How I Manage Housework with No Maid

Sharing is caring, please pass this along!

“So, how many maidS do you have?” is a common question I get when people see me out with my children. And then when they hear that I have none, they want to know how I manage housework with no maid. 🙂

Yes, it is possible to handle the housework without a maid, live in or part time. But of course, certain conditions need to be met.

Such as having as little clutter as possible, getting your children and husband onboard and lowering your standards.

Let me share what I do to manage our house and you see if any of these tips help you. It may just give you the needed boost in courage to let your maid go. 😉

Daily Pick Ups

This is important. It helps A LOT visually. So if there is only one thing you can do in this season of life, do this!

Do it at least once a day. Preferably at the end of the day.

Yes, I know you are tired. But do it anyway. When you wake up the next day and you walk into the living room or kitchen, you won’t feel that horrible sense of dread. Instead, you’d be more upbeat in tacking the day ahead without having to clean up the mess from the night before.

When the children were young, I was very militant about it because little children are wonderful at making messes! They are required to do a pick up before lunch and before bedtime. I work with them in the beginning but slowly let them take over.

Each child is also assigned a set of fixed chores and an area he/she is to be in-charge of. Flylady calls them zones. After much trial and error, I only switch chores after a year. This way, they have time to get really good at their assigned chore/s. Switching them around too often makes for slipshod work most times and no follow through.

»»» Now that my youngest is 8, I am way more lax because we seldom have legos all over the floor. 🙂 But they are still required to do a pick up before dinner time because we use a Roomba to vacuum while we have our dinner.

Everything Has its Own Allotted Space

This is the other crucial part – every item MUST have a place of its own. I subscribe to the mantra, “A place for everything and everything in its place.” If an item doesn’t have a space of its own, it either gets thrown out or, if it is important enough, I create space for it.

Then I tell everyone (read : husband!) where things are assigned. This way, everyone knows where each item goes. Things do not get haphazardly thrown into any box or squashed into any corner.

I do the pick ups with them when they are babies and toddlers to show them which toy goes into which box/basket/container. After a while, they know which toy goes where. I would also print out labels and tag them onto the boxes for easy reference.

Vacuuming

I vacuum daily. Previously I used a broom – less noise! But dust and especially hair! are better caught with the vacuum. In order to not disturb sleeping babies and toddlers, I vacuum at midday – after lunch, before their nap times, except on Sundays.

I do vacuum as thoroughly as I can – under sofas, toys boxes, etc. The bedrooms are magic-mopped by the two older children. David does it on Mondays and Wednesdays, and Sarah on Tuesdays and Thursdays. I vacuum the bedrooms on Fridays.

»»» Since 2008, we have invested in a Roomba. Best investment ever! It is used twice a day. The bedrooms and study are done in the morning, and the rest of the house in the evening. This is because the battery lasts about 1.5 hours only. Each room takes approximately 20-25 minutes to clean, depending on its size.

Mopping

Ideally, I would like to mop on alternate days but…. it hasn’t happened, ever! 🙂 What happens is this : I mop the entire house once a week during what I call my “deep cleaning day”. When (not if!) spills occur, I do spot cleaning instead. This means that I would only clean and wipe that area and some of the surrounding area.

»»» We also invested in a Scooba (wet mopping robot) when we bought the Roomba. It is used once or twice a week. It came in real handy after my unplanned homebirth back in 2009. Henson cleaned up most of the mess and then he set the Scooba to work while he sent baby and me to Mount Alvernia for a check up.

Dusting

Dusting is taken care of by the two older children too. Before they were old enough to be of help, I almost never dusted unless the dust was thick enough to form dust balls or when company was coming over.

I am weird in that while I cannot stand the feeling of dirt and dust on the floor, I most certainly can  overlook the dust on the shelves and table tops that I seldom visit in the course of the day. 🙂

»»»  Now I dust about once a week. Having children with allergies makes it harder to assign dusting chores to them. Sigh. But a huge difference now that they are older is that they are in-charge of their own area so I only have to dust the common areas.

Toilets

Toilets are also washed (by me) weekly on Fridays. I would like to wash the toilets (3!) twice a week but I cannot handle that kind of workload at this point in time. So I am waiting for when the children are able to be more useful helpers and train them to help out.

»»» I now have 5 children who can wash toilets! Yay! I assign one child to one toilet. The two toilets upstairs are washed once a week while the toilet downstairs is washed twice weekly because it is heavily used. Now that the boys are older, the toilets are less gross, if you know what I mean!

Deep Cleaning – Almost!

On Fridays, I do the whole hog – vacuum and mop the whole house at one go. This includes the corridor area, living and dining rooms, study, kitchen, balcony and the 3 bedrooms. I also wash all the 3 toilets. Then I am done! Well … until next Friday!

This deep cleaning session is done after lunch. I would serve the children their lunch and feed the baby hers. Then I would zoom off to clean. I am usually done in 2 hours.

Because I do this weekly, I do not have to do very much scrubbing. The grime does not build up too badly. And because I have been doing this routine for a long while, I have gotten faster at it too.

»»» With more helpers now, I do not have to do deep cleaning once a week. Or rush like mad to do get it all done in two hours. Instead, I deep clean every six weeks or so, during our week long school break. I also get the children to declutter their own study area that week as well.

Laundry

Laundry used to be done just twice a week when we had less people in the house. One load of lights and one load of darks. But now, we need to do a load everyday, alternating between lights and darks. But I still only iron once a week, on Mondays.

