• beyondtheveil said on Mar 05, 2007....

  zayda- I have been helping inside the house a lot more in the past year. My wife likes it so much I've somehow landed a few of my own jobs including cooking.
   
  Now this is new to me, but I learned a couple of things. First, doing something everyday makes the weekend cleaning a whiz.
   
  Second, while cooking, I rinse and put in the dishwasher as they are used and not needed anymore. No big clean-up afterward.
   
  Does this mean anything?

• lioneljay said on Mar 05, 2007....

  Z, one of the simplifying things that I do is to prepare a menu for each week and then do all my grocery shopping for the week in a single visit. I post the menu so that everyone knows what's going to be served for dinner each night (this helps avoid the "but I had pizza for lunch" type complaints). For grocery shopping I've prepared a two-column master shopping list laid out according to the grocery store layout. I start at the top left-hand corner in the produce section and finish in the wine section at the bottom right-hand corner of my list. All in all, I do a full week's shopping in about 45 minutes from door to door.
  
  The other labor-saving/simplification thing that we do is we clean the house twice a year, whether it needs it or not. ;)
  

• silverwhisper said on Mar 06, 2007....

  let's see...i know there's a food network show about doing the bulk of your cooking on sunday and making that work for dinners for the next few days hosted by robin miller, but i tend not to watch it myself, as i'm not the one doing the cooking.
  
  i'm afraid i have no strategies, although i do try to rinse dishes and load the dishwasher after each meal/snack. i find that tends to avoid the "full sink" problem. can you enlist your son in helping with that sort of thing?
  
  ed

• Mjedi said on Mar 06, 2007....

  While wife takes extended family visits. On laundry when wash, hang pants over chairs, another chair for socks, and underclothes draping t-shirts over.
  
  So I don't have to spend time meticulously folding them, and stuffing
  them in dressors or closets.
  

• Zayda said on Mar 06, 2007....

  Beyond--Oh, I agree; doing something every day makes things much easier. This is why I try to encourage the little guy to pick up his toys every evening. I don't always get that encouragement reinforced by his dad though.
  
  
  LJ--I need to be better at planning my menus by the week instead of day-to-day based. This would probably save a good amount of time.
  
  I do my grocery list according to the layout of the store as well. I'm glad to know I'm not the only crazy one like that. ;)
  
  
  
  Silver--Well since your wife is the homemaker and you are the breadwinner, it surprises me little that you have no strategies other than rinsing dishes as they are used and loading them in the dishwasher. I don't have a dishwasher; I try to wash dishes as soon as they are used as well to avoid that "full sink" problem. Lucky for me, my son likes washing dishes. I'm sure he'll soon grow out of that.
  
  
  Mjedi--I tend to avoid having my husband do the laundry. Well, actually he does the wash, but he's bad about putting things up once they have dried. The end up on a pile on the chair in our bedroom instead and get wrinkled beyond belief some days. I have actually thrown stuff back in the dirty clothes because it's too wrinkled to wear and ironing it would take hours.

• Mjedi said on Mar 06, 2007....

  When Wife vacationing I do simple as I like, haven't had an
  arguement with myself yet :)

• lioneljay said on Mar 06, 2007....

  Z, I have met one other person with a grocery list that is set up to reflect the layout of her store. I'm proud to say that my original Word file dates back to when we used Windows 3.1. I have modified it many times as our store has changed and as our needs have evolved.

• Zayda said on Mar 06, 2007....

  Mjedi--It's much easier to do as you like when the spouse isn't around, no?
  LJ--I had to modify mine a bit too when the local Kroger renovated their store. Actually, I should say I have two lists, depending on which store we go to.

• Mjedi said on Mar 06, 2007....

  Zayda: I have back problem, get it :) Have good day.

• Zayda said on Mar 06, 2007....

  Mjedi--Yeah I get it. :)
  
  
  
  One of my favorite cleaning tips isn't so much a cleaning tip as it is a how to avoid making things dirtier tip.
  
  
  Take your shoes off every tome you enter the house. Tracking creates more than 80% of the dirt and dust inside your home.
  
  
  Of course, to do this, it's best to have some place you can put your shoes as you enter the house/apartment.
  

• pickersplock said on Mar 06, 2007....

  I have the same problem Zayda. My husband is a terrible pack rat. He had piles of jeans piled up on his dresser, more in the drawer. I counted them all, 65!
  Why, does anyone need 65 pairs of jeans? My secret plan is to send him out of town with some NASCAR tickets, call 1-800-CHUCKIT, and then tell him we were robbed!

• Zayda said on Mar 06, 2007....

  Pickers-- 65 pairs of jeans?!?! Wow. Okay...umm...well, I probably have 65 pairs of shoes, but they are all neatly put away in plastic boxes with clear drawers so I can easily see what shoe is in the box. And the boxes are organized according to season.
  
  
  Yes, I'm neurotic.
  
  
  But 65 pairs of jeans. Wow, I suppose if he has 65 pairs of underwear (minimum), and 65 shirts, you wouldn't have to wash clothes more than once every month and a half.
  
  
  Hmmm...let me know if that plan works and maybe I'll do the same with my husband. Although, I suspect they will both be suspicious of the robbery if none of the high-end stuff from the houses are gone, no?

• pickersplock said on Mar 06, 2007....

  Yeah, I know maybe I'll say it was an OCD robbery by the notorious OCD
  bandit! Do you think he'll buy that?

• CamDaMan20 said on Mar 08, 2007....

  Give the boy's the garage...make them clean , oh lets say...every spring.
  
  Toys and tools stay in the garage (except video games, keep them in the Attic with the dart boards and like).
  
  Get Mom off the computer so she can make "large meals" (like 10 pounds of Lasagna  -  then freeze 2lb pks) ;  Large Pots of Beef Stew---Freeze  into quarts ;
  basically, if your making a meal...make two or three at once...ready to go, thus giving you more time later on down the road.
  
  Make 1/4 burgers from 20 pound of 80/20 Beef and freeze.
  
  A hamper in every bedroom...deliverable to wash room twice a week.
  
  GI day every rain day when off work....we call it...pick a project day, just a couple hours spent each ends a lot of extra work for Mom.
  
  Sub day..Chips and Dip...favorite drink...easy meal little clean up...easy to prepare.
  Deli trip while shopping takes care of that say of the week.
  
  Paper plates for this day also helps, cups too...camping at home kinda day.
  
  Common sense....oops....guys and kids don't usually come with high dose's of this...hehe
  
  Smile...know we love ya and appreciate you even if we don't always say it.
  
  Just another guy...who enjoys his toys.
  
  
  

• missunderstood1162 said on Mar 10, 2007....

  Pickers...you make me laugh.  Are you sure we don't have the same mate?  mine's a pack rat too.....no it's not 65 pairs of jeans but I bet we have a LOT in common!  

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