As I mentioned earlier, I split my house into separate areas and I loosely aim to attack one area at a time over five nights. The split is actually over six areas but my son has been designated the responsibility of looking after the dining room and therefore this leaves me with five areas – one a day with Saturday and Sunday relatively clear of chores.

My areas are split as follows, but there are overlaps – for example, if I’m vaccuming, I’ll do all the downstairs at once as this saves time in the long run:

• Monday – kids room and bathroom
• Tuesday – kitchen
• Wednesday – shopping and hallway
• Thursday – master bedroom and landing
• Friday – lounge
• Saturday – dining room (son’s chore)

This layout works for me since it suits my plans for each night; Monday’s I like to be quite easy since it’s the first day at wor after the weekend and I don’t want to be too busy, Wednesday’s I go shopping so I don’t want to be up all night cleaning after getting the shopping, and Friday’s I like to clean the lounge so that it’s all tidy in case we have guests at the weekend (no point in doing it earlier in the week and then again just in case someone comes to visit!)

I don’t particularly like housework but I do like the feeling that all the housework is done (or enough is done) so that I can relax without thinking that I should be doing something more productive.

Ideally everyone in the house should have their own chores so that the load is distributed and there isn’t just one person doing the work for everyone else, although sometimes that’s just not possible.

I find that the easiest way to get everything done is to have a schedule and do a little every day – if I miss one day, it’s not the end of the world since it’s only about 20 minutes of work not done, but a little and often is my way of keeping on top of things instead of having to spend hours tackling a seemingly mammoth task.

In my householf my partner cooks and I clean (he also cleans, but just tends to do the bigger jobs!) The way I look at it, whilst he spends 30 minutes or more cooking dinner for the family, I spend the equivilent amount of time cleaning up for the family so it all evens out.

You need to find a schedule that suits your circumstances but I like to spend half an hour or so doing the chores after work so that it leaves my weekends free to do something much more interesting.

Below are my guides as to when I do certain tasks which I split into daily, weekly and monthly:

Daily:

I tend to do small tasks in the evenings just to keep on top of the chores

Weekly:

I split my house into “”areas”" and aim to tackle an area every week so that by the end of the month the slightly bigger tasks have been done (like cleaning windows – I don’t want to clean all my windows every week but I do want all of my windows cleaning every month so I do a couple a week and by the end of the month they are all done).

Monthly

There are then those tasks that just need to be tackled at some point during the year, either quarterly, twice a year or maybe just once a year. I have a schedule of these tasks and split them over the months of the year so I can plan to get them done without trying to get everyone done at once

During 2010 I aim to get much more organised which I hope will manifest itself in several different ways:

Firstly I know that keeping my paperwork up to date and regularly reconciling my bank will ensure that I keep track of my finances which in turn will ensure that I stick to my budget and pay off credit cards which is my main aim for this year (and next) so get the balance down to zero.

Secondly, and this will help with the above as well, I want to plan all my gifts for the year in advance and aim to give homemade presents where possibile. I have already been going through some of my knitting books and planned a couple of the gifts I aim to make – hence the preparation needs to start now so that I will have time to make some of the gifts.

Thirdly I hope that in planning in advance I will ultimately save time (and money) since I will spend less time procrastinating and putting things off.

So below is my list of what I need to do so that I can get organised:

• Make a master gift list: list all people that I will need to get gifts for and sort into birthday order (so the closest ones are dealt with first) and write down ideas for birthdays and Christmas gifts
• Write everyone’s holidays onto the kitchen calendar and my own personal diary – this includes parents holidays to ensure continuity of childcare cover and school holidays along with big events like birthdays and my marathon.
• Make a “simple” housework plan of tasks that need to be carried out every week – see if any of these can be delegated along with estimated times to complete (this will come in handy soon)
• Make a list of household tasks that need to be carried out periodically (monthly, quarterly) and schedule when these can be done so that they are done evenly throughout the year, for example cleaning carpets, defrosting the freezer, turning mattresses, servicing the boiler, etc.
• I’ve already made a start on this during my time off from work this Christmas, but pick a room a month and spend a half day (or whatever is required) decluttering it.
• Make meal plans for each week so I know what needs to be bought when I go shopping and save money by not buying unnecessary food that will not be used.
• Sense Check: with everything that I want to fit into any given week – making gifts, training for a marathon, housework, “real” work, me-time – estimate the time that each task will take to ensure that I have some sort of balance and set out enough time to get everything done.  I might need to let some of the less important housework slide (or give pocket money out for dusting!) so that other things can take precedence
• Re-assess at the beginning of March to see how things are going, then again in June and October by which time I will hopefully be a long way towards having the Christmas gifts sorted and will develop a more detailed plan for Christmas itself which will include preparing the Christmas cake and pudding in advance (I had to pay £14 this year for a Christmas cake and it certainly wasn’t as tasty or as big as what I have made in the past…)