In a recent survey.....

Did you see the recent survey that claims the average household spends 4 hours 25 mins a week doing ‘chores’?! That’s only 37 mins a day!

How long do you spend each week homemaking?

Hmmm, hard to say. Probably a couple of hours a day. More if I'm doing something like deep cleaning the kitchen or regrouting or something like that. If bits of DIY, decorating and researching purchases and stuff are counted as homemaking too then maybe 4 hours a day or more. Dan classes it as homemaking when I make stuff so that would add even more time.

hard to say not sure there is always something to do though. Its nice when you go out, for as long as you are in you end up doing something.

TP wrote:hard to say not sure there is always something to do though. Its nice when you go out, for as long as you are in you end up doing something.

I'm the other way about. I am in love with my house so I love spending time doing stuff to it and making it more gorgeous. The best thing about going out for me is getting back to the little sugarlump house of joy!

I'm not honestly sure, but I know that the dinner pots takes me about 40mins. cooking is anywhere between 30 mins and 4 hours or so per day, washing clothes I'm not sure how to count it because it only takes a moment to put the clothes in and take them out, but for instance a white wash is 3 hours on my washer....?!

I don't know. I work til I tire, then I sit and do internet things, watch a bit of telly, play on the wii and have a biscuit, then back to the work again.

alec eiffel wrote:

TP wrote:hard to say not sure there is always something to do though. Its nice when you go out, for as long as you are in you end up doing something.

I'm the other way about. I am in love with my house so I love spending time doing stuff to it and making it more gorgeous. The best thing about going out for me is getting back to the little sugarlump house of joy!

Do you enjoy actual cleaning or do you mean you enjoy making the house look nice if that makes sense.

TP wrote:

alec eiffel wrote:

TP wrote:hard to say not sure there is always something to do though. Its nice when you go out, for as long as you are in you end up doing something.

I'm the other way about. I am in love with my house so I love spending time doing stuff to it and making it more gorgeous. The best thing about going out for me is getting back to the little sugarlump house of joy!

Do you enjoy actual cleaning or do you mean you enjoy making the house look nice if that makes sense.

Both really. I think everyone has jobs they don't like doing - I hate doing the recycling for example. But I don't separate the "making the house look nice" bit from the cleaning bit, it's about the whole thing working together. We're working towards a mid century/scandi look so if the place is untidy it just doesn't look right.

The more I've decluttered, the quicker the housework - I now only need 30 minutes to go from really messy and grubby to nice enough for visitors. I try to clean as I go along rather than letting it get really dirty/untidy - that's the biggest frustration with DH - he never ever ever cleans up spills/crumbs on the kitchen counters and then puts clean stuff down in dirty places. Grrrrr.

life_in_termoil wrote:Did you see the recent survey that claims the average household spends 4 hours 25 mins a week doing ‘chores’?! That’s only 37 mins a day!

I think they must of just asked MEN how long they spent cleaning!!

lol, most men yes. but mine's an exception. I think he just got into the habit when i was ill and it never left him.

Ages when I do any, I am so cluttered I spend longer moving stuff around then actually houseworking.
Julia Penguin, you should hire yourself out by the hour (month) for me.
I am very impressed with anyone who can declutter their house that much. I wish I could.
Did you get fed up with clutter & get rid of everything at once, more or less. Or start getting rid of things & realise that your life was easier?
Your capsule wardrobe sounds so much easier, I have far too many clothes because I can never remember what I actually I have.
I need tips from you.

Hi Rosie,

I know you weren't asking me but here I am anyway.

I think a capsule wardrobe is a brilliant thing, for one it removes that problem of having that one item at the bottom of the laundry bag for ages as you don't own anything else in that colour. There are fewer expensive mistakes (or even sale bargain mistakes) hanging around never being worn as there's nothing to go with them and the vast majority of the clothes can be worn year round, layering up and adding accessories. It's really efficient and is very much a case of "less is more" as there's less chance of thinking you have nothing to wear as everything goes with everything else.

When I started decluttering the house (and it could have been a candidate for that old tv show "How Clean Is Your House?") I reached an "I've had it" moment and things just had to change. I didn't get rid of everything all in one go as there was just far too much stuff but getting organised did become my full time job for a few months. Starting with the easy stuff - the obvious rubbish and things that could just be slung. Then it was just the peeling the layers of the onion, day by day more and more stuff would leave the house and then I discovered routines and systems were presenting themselves to me. and this being tidy thing that had been an alien concept to me for my entire life just seemed so simple! When everything came out of the boxes and out into the open for me to examine it just made sense and the more things left the house the more I could appreciate what I wanted, what I needed and what was important to me. And hanging on to everything for the hundreds of reasons I had for hanging onto everything was irrelevant.

