We tried chore lists, we tried other things, but bottom line, he didn't do the chores when I wanted him to. He likes to come home at the end of the day and rest, then spend the rest of the evening slowly doing his chores. Me, I like to come home, rush thru my chores, and then have the rest of the evening to PLAY! We're different like that. And for many years, it was not a happy co-existence in the area of chores.
But, then came kiddos, and my standards, well, they were lowered. They had to be - I could not keep up with the same level of tidiness when I had one and then two little people coming behind me and undoing my cleaning. So...now we divide and conquer. We each have our own chores and I know Lance will eventually do the ones on his list. If we are having company or if things are getting especially out of control, I will ask him to go ahead and do it and I don't think he minds so much, because I've let it slide for awhile.
This is one of my main jobs. It's funny when it was just Lance and I, I did laundry once a week. No big deal. When we added N to the family, I did laundry twice a week - no big deal. When we added L to the family and I mean from day 1, I now do laundry almost every day. How did one little girl change our laundry situation so drastically?!?
I also am the dishwasher loader/unloader; sheet changer, tidier-upper, duster, carpet vacummer, sink cleaner-outer, kid lunch fixer, clothes picker-outer. Basically, I'm the everyday cleaner that keeps us from living with "junk" piled everywhere.
Lance is the keeper of the yard. I have NO interest whatsoever in the yard other than pulling weeds. Lance is also our resident mopper, toilet scrubber, and bathtub cleaner. Even though I have way more chores to do on a daily basis, I'm okay with it, because quite frankly, I have the better jobs. He has the jobs I really don't like to do and so it works for us!
How about in your house? Do you have a system? Do you fight about it? What works for you?
5 comments:
Heh, this sounds familiar. I basically do all the inside work,except certain things like heavy lifting, ladder climbing, etc...Shane takes care of the outside and the attic, not something I'm interested in doing. When I need help with extra cleaning, say for a Bunco party, he pitches in.
Oh goodness! Where do I begin? I do it all...in fact this past Sunday I broke the riding lawnmower. I didn't make sure it had oil in it, I didn't know any better. So this of course is always our dilemma. I can't keep everything clean and tidy inside and out and remember to put oil in the lawnmower too.
I do everything, he does nothing. Haha. Not really. We have somewhat of the same chore list, only my hubby wouldn't clean a toilet for anything. I basically do all the inside work, he does all the outside, but he is really good about doing things inside that I ask (as long as I ask- if I don't, he literally won't notice there is 3 days worth of dirty dishes in the sink!).
Ha! I'm taking a break from scrubbing toilets right now! ha!
I do most all things in the house most all the time however, I only work part time out of the house, and not at all 2 months in the summer so, I see it as my main job. I admire you and all full time working moms...don't know how you do it all! When I return full time, Coach will pick up more jobs I'm sure!
He is wonderful at vaccuming and does it often, I like to load but, he unloads the dishwasher. He will fold and put up laundry...if it sits there long enough! ha!
And, the kids have their chores too!!! We don't enforce theirs like we should but, we are committed to getting better! Of course the 8 yr. old has more than the 3 yr. old.
Your chore list sounds like how my parents separate the chores. Brock and I are a little different - atleast for now (I'm sure things will be much different when we have kids). I have much more tolerance for "untidiness" (is that a word?) than Brock does - to a certain extent. MY clutter is ok for me, but HIS clutter is not. HIS clutter is ok for HIM, but MINE is not. Anyway, we have a pretty small place with lots of stuff, so clutter shows up very fast. Brock does a lot of the work around here, but I'm trying to be better about helping out - things are definitely easier now that my weekends are mostly free (except for stamping!). I will say that I'm very thankful that Brock has is being tolerant of all my stamping stuff in the dining room around the table. I keep it all put away in some handy plastic boxes, but it's still there. Once I started keeping it there, I've found lots more little opportunities to get it out and make something quick - so that's been lots of fun.
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