State of the Household

Several weeks ago I linked to an article that discussed the “psychic burden” of parenting — things like buying and sorting kid clothes, scheduling appointments, general household organization, etc. I’ve continued to ponder this concept since then and think about how things tend to operate for my family. I’m calling this my 2016 “State of the Household” address!

Work: We both work full-time, outside the home, Monday through Friday. Our hours fluctuate slightly depending on what’s going on at work that day for either of us, but my “usual” hours are ~8:30 to 5:00-5:15. Even though Jose and I work at the same place, we rarely ride together (for a few different reasons).

Childcare: Both girls are now in daycare and that drives a lot of our daily schedule. The daycare serves breakfast until 8:30, so I always want her there by ~8:15. And daycare closes at 5:30, so that’s the biggest factor in determining when I leave work.

Pre-Charlotte, Jose would usually get Emma up while I got ready, then she and I would leave. Whoever did drop-off also did pickup since we only had a carseat in one car. Now that Charlotte is here, we’ve been doing something similar. However, I started to feel like the dropoff/pickup burden was falling much more heavily on me so about a month ago, I bought a second carseat for Emma. (We already had 2 bases for Charlotte’s bucket seat.) Now that both kids can ride in both cars, we can more easily split dropoff/pickup duties without having to switch cars during the day. These days, I probably do 60-70% of the dropoffs and pickups.

It’s not unusual for one of us to have an early meeting once or twice per week. When that happens, the other parent is on their own to get the girls up and out the door.

After work, childcare duties are split pretty evenly. Before Charlotte, we would alternate the bed/bath routine — one of us did bathtime and the other read books and put Emma to bed. These days, we pretty much divide and conquer with Jose handling Emma and me taking care of Charlotte.

Food: First of all, Emma gets breakfast, lunch and two snacks at daycare which, for the record, is awesome. Jose doesn’t eat breakfast; I almost always have a bowl of cereal. I successfully broke my daily Starbucks habit a while ago and now bring my coffee from home. (I do still get Starbucks, but only a couple times per month.)

I pack my lunch ~50% of the time, run out to quickly pick something up ~40% of the time, and go out with Jose or friends ~10% of the time. Jose always buys lunch somewhere; he never takes it from home.

We split dinner duty, probably somewhere around 60% me and 40% Jose. There are some meals that he always makes (salmon patties, turkey burgers, chicken breasts) and there are some that I always make (chicken tortilla casserole, crab risotto, enchiladas). We eat our fair share of frozen entrees too, but of course the only work involved in those is popping it in the oven.

We don’t have a set routine on kitchen cleanup. I do the dishes nearly every night after Charlotte is asleep. Emma’s bedtime routine is longer than Charlotte’s so Jose is usually still with her while I’m doing them. But dishwashing in particular is a chore that illuminates a difference in our personalities: I’d rather have the dishes done right after dinner and have that task out of the way, while Jose would rather relax for a while and then do them before he goes to bed. This type of thing can easily lead to a clash if I’m not careful to remind myself that chores don’t always have to be done on my schedule.

We used to go grocery shopping as a family on Sunday mornings, but since Charlotte arrived this has become a Jose/Emma errand while Charlotte and I stay home.

House Cleaning: We pay for a cleaning service every 2 weeks, so the only cleaning we do on our own is the daily stuff, and 95% of that is in the kitchen. I don’t clean toilets, I don’t dust, I don’t vacuum unless something gets spilled. You may be aghast to hear that our bathrooms only get cleaned and our floors only get swept every other week — but that is more frequently than they got cleaned before we hired the job out, so I consider it a step up!

I straighten up daily, and Jose straightens up…hardly ever. I’m not a neat-freak and my tolerance for clutter rises and falls, but on average it bothers me A LOT more than it bothers him. I recognize this, but it can still be frustrating for both of us — me because I feel like I have to do it all myself, and him because he doesn’t want to be nagged about something that he doesn’t really think is a big deal.

Laundry: I do it all, usually every Sunday. This is my least favorite chore and I complain to Jose regularly about the fact that it falls on me. As a compromise, I have started leaving his clothes laid out on his side of the bed for him to fold and put away. (Because really, laundry itself isn’t hard. It’s the folding that I hate.)

Yard: We pay for a lawn guy every 2 weeks (once a month from December-March). He mows and edges. The only other lawn task is weeding the flowerbeds, which basically doesn’t get done until we get a nasty-gram from the Homeowner’s Association about it…at which point I usually do it or we hire it out. I actually don’t mind yardwork at all and even found it relaxing at times before we had kids, but it’s just not a priority at this point in my life.

Home Improvement: I tend to take the lead on this because I’m the one who cares more about it. However, Jose provides a lot of input and I would never make a decision about a home improvement project without getting his opinion and concurrence.

We’ve been in our house for almost 7 years now and one of the biggest things I’ve realized is that neither one of us loves DIY. No matter how many cool ideas I see on Pinterest and think we could tackle, reality is that most DIY projects are never going to be a priority on either of our to-do lists. So while painting a room or installing a ceiling fan is pretty easy, it’s even easier to hire someone to do it for me and save my time for something else. When we hire someone, it’s usually me who finds them.

Cars: Both of our cars are pretty new, so they don’t require a lot of maintenance at this point. However, the logistics fall on me — keeping track of when inspections are due, scheduling things like oil changes and new tires, etc. Car maintenance is one of those things I tend to take care of on my flex Fridays, when I’m not at work but the kids are at daycare.

(I should note that Jose doesn’t get flex Fridays, which is unfortunate.)

Communications: I communicate with my family and Jose with his. Several of my family members read this blog so they know what’s going on to begin with. We used to skype with my parents on Sunday evenings but we’ve fallen out of that habit lately. (I would like to get back into it!) Jose facetimes with his mom once a week or so.

Finances: We are both involved in long-term financial decisions like retirement planning, life insurance, and college savings. But I do 100% of the money management on a day-to-day basis, I pay all of our bills, and I do our taxes. I would want to know where our money is going regardless of Jose’s level of involvement, so the unevenness in this area doesn’t bother me. (Plus, it’s just not a very time-consuming task thanks to budgeting software and e-billing.) We have joint accounts, so he has access to everything if/when he wants.

Activities: I am definitely the “default parent” in this department. I keep track of family and kid appointments. I make travel plans and pack for both kids. I remember to leave the key for the cleaners. I remember to take more diapers, wipes, and extra clothes to daycare. I remember to put out the trash and recyclables.

This is definitely the area of our life where I feel the effects of an imbalance the most, because keeping up with everything does lead to periods of stress and a general feeling of being overwhelmed. However, it would be unfair of me to put any blame on Jose — because not knowing what’s on our schedule also makes me feel panicky.

On the flip side, I also do more solo activities than Jose does — book club, recipe club, mom’s night out, long runs — and would say that overall, I do get more “me time” than he does.

Overall: I think things run fairly smoothly in our household at the moment, especially considering we still have a small needy baby. I would say that I carry more of the “mental” load of all the things that need to happen in our day-to-day life. I also take initiative more often to keep thing rolling, whether that’s a daily task like getting dinner started or a broader task like scheduling appointments.

Sometimes I get frustrated by this, but reality is that Jose and I are different people. I’m more of a planner/doer and he’s more of a thinker; we have different ways of doing things, and different things that matter (or don’t matter) to us.