i was talking with a good friend last week lamenting the state of my house. walls are half-painted. the kids lovingly refer to the living room as the “trash compactor.” every time i turn around henry is turning some bit of ephemera from my life that hasn’t found a home yet into a weed trimmer. my pantry is chaos. [i don't even have corn starch!] i have piles of clean and dirty laundry in every room. and on and on and on and on. and this friend pointed out, “yes, i remember you have a problem with unpacking.”
my heart gave a little hiccup. it was startled to learn that it is as obvious to other people as it is to me that i don’t exactly have things together. [especially now that joe wears four blue socks on mondays, two white socks on tuesday, and three green socks on wednesday.]
it sent me on an introspection rampage. i won’t bore you with all the details, but here are the things still rambling around in my brain.
- what is a clean house?
- how much time a day should a person spend cleaning her house?
- is it more important to take the kids to the pool, or to unpack that last box i keep stepping over?
- what do i think the ideal mother should be up to?
- how am i not living up to my ideal?
- where did i get that ideal, anyway?
- what should a mom be doing?
- how should i split myself between educating and delighting my children and the ever present housework?
- is it so bad to sit on the couch and read instead of doing any of the above?
i’ll be happy to accept any and all answers to my questions. i am really curious how other stay-at-homes moms divide their time. or not stay-at-home moms. it’s even more baffling to me how one could work full time and then come home and keep working full time, because this mothering and housekeeping business is seriously full-time.
sometimes i try to shove my disarray off onto the kids, thinking that if they weren’t such whirlwinds of destruction, my house would be tidy. but, let’s be honest, my married house has never been tidy. which is kind of bizarre thing to think about if you knew me as a child—i was so persnickity about my bedroom that i could tell if my sister moved anything on my bureau a fraction of an inch. i even remember asking my mom how she could stand to have such a messy desk. i remember she said to me, i could spend all day cleaning, or i could spend all day doing other things. [i can hear her in the back of my head saying, i never said that! which is what she always says to me.]
but i think the tiny little perfectionist that is still inside me really really hates cleaning when it knows that nanoseconds later someone is going to spread bills across the counter or kix on the carpet or mr. potato head parts in all the laundry baskets. i want clean things to stay clean: and since they aren’t going to, i would rather not clean them at all.
i could spend all day cleaning. or i could spend all day doing other things.
which will it be? because, guess what, it’s gonna be the future soon.
I have been having a similar internal dialogue with myself ever since I started staying home full-time with my kids, just about a year ago. (I will say, for my part I find being a stay-at-home mom of three kids is a lot harder than being a full-time working mom of two.) I have no answers, only the same questions I ask myself in various ways over and over. If I spend more time cleaning and on other homekeeping type tasks, I feel guilty for ignoring my children, not enriching their lives more, and wonder why I’m bothering to be a stay-at-home mom if I spend all my time on tasks I could hire someone to do just as well as or better than me. If I don’t spend the time cleaning and my house is constantly an embarrassing mess, then I feel like it reflects on my worth as a woman, mother, wife, and human being (in that order). Not to mention that it drives me totally crazy after awhile, like my life in general is out of control. I feel like I am constantly looking for ways to get my kids to leave me alone so that I can get something done, which makes me feel like a terrible mom. I want to have a clean house, sew, cook good and healthy and cheap meals, bake my own bread, read novels, lose 20 pounds, exercise regularly, refinish my kitchen table, play with my kids, teach my kids to read and love the outdoors and to be good people, and and and….
i hear you. if i can’t have it clean, i’d rather not clean it as well. the only thing that helps me is manageable bites. a little bit each day. and, i’m trying my guts out to have the kids help me, but . . . what, exactly is a three year old capable of cleaning? and, let’s be honest, a one year old isn’t cleaning anything, is he? when you have all the answers, please share . . . meanwhile, I’m off to read a novel in my wrinkly bed
Can I just say ditto to your post as well as Maren’s? I just can’t seem to get it together either. I have the same internal debate quite frequently. Most of the time (until I just can’t stand it another minute) I choose to do other things. And I see nothing wrong with reading a good book on the couch!
I do that during naptime. Nap time is MY time for ME…not for cleaning the house and doing the dishes. Those things will always be there. My kids will not.
Oh no- did I say that? and did it come out unkind? is that why you hung up on me?
here’s what I think- a clean house is anything that you are happy with. If you are fine with it, leave it! It is much more important to play outside on the swing-set, although less immediately apparent that you have accomplished something. Its easy to make a bed and feel like you’ve accomplished something- because you get results immediately- if you spend that same time playing on the swing-set, you can’t always see the results right away. children take a long (years and years) time. #8 is a mystery to me- because they need to be cleaned and feed and cleaned again, and feed again…
what do you do with corn starch anyway? should I put some in my pantry?
Jessie,
I used to be a perfectionist about my room too! And my house actually was pretty clean before I had kids. But now I feel like you do. If it’s not going to stay clean, I’d rather not bother cleaning it. Until it reaches a certain threshold of grime. It gets to me when it’s too chaotic and I start losing things.
My mom wasn’t so picky about cleaning, but she was always doing cool stuff, I thought. Over the years she taught English, played tennis, did yoga, learned how to raise dairy goats and honeybees, wrote letters to Grandma and Grandpa and various friends around the world, hosted exchange students and helped out people who needed it, made beautiful quilts, and somehow raised four kids at the same time. I guess you can tell she’s my hero.