»»» This has seen the greatest change. When children grow bigger, their clothes also take up more space! I have assigned one child to be in-charge of laundry. She has to do TWO loads per day – just for clothes! Towels and bedsheets are done separately, of course.

She puts in one load in the morning and hangs it up to be sun and wind dried as we have chosen not to use a dryer. The clothes are taken down after lunch. Another load is started after dinner and hung up to be dried overnight. This lot is taken down only after breakfast the next day so that it gets some sun as well.

I still do the ironing because … I like ironing 🙂 Yes, I know I am weird that way. It is the time I get to listen to podcasts or watch Youtube videos. However, unlike before, I now have to iron twice a week unless I want to stand and iron for 3 hours! Each ironing session lasts slightly over an hour.

(a) towels and pyjamas

We wash towels once a week. Our bodies are clean after our showers, right? So why the need to change the towels so often? Pyjamas are changed twice a week. Our children seldom sweat in the night even without the use of air-conditioning. But if they did or if they had accidents, then of course pyjamas are changed more regularly.

»»» This practice still happens except for one child who prefers to change PJs daily.

(b) clothing

Clothes worn at home (home clothes) are changed daily, of course. But dress clothes (outside clothes), worn only when going out are changed out of immediately upon reaching home and hung up on hooks in their rooms. My rule is that outside clothes must be worn at least twice (i.e. two outings or more than 4 hours) before they can be thrown into the wash. Well, unless it is an extremely hot day or they had an accident.

»»» Now that the children take public transport on their own, they usually end up having to throw their outside clothes into the wash once they come home because the walk from the MRT station home gets them all sweaty.

(c) bedsheets, stuffed toys and curtains

Bedsheets, soft toys and blankets are washed once a month, at 60 degree temperature, unless accidents happen. Or unless someone is having a bad allergy attack. Then I would have to change the sheets weekly and vacuum their mattresses with the Rainbow Vacuum.

I try to wash our curtains every year at least. I know I should wash them more often though.

»»» This practice has not changed.

Kitchen: Stove, Sink, Fridge

Mess and/or oil splatters on the kitchen stove is supposed to be wiped everyday. A thorough cleaning is given every Tuesday. The sink is scrubbed every Tuesday too. Doors of the fridge and cabinets are given a wipe down by one child weekly.

»»»  Now that I do not have babies or toddlers clinging to my legs while I cook and clean, I clean as I cook. Meaning, I clean and wipe up after cooking each meal. This includes cleaning up the sink.

My part time helper used to line my stove with aluminium foil to make cleaning the stove easier. But I found that it just makes ME lazier! I tend to ignore the mess when the stove is lined with aluminium foil. Without the foil, I wipe up the mess immediately. So, no foil for us. This has worked out much better for me. You see what works better for you. 

I will confess that I clean my fridge only when I spill stuff or when something leaks. 🙁 I do line my shelves with newspapers so that I can just throw it away when spills and leaks happen. I know it does not look nice, but …. life is short! 😉

Daily Dishes

One child is assigned to be the dish washer per meal. So for example, Child 1 always washes the breakfast dishes and Child 2, the dinner dishes, etc… I will wash the pots and pans. This way, they do not get to be calculative about washing only their dishes.

Since breakfast sees us using the least number of dishes, a younger child is assigned this duty. Dinner dishes are washed by the oldest child since we usually have a lot of dishes.

»»»  This has changed a lot. I knew it had to change once the older children started having more and more activities out of the home. It came to a head when David started working part time and then was enlisted in the Army. So although I do not like getting each child to wash only his/her own dishes, I have had to switch to this mode.

As expected, everyone got calculative. Sigh. Even if it is ONE fork in the sink, they would not touch it because “I did not use it!” But this is the system for now. It has some benefits. I get to see who is or is not washing the dishes properly. Yes, I do label their plates and cups so if said child washes her plate poorly, she has to eat off that plate! Consequences! people!!

One Area Per Day

In order that I do not miss out on any area of the home, I assign one area to a day.

Vacuuming : daily. Ironing : Mondays – Ironing. Kitchen Stove and Sink :Tuesdays. Deep cleaning and all 3 Toilets : Fridays.

»»»  I do not stick to this schedule anymore since the children do leave me well alone when I am cleaning. 🙂 Currently (2017) this is what it looks like.

Vacuuming* : daily, twice a day. Ironing : Mondays and Thursday. Upstairs toilets x2* : Mondays and Tuesdays. Downstairs toilet* : Tuesdays and Fridays. Deep cleaning : on the week long break after every six weeks of school. Kitchen sink and stove : daily, after every cooking session.

*done by the children

Teaching Life Skills, Not Exploitation

I see teaching my children how to manage housework without a maid as teaching them life skills. For those who think that it is cruel and that I am exploiting the children, it is ok. We can agree to disagree.

I never learnt how to keep house because I didn’t have to. Mum did everything. And whatever she did, I never saw because I spent many hours in school or was out with friends. I had no idea what it took to maintain a house and keep it running smoothly.

I promised myself that my children will not have to learn the hard way like me. The earlier they learn how to manage and run a house, the easier it will be for them later on, whether they get married and have children or not.

So this is how everything (well, almost!) gets done here. Has it been helpful? Did I leave out anything?

Related Posts :

• So How Many Maids Do You Have?
• When Does the Housework Get Done?
• Maids : An Essential or A Luxury?
• Do I have to cook and clean to be a good mother?

***Post originally published 7 February 2008. Updated 18 July 2017***

Sharing is caring, please pass this along!