Wednesday 10 July 2013

Dodging the duster

I don't know about you, but I will do anything to avoid cleaning. Social media and increased accessibility to the net has only made me worse. Things like cleaning the oven and washing the windows are now in the 'pffffft' jobs category.... Meaning that is someone asks me how often I clean my oven I make that sound 'pppppffftttt!!!!'. I'm still trying to work out whether this is a good or a bad thing. Yes, I may not be in the running for housewife of the year amongst the Martha Stewart types, but I am spending more time doing things that I want to do! I have let go of the stress of having to make sure that the windows are washed to a squeaky clean shine each week. The bathroom gets done when I can be bothered and the toilet gets done when it needs to be (ie. when you look at it thought the eyes of a visitor and wonder what people might be saying about you!!)

The other day I had the perfect opportunity to finally catch up on some housework and I had to actually set myself a Facebook ban!! I turned my phone to 'do not disturb' to stop all my notifications popping up and got to it. I felt so much better when it was finished but it really made me reflect on why it takes me Sooooooo long to get the housework done on other days. 

I am a fairly distractable person. If a bird flies by while I'm doing the dishes I am likely to wash the clean stuff and dry the dirty stuff whilst thinking about where it might be flying to. When it comes to cleaning, I am worse!!! Firstly I will start at the bedroom end of the house which is more successful because I don't have as many distractions. This however kills me because I can't stand being away from everyone else so I always find a way of sneaking back up to the main living area whether it be to check the television, check my phone, or take some washing into the laundry. Once the bedroom end of the house is done the trouble starts. The television noises draw me into the lounge room and I find myself almost tip toeing past myself to get to it to see what is on the latest talk show. I find I will sit down, start watching and then before I know it I am making promises to myself to 'get back to it next ad'. Next ad I am off again only to find that the kids have found the three only clean rooms in the house and have become excited at the prospect of clear floors and have therefore covered the floor with toys again.

The next attempt I have will be a quick clean up of the rooms I have already done and then moving onto the next room. My phone normally lingers about here so I have a tendency at this point to sneak a peek at the screen. If there are any notifications on Facebook I MUST check them and then while I'm there wrote a status about the fact that I am avoiding housework/ hate housework or something of that calibre. The problem from here is that I have then committed to a status and every buzz of the phone , despite being elbow deep in dish water, warrants a response or at least a like.

The next thing that happens will be the children. By this time they will have either been playing quietly (which is never a good thing in my house) or they will be hanging off my legs whilst fighting over who gets to push the vacuum cleaner. If I had have avoided distraction the cleaning would be done and I would be playing with the girls by now, but alas, now not only do I still have half a house to clean I have two children under the age of four who are bored, ratty and fighting. I generally forge on briefly before succumbing to miss A who by this time is usually hanging from my leg screaming 'up peeeeeeeaaaasssss!!!'. I then end up again sitting on the couch with miss A on my knee watching pepper pig or something to that effect.

With phone in hand and TV on, I become entranced in the peace that suddenly surrounds me and I forget that miss M is still at large. After looking at the clock and terrifyingly realising that miss M has now been at large for over 15 minutes I put down a disgusted miss A to run up the other end of the house only to find miss M spraying leave in conditioner all over her bed. Back at square one again and now having a bed to strip and wash, I give up.....

Lesson learned. Distraction doesn't pay when balancing preschool children and housework. My Facebook ban on days off will exist on a permanent basis until the girls go down for their midday sleep. I'm going to make a concious effort to cut my distractions but cutting back my Facebook/ phone time. Lets see how this goes.... 

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