Clearly I’m still getting the hang of this Mum thing. Each morning Our Sidekick has a list of things he has to do before school. Along the lines of:
- Shower (if needed)
- Get dressed
- Comb hair
- Have breakfast
- Put breakfast bits back in the kitchen
- Feed guinea pigs
- Change the guinea pigs water
To me this isn’t complicated – it’s pretty clear what needs to be done in the morning. Well this morning I went downstairs to see if my black work trousers were in the clean laundry pile – well they weren’t there but at the same time there was a bunch of clean washing all over the floor and had been merged with the dirty washing that had been abandoned on the floor next to it last night (instead of in the big blue Ikea bag in front of the machine – there is a different reason to why the dirty washing was in the wrong place but now it’s all merged and I’m annoyed!)
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I grabbed my brown pinstripe trousers (which need the seam sewing up! Someone remind me!) and got dressed – at this point in time getting to work was more important that dealing with the mess. I went into the living room to grab my handbag and there was Our Sidekick’s breakfast bowl and plate (Clearly he had cereal and toast this morning).
I texted Chris with “I take ignoring instructions as disrespectful. Therefore at least one person in our house will be doing his own washing and cleaning until he realises it. Breakfast bowl left out again and clean washing across the floor”. It’s going to be a pain if we get to the weekend and then he needs school uniform and it hasn’t been done but at the same time it becomes his responsibility to do it on Friday when he gets in from school (just like I do when I get in from work). It’ll also be a pain if we all need the machine at the same time but having had a housemate and one washing machine I think we managed to get round it. I spend a chunk of my weekend doing chores when I’d rather be sleeping, improving my baking skills or watching movies and I do chores to make sure that Chris has uniform to wear to work and Our Sidekick has uniform to wear to school.
I don’t want to be bad cop but at the same time the house doesn’t tidy itself and both me and Chris work full time so we all have to do our share. Am I being unreasonable? Answers on a postcard please…..
Not unreasonable at all Hannah.
But sadly, possibly unrealistic.
Yeah. It might be a bit unrealistic but I can at least threaten it – I’m pretty sure when me and my brother were about his age the idea of having to drive the washing machine was ridiculously scary and therefore would do what was needed! If all else fails I can always threaten to not give Our Sidekick his presents when it’s his birthday at the end of the week.
I COMPLETELY agree with what you’re saying! I don’t even think it should be up to just one person to keep the house and clothes and everything else clean and in order, but often it seems like that’s the way it goes. i never want to be the nagging wife, but every now and again i’ll have to say something to my husband along the lines of, “i’m not going to ask you to take on all of the house cleaning, laundry and cooking, but sometimes it would be nice if you’d just wash a few dishes or wipe the counters off after you eat something so i don’t feel quite so overwhelmed.” sometimes it helps, sometimes it doesn’t, but i’ll keep trying!
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