Do you clean your kitchen every night?

[Calizzy]

I would really like to have the kitchen clean every school night before we go to bed. I just find that if I have to start the day and am already behind with a dirty kitchen then it's a bad start. Dh thinks I'm legalistic about the clean kitchen. He thinks if we're tired we should let it go (which is easy for him to say, he's not the one cleaning it in the morning!) So, do you go to bed every night with a clean kitchen?

[AmandaVT]

I do. It makes me mental if the dishes aren't done and counters aren't wiped down before bed. I clean the kitchen as soon as we're done with dinner. I'd rather take a few extra minutes in the evening than wake up to a dirty kitchen. 

[Farrar]

I don't... but I will say, I'm very far from a neat freak, yet it is something I loosely aim for. No self judgment when it doesn't happen, but I think you're right - when I start the day with the kitchen a mess, the day is already behind on some level.

[wendy not in HI]

It's a bad day if there are dishes in the sink in the morning.  It makes all the difference when I end the day "ahead" by cleaning up the dinner dishes.  My kids are old enough to do the bulk of the kitchen clean up, if I remind them.  I also clean as I go when fixing dinner.  

 

I try to remember to bag up things for lunches the night before (my kids are in school).  When I do that, along with washing dishes, I'm off to a great start in the morning.

 

I'm not sure why, but I hate unloading the dishwasher first thing in the morning, I should remember that it is full because we did the big clean up job the night before...

Edited April 18, 2017 by wendy not in HI

[slackermom]

Not squeaky clean, but acceptable by my standards. That includes:

Dishes etc in the dishwasher

Hand-washed items washed, left to air dry

Food put away in cabinets, closed bins, frig, etc.

Counters and stovetop wiped down

Empty the little sink strainer into the trash

Take out the trash if needed

Make sure kitchen trash lid is locked

 

It is always a mess again when I walk in the next morning, since dh is a disaster.

[Wilma]

Yes to a reasonably clean kitchen before bed! We all help (four kids, plus us) tidy up after dinner and then the kitchen is closed. I do save emptying the dishwasher for the morning, but I always knock that out while my tea kettle heats up.

 

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[OneStepAtATime]

How clean is clean to you? If you mean no dirty dishes in the sink, then yes I do try but I have everyone lightly rinse their dishes and put them in the dishwasher so I usually only have to deal with pots/pans/serving dishes.

 

If you mean all surfaces scrubbed down, dishes cleaned and put away, floor mopped, etc. Then no I don't do that daily. Wiping surfaces I do in the AM before breakfast. After that I just clean up spills (or one of the kids). I mop at least once a week but not daily.

 

If this helps you mentally maybe explain to your DH that this is way cheaper than therapy. All it costs is time and a bit of energy. Are you needing his help every night to get the kitchen the way you like it? What level of clean are you shooting for? If you need his help and there is a lot to do right before bed, is it possible to start earlier, long before bedtime? And do bits throughout the day so there isn't as much in the evening?

[regentrude]

No.

I am the first in  the family to go to bed. I am tired in the evening. DS is often not even home yet. People still eat, warm up leftovers, etc.

 

I can quickly clean up in the morning, while I wait for coffee water to boil. On my late days when I don't have to leave for work until 8am, I wash pots and pans and knives after breakfast. I want to come home to a clean kitchen for cooking lunch which is our big meal.

 

 

I hate having to empty the dishwasher in the morning, so I don't like to run it overnight. I prefer to start it during the day, so it can be emptied before I go to bed. But we have no set routine, since I only run it when it is completely full.

Edited April 18, 2017 by regentrude

[melbotoast]

I don't, but it sure sounds nice!

[LucyStoner]

No, but it gets cleaned every night. Usually my husband and/or sons do the dishes after dinner and around here, that includes a light cleaning of the kitchen- sweep, wipe counters, empty the garbage if it is full or potentially smelly (i.e.: take out the trash that has fish scraps in it even if it's just 1/3 full) and for bonus points make sure there's nothing out that should be put away and the stove and hood are wiped off too.

Edited April 18, 2017 by LucyStoner

[MooCow]

I try to have a clean kitchen when I go to bed. It used to stay that way most of the time, now that my oldest closes at work, it's a carp shoot.

