Chores and How to Cope

Hi read, Today let's tackle chores. There's no getting around it: chores take time. Most of them have to be done in one way or another. It's important to us to eat a healthy dinner at home, so we have to cook and wash the dishes. It's important to us to have friends over, so we have to have a clean living room. Most people like it when we wear clothes in public so laundry has to happen. And on and on... I have a couple of strategies for chores. Some of them reduce the time a chore takes and some of them just make the chore more enjoyable. Some of them cost money and most are totally free. 1) Simplify your surroundings: In many ways, this is the easiest way to reduce your chore load. Just have less stuff! I recommend doing a twice yearly declutter of clothes, papers, and stuff. If you have kids you probably have a lot of stuff that just comes into the house. Right now, my dining room has been overtaken by kid art and it has to go. I usually like doing a spring declutter and a back to school declutter because this seems natural to me. I also do a mini round of donations in late fall when we start getting winter clothes out. 2) Habit Stacking: My kitchen has become magically cleaner since I started combining my morning kitchen cleaning with making my coffee. I like fancy coffee, so I have to bring the water to a boil, pour it on the coffee, wait one minute for the bloom, pour more water and stire, wait another three minutes, then let the coffee drip into the cup. This adds up to something like 7 minutes which is enough to fully clean up the kitchen from breakfast and start the dishwasher. I also frequently clean up my bathroom counter when I'm brushing my teeth. Doing mini clean ups like this keeps things somewhat in order so I'm not faced with a massive cleanup later. 3) Clean up by section: I get overwhelmed by a mess so I sometimes have to limit my scope to literally one section of the kitchen counter or one corner of the living room. Otherwise I tend to float around doing a little of everything but not actually finishing anything. If I do this 15 minutes at a time I can get the house tidied in a day or two in small chunks. 4) Recruit your family: My kids are old enough to really help around the house. My youngest is 9 and she doesn't usually have much homework. While her older sister is doing homework, my youngest can unload the dishwasher and reload it, help with weekly meal prep, and put away her clean clothes. Sometimes I give my kids a one-time chore. Funny story - yesterday I challenged them to find every taekwondo tournament medal in the house. I offered 50 cents per medal found. I was expecting maybe 20 medals total. They found 107. Oops, that was expensive. But at least all of those medals have now been collected in a box in the basement. 5) Hire someone: Hiring someone to help with chores can often be cost effective and time saving. Many people hire people to clean the house and do the lawn and garden maintenance. But don't be afraid to get creative. If you hate laundry, you can usually find a wash and fold laundry service that will pick up your dirty laundry and return it clean. If you have the means, you could even hire a housekeeper for a few hours a week to make sure the whole house is tidy. 6) Make it less boring: Personally I find chores extremely boring, so I avoid them. It really helps me to listen to an interesting book or podcast or music while I'm doing chores. Sometimes it just takes a good story to get me moving! Hope these help! Let me know if you plan to try any of these. Best, Beth

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