by just not cleaning unless people are coming to our house. True story.
.-= Burgh Baby´s last blog ..I Want to Be Just Like Rory When I Grow Up. =-.
I’m in utter awe of you. NO way I could adhere to such a schedule, because quite frankly I am a lazy bitch. Laundry is the one thing that I do all the time, but actual CLEANING? Well, that’s a little less often. The fact that you think you should sweep and MOP the floors every day is very foreign to me. The floors get mopped (by my husband) whenever we get sick of looking at all the crap on them. I do love to vacuum, AND steam clean too!
.-= Suzy Voices´s last blog ..Resolution Disillusion =-.
I totally have a schedule. I have a pretty small house and it’s just one floor, so it’s not THAT hard to keep it pretty clean and tidy, as long as it’s a priority. And to me, it is. Mess makes me crazy. Laundry is actually the least of my concerns compared to sticky counters and dust and dog hair. I’ve stuck with a weekly dusting/vacuuming/mopping/bathroom cleaning schedule for over a year now, and I agree: the schedule keeps you sane. You can look at a sticky floor and think, “Well, tomorrow that’s going to get done, so no need to get stressed about it right now when I have a million things to do. It WILL get done very shortly.”
Laundry, interestingly, is the thing I DON’T really have a day for. I just do it as needed, on an almost constant basis. There’s always SOMETHING that needs to be washed.
.-= Sarah´s last blog ..THAT Mom =-.
Oh, and I just read that comment trail up a bit, about not shaving on clean sheet day so the husband doesn’t want sex and thereby mess up your clean sheets…. OMG. I thought I was the only one neurotic enough to ever think about such a thing, but I totally do this too. I’ll think, “Hmm, this would be a good night to get it on. Oh, but I just changed the sheets… Maybe we’ll still be in the mood tomorrow?”
.-= Sarah´s last blog ..THAT Mom =-.
OMG, is Mario Kart not THE BOMB? I LOVE IT. In fact, I’m pretty sure the decline in my housekeeping occurred around the same time we bought Mario Kart.
I no longer have a cleaning schedule. It’s so liberating! And it’s been great to learn a little (more) dirt doesn’t kill anyone. In fact, I bet that is why my children are rarely sick. A little (more) dirt builds immunity!
.-= Heather, Queen of Shake Shake´s last blog ..The Dwindling of a Wonder Boy =-.
I like your schedule. I don’t have a schedule, but I do one load of laundry every day, dishes and kitchen every day, and tidy up every day. I clean the bathrooms about weekly, same with the vacuuming and mopping. I don’t dust much at all. I think I clean my baseboards once a year…
.-= Lora´s last blog ..This Day =-.
Ummmm…would you come and be my wife because I totally suck at it. Piles? Everywhere. Laundry? When I feel like it or run out of underwear – which ever comes first. Floors? When the hair or crumbs start to bug me (was twice daily when I had a crawling baby – yay for walking!). Bathrooms? Weekly(ish).
I remember the last few weeks I was working, I daydreamed of a schedule like yours…I ever wrote it out. But it never once followed it. I hate housekeeping and am too poor for a maid. So I keep us from living in filth and call it a day.
.-= Michelle Smiles´s last blog ..If we get snowed in I can bake something =-.
Lived by my schedule when boys were home full time. HAD TO HAVE IT. Now, not so much. And getting things done – not so much. They are both in school full time and I feel like I have the whole day and then I see the clock is 2:20 just like RIGHT NOW. SHIT, I gotta go.
KEEP BELIEVING
.-= Angie @ KEEP BELIEVING´s last blog ..MaHannie, get your… =-.
When my girls (now 25 and 23) were little, I lived and died by the schedule. But, I was a single parent from the time they were 2 and 4, so between having to get to daycare in the morning and into bed in the evening, all we were was schedule. On Saturday, we got up just as early as weekdays in order to be in the laundrymat early enough to get as many washers as I wanted, then as many driers. The more machines I could use at once, the sooner we were out of there. The sooner we were out of there, the more likely we’d be out of the grocery store in time for lunch. Then, we all napped.
Since the little guy (36 months) was born, I’ve had a terrible time getting scheduled. We’d spent the previous few years with everyone taking care of their own laundry, not eating at home most nights due to their jobs and my being in school. Then one of them even moved out.
I tried flylady, but she was way too organized, plus, I only logged on once a day or every other day, so the emailed reminders were a little pointless.
These days, our weekly schedule is something like this:
Daily: Empty dishwasher in the morning, run it in the evening. Kitchen counters and sink are cleaned each night. Pick up all the boy’s toys downstairs. Run the vaccuum downstairs (we have 2 long haired cats, hardwood floors and leather furniture. if I don’t vaccuum daily, there are drifts of fur because there is no where for it to stick, no carpet or upholstery. Luckily, downstairs is basically one room, not that big really.) Scoop litterbox, well, most nights.
Monday: the boy’s laundry, generally one load as he is not interested in the potty AT ALL. Plus general picking up of junkola, resulting in emptying all the trashcans & recycling bins in the house into the ones outside the house.
Tuesday: Whatever, probably bathroom cleaning. And a load of laundry
Wednesday: Whatever else, and a load of laundry, think about grocery plans because the flyers come today.
Thursday: Vaccuum upstairs. Change litterbox. Repeat of junkola pick up, resulting in trash and recycling being at the curb sometime before midnight.
Friday: groceries, and a load of laundry and whatever.
Weekends:my husband plays soccer on sunday and washes that icky laundry. ewww! other than that, no major housekeeping unless there’s a project like the garage or some sort of repair or redecorate. At some point we’ll bring the trash and recycling bins back up to the house, generally we are the last on the block to do so.
My husband is the paperwork handler. so although I have a small pile of stuff to deal with, it’s not so much that I have to schedule it.
“Whatever” includes any number of things, from my paperwork to cleaning the refrigerator to cleaning windows. I’m no longer a by the calender cleaner, more an if it looks dirty type. Or, if someone is coming. On the other hand, since culinary school, I have a deeply ingrained habit of wiping things off and tidying up as I pass by, Things seem to stay neater and therefore appear cleaner and so I am not triggered to do a deep clean.
I hate Laundry! Is there more to say, it is a very impressive schedule but god why can’t it just do itself.
.-= Drago´s last blog ..Comment by =-.
I would love to be more like you! I suffer from an all or nothing mentality, and unfortunately I tend to side with nothing, aka, why bother! But I do laundry prob, every other day. That way it’s only one or 2 loads at a time. So I pretty much always have clean undies…the rest of the house, clean, uh, not so much!
.-= Natalia Burleson´s last blog ..Monday Goals..1st week =-.