[zoobie]

If DH helps you at night but doesn't help in the morning, I definitely would get that done at night! And of course he wants you to wait until the morning, ha! I try to have the dishes done and things wiped down, but it doesn't always happen. It is a much nicer start to the day! 

[Guest]

Pretty clean before bed, yes, though I have a short morning routine as well. The kids have rotating jobs for after dinner so these things are always done: dishes in washer and started (full or not, we run it routinely either way), hand-wash dishes washed and left to dry, sweep floor, clean off counters, put away food, clear off table (and set table before dinner).

 

In the morning, I empty dishwasher and put away hand-washed dishes. I also clean the glass cooktop to my standards if it wasn't done correctly.

[Night Elf]

Sort of. I don't like dirty dishes out at any time and will put them into the dishwasher when a family member doesn't do it. Why they don't perplexes me. I do not always wipe down my stove because it's a nuisance. So stove and counters are not always cleaned at night.

[LucyStoner]

When I was having a period of clinical OCD, I would repeatedly clean the kitchen before bed while worrying about anything and everything. My husband remembers that and does his level best to kick me out of the kitchen after dinner. Some nights I do the cleaning (a few times a month he works until 11:30 or he's doing scouts with one son so the other son and I donthe kitchen etc) but with appropriate treatment, I can leave it without making sure everything is spotless.

[SeaConquest]

No. I leave things for the morning. I prefer to relax in the evening.

Edited April 18, 2017 by SeaConquest

[carriede]

Yes I do. All dishes in dishwasher or hand washed and in the draining board. Counter tops and table wiped down. Dishwasher turned on.

 

Sometimes if things are super crazy, I'll let it go till morning. But that's an exception to the rule, and then the first thing I do is clean the kitchen.

 

I'm not a neat freak, but I'm an order freak and clutter makes me crazy.

[regentrude]

For those of you who clean the kitchen in the evening, how do you handle family members eating/cooking afterwards?

 

[fairfarmhand]

I feel like crap if I wake up and yesterday's crap is protruding into today.

 

I can stand a plate or cup or spoon in the sink. But filth? Dirty pots? Nope. That drives me bonkers.

[KungFuPanda]

Not always, but seeing dishes in the morning causes me no emotional trauma.

[almondbutterandjelly]

No, I don't clean my kitchen every night.  We stack dirty dishes on the counter to the left of the sick.  We occasionally soak dishes in the left half of the sink.  Dh loads dishwasher when he feels like it and runs it immediately.  DD empties it when she gets around to it.  We do try to keep our largest countertop relatively free of clutter and somewhat clean since that's where we do our food prep, but it's not a nightly thing.  It's an as-we-go thing.

[Farrar]

For those of you who clean the kitchen in the evening, how do you handle family members eating/cooking afterwards?

 

I'm not bothered by it. Occasionally the kids make a snack. Dh is up all night working and he will make himself food (or, more often raid the leftovers) and coffee and so forth. But having a few dishes or a pan or two is different for me than having the dinner pots and pans and dishes undone and the countertops still a mess and so forth.

 

I don't aim to start the day with the kitchen spick and span. Just cleared countertops, mostly neat. No one is cooking serious meals after dinner here so if I clean up, it'll still meet that standard in the morning.

[SparklyUnicorn]

No I don't.  I'd like it to be that way too, but sometimes I just don't have the energy or time.  Especially on nights I'm home late. 

 

I try to clean as I cook.  That doesn't always happen either.

 

 

[Julie Smith]

For awhile when we were dealing with mice. I would CLOSE the kitchen at a certain time. 

 

As in no one was allowed to dirty a single dish. Because at that time the kitchen would be cleaned, every dish washed, the counters wiped down, the dry dishes put away (we have no dishwasher) and the dish drying rack put away....

 

 

[myfantasticfour]

There have been times over the past 8 homeschooling years in which we had "family closing procedure" and DH would take certain kid(s) in one direction and I take certain other(s) in another, and one of us would herd them in helping (at their level) to pick up and sweep the living rm/dng/rm/study and the other team would do the kitchen. Then we could enjoy a happy evening together, somehow, between kid bedtimes and late-night Star Trek or something.

 

But that was only those rare "sweet spot" years when we didn't happen to be going through the toddler years of one of our more difficult children. Of which we have a 50% success rate at having.

 

Currently, Difficult Child #2 is in the toddler phase, and my oldest is 12, and I clean my kitchen when it stinks and the floor is crunchy, or when DH has the day off and I can muster the will.

