I am so unorganised at home, how can I get organised?

Question

I have a 4 year old girl, 2 year old boy and 10 month old, I feel like I am constantly cleaning and washing, but my house is such a mess all the time. I am embarrassed to have people just drop in for a visit. Please help

Answer 1

www.flylady.net

She's AWESOME! Give it a try, it's free!

Answer 2

What I would do and this is what we do at our house as well ~ get a little decorative iron basket that you can hang on the wall and everyday that you get your mail, you stick your mail in the basket that's hanging on the wall. You will want to put this somewhere close to the front door. Then when you are ready to go through the mail it's all right there in the basket.
Another thing you could do is instead of having certain places in the house as the "catch all" places, ask your 2 yr old and 4 yr old and your husband to take their things back to their room(s) as they make their way down the hall. In my house, the kitchen is one of the first rooms that we dump all of our stuff. But now my mom has us in the habit of taking our things back to our room since we are going there anyway and it gets unwanted things out of the kitchen.
Start keeping things in certain places, rearrange some of your stuff so it's easier to get to. You certainly have your hands full with 3 little ones so I can see your frustration. All you do is pick up here and there and cleaning doesn't have to be a constant thing. By the way, I don't know of anyone with a spotless house and my mother is a perfection when it comes to cleaning.
It's going to take some time for you to get into a routine, but you could possible choose a day of the week that you did things. For example, you could do laundry on Monday, sweeping & mopping on Tuesday, dusting & vacuuming on Wednesday and so on and so forth.
That way you are not killing yourself by trying to have a clean house. I don't know if it's hard for you to get out of the house or if you even work, but there are some organizers you can buy at Target or Wal-Mart that come in handy as well. Cleaning doesn't have to be an everyday, uphill battle. You'll only kill yourself that way. Hope this helps you!!

Answer 3

You have three young children who need your attention. If your house was immaculate, I would say that you were neglecting your children. About all you could do, if you want to have a place for visits, is to earmark one area as a kid-free, adults-only zone that will keep it relatively clean. (However, I predict that if you try to do that, it will become the place your kids most want to be.) Truthfully, anyone that has had kids will understand the mess, especially if they are just dropping in unannounced. If your budget stretches far enough, you could hire a cleaning person to come in once a week. Alternatively, you could find a teenage mother's helper who could entertain your kids while you get some major cleaning done. But do not expect perfection. You are outnumbered.

Answer 4

Break everything you want to accomplish down into managable blocks of time and schedule things to get a certain amount achieved every day. Get friends and family to take the kids for an hour or two a few times a week so you can dedicate time to getting things the way you want them. Some moms even hire a sitter just to be in another room with the children while Mom deals with everything else she needs to do. At this point in your existence life may be in the details, but salvation is in scheduling!

Best of luck to you.

Answer 5

Join the club. I only have one whose almost grown and it doesn't change. If you have 3 children under 5 you are expecting too much to think you can keep a clean house unless you have a lot of help. I have to say I think you need to lower your expectations and get someone to help as much as you can. Maybe you could even hire a teenager to play with the kids at home, maybe in the yard, while you do some catch up work.

Answer 6

Have a laundry basket in all the bedrooms and bathroom. This way you aren't tempted to just put clothes on the floor.

Don't allow the kids to eat outside of a certain room - preferably one where there are tiles or floorboards. As you know they can be very messy in their eating habits and food can get dragged from 1 end of the house to another in minutes.

Get a toy chest and put it in the play area. Start teaching your older kids to put a toy back in the box before playing with another. Having the box in the play area will make it seem like less of a burden to them.

Answer 7

how do you eat an elephant? one bite at a time. looking at your house as a whole can be overwhelming when you're also dealing with the kids. so you need to allow yourself to say, today i'm doing laundry. period. tomorrow, i'm dusting/vacuuming. next day i'll clean the bathrooms. whatever, the point is to divide things into more achievable tasks that you can feasibly accomplish without feeling like all you do is clean all day. also, its never too young to start getting the little ones to help. we made up "clean up songs" and set a timer and everyone would race to pick things up and put things in their place. kids love to help and if you teach them good habits from the beginning they'll learn to be neat and understand that the more they help, the less you have to do and the more time you have to spend with them. good luck!

Answer 8

only allow eating in the kitchen or dining room. constantly have a wet wash clothe and pray to god you get two min to pee. LOL honey if you live in your house don't be imbarassed that you do. let the kids have fun. As long as they behave and have some kind of manners. I worked on one room at a time. get the 4 and 2 yr too help. don't get upset if you vacum then they darg the toys out. they are only little for a while. get baskets to through junk in and go through ten min each day. I hide mine in a closet. LOL

Answer 9

It's tough keeping things nice and tidy when you have three little ones under the age of five, but it is possible to make things less stressful for you (especially when you have a 10 month infant).

You can delegate some 'small chores' for your preschooler and toddler, i.e. picking up toys, putting unbreakable things away. Your four year old can even start folding and putting away her own clothes, after you've washed them. It is all possible to do that. I know, 'cause I have two little ones myself. ;)

It may not be as PERFECT as you'd like it to be, but it is a start. After awhile, your four and two year old will start putting things away on their own. All in all, teaching them how to pick up after themselves now will not only teach your children the importance of keeping pride with their property but will benefit the entire household in the long run.

Answer 10

flylady is good, but the daily emails can get overwhelming.

Decorative baskets in each room as a "catch all" can make pick-ups easier.

http://www.titus2.com/chores/chore-charts.html might give you some ideas.

"401 Ways to Get Your Kids to Work at Home" is a great older book with a detailed age-appropriate list for teaching them to help with chores and learn important life-skills.
---------------------------------------------------
Finally, copy and paste this poem in large print on your wall!!

"Babies Don't Keep"

Mother, of Mother, come shake out your cloth
empty the dustpan, poison the moth,
hang out the washing and butter the bread,
sew on a button and make up a bed.

Where is the mother whose house is so shocking?
She's up in the nursery, blissfully rocking.

Oh, I've grown shiftless as Little Boy Blue
(lullaby, rockabye, lullaby loo).
Dishes are waiting and bills are past due
(pat-a-cake, darling, and peek, peekaboo).

The shopping's not done and there's nothing for stew
and out in the yard there's a hullabaloo
but I'm playing Kanga and this is my Roo.
Look! Aren't her eyes the most wonderful hue?
(lullaby, rockaby, lullaby loo).

The cleaning and scrubbing will wait till tomorrow,
for children grow up, as I've learned to my sorrow.
So quiet down, cobwebs. Dust go to sleep.
I'm rocking my baby and babies don't keep.

-- Author Unknown

Answer 11

You have your hands full. I have a 1,2,6 and a 10 year old. I'm really unorganized. My hubby won't let me keep much. He has a rule. If youi don't use it in a month, throw it out. I'm a pack rat. I don't think there has been much he has tossed that i have ever needed again. Laundry never ends. I'm sure people who visit realizes you are very busy.
Good luck enjoy your kids. They grow way to fast!