She also took time to do things for herself, like go on walks, read the paper, and even take afternoon naps. Imagine that. Remembering that made me feel better when I was pregnant and tired and would let the kids watch a video so I could lie down for a little while. Creativity, little kids, and cleanliness aren’t an easy mix. This too shall pass. So do other things. What are they going to remember more when they’re older, that you were an excellent unpacker, or that you took them swimming in the summer when it was hot?
When they’re a little older they can help you with the cleaning. Actually it will take longer when they help at first, but when they learn how, they can vacuum and do dishes, clean bathrooms, you name it! Maybe one of them will become a great chef, even. Jen’s Alice is!
I should have sent my cornstarch with you. We only ever used it at your house!
I like to divide my house up into two zones - zone 1 is all the areas that have to be kept clean or I will suffer a nervous breakdown. Zone 2 is all the other areas that I don’t care about and can just sit there until I move. I spend about an hour every day keeping all the zone 1 areas in order (not an hour in a row - an hour spread out over the day). I’ve noticed that it takes more like 5 hours if I let the area get out of control (hence, the nervous breakdown). If I spend 10 minutes 6 times a day keeping it in control, it’s no big deal. I make sure that the zone 1 places are tidy and in order before I go to bed, so the next day starts off great.
I still have laundry issues. I’m not very good at laundry. Or bathrooms. Or making my bed. And I do get really frustrated when people undo what I have just done. That’s another thing I do - I divide up the house into public spaces and private spaces. In public spaces, personal items are not allowed to stay. Public spaces are for everyone to enjoy, therefore they must be kept clean. Personal spaces can look however that person wants them to look (ie, Spencer’s office and his half of the bedroom, behind the basement door, the entire basement…). My mom did that with us kids - we weren’t allowed to leave our toys, clothes, garbage, whatever, in the Living Room or Kitchen. We had bedrooms and a Family Room that were for those things. We could take something into the Living Room, use it, and then put it away. If we left it in the Living Room, it was confiscated and we had to work to get it back.
Okay, so my comment is as long as your post.
After reading your post, I think I need to eat some humble pie. I can’t seem to keep my house clean either. And it makes me feel so bad about myself. So I keep convincing myself that it’s because I’m working. If I wasn’t working, I would be home and have the time to clean, right? This will all change once I have kids and can stay at home with them, right? Umm…. Maybe instead of always having a “the grass is greener…” attitude, I should just do my best and then let it go. Really let it go.
#3. Kids to the pool. I say as long as there are not cockroaches perpetually snacking off the popcorn ground into the carpet, you’re good. Also, I like flylady. (flylady.com). She helped me a lot when I was working and trying to keep a house clean. Which is pretty much impossible, btw. I didn’t fold laundry for a year.
i loved your list maren. it seems very similar to mine. (why do i feel like a failure if i haven’t refinished my table or turned a dumpster find into something beautiful?)
you all have helped me sharpen my thinking: my problem is not that i don’t get everything done that’s in my head, my problem is that i can’t let it go. i spend all this time beating myself over the head. so maybe what i’m looking for are tips on letting go of the guilt.
i’m glad that you’re writing your novel in wrinkles, reba. and i don’t believe you for a second miriam that your life is a mess. but i love you anyway.
and sarajane, i didn’t mean to hang up on you. and corn starch is great for thickening things and making sweet and sour chicken.
becky, i guess the problem is making the leap from knowing certain things cerebral-ly to actually acting like you believe them and not badgering yourself about it.
karina, i like the idea of zones. i officially name the living room the trash compactor zone.
and tiff, everybody knows that nobody on earth has as much time to clean the house as a PhD student in biochemistry. duh.
Jessie!
Wow–it’s been a while. I’m not sure you even remember me from the good ole Cleveland 3rd.
Thank you for the post. Why is it so comforting to me to know that other moms struggle with this same dilemma? When I was young I decided on the philosophy that when I was a mom I was staying at home to be with the kids, not to do housework. So I acted accordingly–namely not doing almost any housework–and it was generally a disaster. As much as I didn’t want to face it, I found that the state of my house did affect my family life, not to mention my sanity (e.g. I don’t do the dishes, so they pile up until it’s time to cook dinner, but then there’s no room to cook, so I have to do them, but then dinner’s late, and then the kids get to bed to late and are grouchy the next day, and I’M grouchy the next day, etc. etc. Please someone tell me that sounds familiar). Anyway so then I tried getting on top of it, but felt I swung to far the other way, and came to the realization which everyone else comes to, that I could spend all day cleaning. And let me tell you, that’s depressing.
Anyway, I don’t feel like I have any great answers. I’m still trying to find the right balance. I have found, as mentioned, that it’s a lot easier to maintain cleanliness than to catch-up, but even there…like I said, still trying to figure this out.
Oh and a big one for me right now, maybe you have some good ideas–how in the world do you get personal time with two kids? Has it gotten better now that Violet is older? Joshua has gotten spotty with his nap-taking, and it feels like wringing a dry rag trying to squeeze out any time for personal renewal. And let’s be honest–don’t we need that to be good moms? I do. Otherwise I turn into feral mommy.
I always wanted to stay current on your blog, but lately it’s been hard to even get on the computer for more than 5 minutes a day. It’s taken a nasty stomach bug to knock me flat on my back, stick in a bunch of movies for Joshua, and be able to do nothing other than read and look at friends’ blogs. Any advice out there about snatching personal time?
Sorry, reading over my comment. I do know when to use the word too. Wonder if I puked my brains out as well as my stomach. Yuck. sorry. that’s gross.