Seriously.

 

But I know that this too shall pass and one of these days our home will be more like a home again and less like a hovel. For now we have 4 kids, two of whom are in the throes of early adolescence, and the other two are Littles. And 3 are boys.

Right now I am having a hard time, with perimenopausal midcycle mood swings and hot flashes into the mix. My kitchen is pretty gross, but on weekends I blare the classic rock in the kitchen, settle the kids with popcorn and a cartoon movie, and finally see clean surfaces and get laundry put away, and if I'm lucky, I pour a boiling kettle over the worst spots and get it all mopped. It stays clean for 12 hours or so.

 

Hope that helps.

[Lady Marmalade]

No.

 

When dinner is over. I am done working for the evening and that is my time to relax and unwind.  I put leftovers away and move dirty dishes to the sink or top of the stove and that's it.

 

I don't have a dishwasher, and I don't even do dishes every day.  I live in a very small house (not quite tiny) with very little counter space, but I hate ending my day with housework.  Dishes and cleaning the kitchen are some of the tasks I can do while the kids are doing schoolwork in the morning.

[myfantasticfour]

For awhile when we were dealing with mice. I would CLOSE the kitchen at a certain time. 

 

As in no one was allowed to dirty a single dish. Because at that time the kitchen would be cleaned, every dish washed, the counters wiped down, the dry dishes put away (we have no dishwasher) and the dish drying rack put away....

 

Mice are the worst! You have my sympathy! We had a mouse problem a couple of years ago, and I never knew I would be the kind of woman up on a chair shrieking for my husband (he's smaller than I am) until the darned things invaded, then started chasing us around!

 

I was wishing for a carver's knife.

 

Mice seemed cute to me, before that event, but never again.

 

Growing mint around the foundation helps. They hate it, and it can deter them from entering, but it won't do a thing if they are already inside. Having cats helps also, but I'm too allergic. If you can stand them as pets, pet rats will keep mice away, as rats are predators who mice wisely fear. Likewise snakes (if you can stand them, again).

[HTRMom]

Dishes are always done. Counters and floors are sometimes messy.

 

 

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[Wheres Toto]

I don't.  I usually empty the dishwasher while my tea water is heating up.  Then I'll load it up right after I eat my breakfast.  

 

My house is generally a mess.  

[Guest]

I am religious about it. The day DOES NOT END unless the kitchen and dining room are spotless and ready to start anew the next morning. The last thing I do before heading off to bed is start the dishwasher.

Edited April 18, 2017 by Kinsa

[Katy]

This seems like the sort of thing a DH says when he wants more TeA.  My answer to him would be that if he wants to go to bed earlier perhaps he should clean the kitchen after dinner, because I'm not going to bed until the kitchen is clean.

[FriedClams]

Agree. Totally. Dishes drying on the rack and dishwasher started. Table and counters wiped. All food put up. Everything straightened.

 

Trash goes our first thing in the morning with the dog walker.

[Alice]

Yes, but it's a quick clean. I pretty much do the same thing after every meal: dishes in dishwasher, pots/pans washed and counters and tables wiped. At night I sweep the floors and sometimes Swiffer mop. I might clean something a bit extra (the stove or the sink) if there is time or it got extra dirty. After dinner everyone helps and it really takes no more than 15 minutes tops if all 5 of us are working I am also mostly a clean-as-I-go cook so there is often not a huge mess anyway. We run the dishwasher at night and dh usually empties it in the morning. 

 

I don't have kids who are older and going in and cooking late. Occasionally dh gets a snack but he cleans it up. Or occasionally ds has an activity and comes home after we've had dinner. We usually make him something quick and clean it up. As the kids get older, it might change. They are fairly used to cleaning up after themselves though and the house norm is to clean after every meal so I think the person who cooks would then clean up. 

 

 

[DesertBlossom]

Mostly clean. A few years agonwe started "dinner chores" so everyone is involved in clearing off the table, doing dishes and picking up the house. It may not be sparkly but it helps.

[Carrie12345]

For those of you who clean the kitchen in the evening, how do you handle family members eating/cooking afterwards?

 

In our house, people are supposed to clean up after themselves at any time of day.  The "big" evening clean is only because we tend to use more stuff for dinner than other meals or snacks.  That doesn't mean they can leave dishes and crumbs and spills throughout the rest of the day.