Some things were hard to get rid of and there is still one skirt that I just will not part with even though it's 4 sizes too big and I'll never wear it again. But that's ok, because I love it and it makes me happy to see it. I think it does make life easier, you know what you have, it's easier to shop, it's easier to not shop and it's great to realise that your house doesn't have to be like Argos or the B&Q warehouse - it's ok to run out of something that's why we have friends to borrow things from and hire shops and freegle and gumtree. If you let something go you'll almost certainly be able to replace it or get something else to do the job instead. We are not our stuff.

That is such sound advice, I've got to the point where I find it hard to begin.
I've been taking pictures of stuff to ebay this morning & selling in job lots, to hopefully peel my onion faster.
I'm sure that if I can sort out the clutter then the rest of my life will be easier, maybe shed the lbs from my comfort eating body as I shed the excess stuff.
A few months ago in a mad moment, I shoved all my clothes that wouldn't fit easily into my dressing table drawers & one wardrobe into suitcases & vaccuum bags, the theory was that I would get round to ironing it at some point. It's languished there for the entire summer, I've not touched the stuff in the wardrobe as I couldn't get to it because of the cases & bags in front of it. So I obviously don't need any of it. Except maybe jumpers that haven't been needed due to the weather but I must have 30 of them.
As soon as I can get rid of stuff loafing I will go through the stored clothes & get rid of it all.
I'm actually going to start a diary, I hate to say it but later in the week, I shouldn't keep stopping & coming on here & MSE to check to see if I'm missing something.

Hi Rosie,

One of the first things I learned was all the stuff I used was on the floor, worksurface, chair, dining table etc and all the stuff I didn't use was in the cupboards Seems obvious now but it was like some amazing realisation at the time. So the first couple of weeks the house didn't really seem that much better. I started with a couple of laundry baskets and a bin bag and chucked the obvious rubbish into the bin bag, put the recycling into the recycling box then had a "stuff to put away" and a "stuff to get rid of" laundry basket and dealt with the stuff that was out on the floors etc. So there were just piles everywhere. Then I started on the cupboards, took loads of stuff to the charity shop, shredded loads of stuff and did countless runs to the tip. So then the cupboards were looking pretty empty and I had space to put away the stuff that was usually left out because it was the stuff we used all the time!

Believe me, my house was a mess, Dan had to go to the 24 hour Asda on occasions to buy underwear or socks to wear that day for work or even get a new shirt. It was that bad. You can do it. And I agree with you, you'll probably start to see some weight come off too. As Dave Ramsey says - when you change your life, you change your life. You can't touch one area of it without the others being touched too.

Thank you for that. I think that's one of the many good things about a forum such as this. You can get encouragement & brilliant tips, without feeling as though you're the only person in the world to have got themselves into a pickle.
Onwards & upwards, I am going to fill a black bag with stuff to throw each day as well, I tend to forget about binning stuff, I'll take the tags off something that I've bought & drop it on the dressing table or worktop & that's where it stays.
I must do a Flylady hot spot a day or better still a frog.
Anonimity does mean that you can be open & honest without feeling that everyone is tutting & shaking their heads at how inept you are.

I want to follow the sorting train too! I need ot reduce my warderobe because to be honest, the only stuff I wear is the stuff that gets washed and worn and never sees my drawers. I recently did the capsule warderobe thing for my daughter and she's going to be having a pink and purple winter lol.

That seems to be quite a common thing, wash & wear a few items, forget about the rest.
I've been thinking of the colours I would have, I can't wear black, not as a top anyway as I look as though I've been dug up.
I'm thinking of brown, or plum & dusky pink, that seems to suit my colouring rather than my favourite colour.
I rarely go out evenings, I think twice in about 6 years I've been dragged out, yet I have a vast amount of going out clothes, what the hell is that all about? Haven't worn heels in a couple of decades & have loads of them as well.
I don't know if by buying them I think that I will suddenly transform & evolve into a wonderful beautiful butterfly, flitting around, instead of the old chrysalis stage that I'm stuck in.
I think that my new mantra will be, Clear the clutter crap, clear the head.