 

(Just to be clear, they still TRY to.  I'm not claiming perfection at all!)

[mamaofgirls]

Hardly ever, I would much rather spend my evening with my husband and children. Especially when the weather is nice and we can go for a walk on our property..

[ScoutTN]

Yes, the basics. Dishes washed or in dw, pots and pans washed and put away, food in fridge, counters wiped, floor swept, trash emptied of it is full or smelly. Table reset for breakfast - this is a kid job. My kids clean up after breakfast and lunch most days, so I make sure it is done right at the end of the day. I don't mind cleaning up b/c dh is "on" with the kids after dinner. 

 

I detest waking up to a dirty kitchen. A few dishes from someone's snack are fine, but not a big mess from dinner. No, no, no!  :svengo:  :svengo:  :svengo:

 

That said, real cleaning - wiping down cabinets, mopping the floor, cleaning out the fridge etc. only happens once a week. 

 

 

Edited April 18, 2017 by ScoutTN

[mamaofgirls]

In our house, people are supposed to clean up after themselves at any time of day.  The "big" evening clean is only because we tend to use more stuff for dinner than other meals or snacks.  That doesn't mean they can leave dishes and crumbs and spills throughout the rest of the day.

 

(Just to be clear, they still TRY to.  I'm not claiming perfection at all!)

 

lol. My children can not even make their own food after dinner.... let alone put it away without spilling, dropping something, throwing away a fork, ect... But they are young ;-)

[Julie Smith]

Mice are the worst! You have my sympathy! We had a mouse problem a couple of years ago, and I never knew I would be the kind of woman up on a chair shrieking for my husband (he's smaller than I am) until the darned things invaded, then started chasing us around!

 

I was wishing for a carver's knife.

 

Mice seemed cute to me, before that event, but never again.

 

Growing mint around the foundation helps. They hate it, and it can deter them from entering, but it won't do a thing if they are already inside. Having cats helps also, but I'm too allergic. If you can stand them as pets, pet rats will keep mice away, as rats are predators who mice wisely fear. Likewise snakes (if you can stand them, again).

 

We use to have pet rats. Worked great, even better than when we had cats. Mind you our cats were incompetent! One of them even made friends with a mouse in our house and it wouldn't even run from it. Once I found the mouse sleeping beside him. 

 

For some reason dead mice freak me out. Live mice I can sort of deal with, I just leave the room. But a dead mouse has me running for the hills. 

[amy g.]

Nope. Once dinner is served, I'm off duty.

 

I quote Scarlett and say, "Tomorrow is another day."

 

I usually clean the kitchen after I cook breakfast and the kids are doing schoolwork.

 

I'm just too tired in the evenings.

[umsami]

I didn't always, but these days, I almost always go to bed with the dishes washed.  Will the counters be sparkling, everything put away? Probably not put away (my counters tend to be cluttered), but wiped.  The floor is often swept too.

 

It does make me wake up happier when I see it looking nice.  It also takes far less time than I usually think which helps.

[StephanieZ]

BEST PARENTING MOVE EVER . . . that took me almost 20 years to figure out . . . is that the entire family works together to clean up the kitchen and dining room after dinner every night. 

 

BEST THING EVER

 

So, yes, we NOW have a clean kitchen before bed pretty much every night. Doing it all together is THE BEST THING EVER. We all work until it's all done. Takes 10-30 min depending on how messy we were leading up to eating, lol. 

[SKL]

I prefer to, but I am able to ignore it if something else is more important.

 

It took me a long time to learn how to let it go though.

[J-rap]

Most of the time, but if I've had a long day and don't get around to it, then it doesn't kill me to leave it til the next day.

 

 

[SKL]

When I was a kid, it was my responsibility to clean the kitchen, and I would get in trouble if it wasn't clean when I went to bed.  That meant all dishes washed, surfaces wiped, and floor swept.  I would procrastinate until almost time for my parents to wake up, then rush to finish it.  I don't plan on being that particular with my kids.  :P

 

But, I agree with everyone working together to get it done when possible.  It makes it rather pleasant.

[Guest]

I don't mind dishes in the sink or on the stove, as a rule, but I can't stand when counters aren't wiped down at night. Preferably the stove top too, but tbh I've let that go way too long sometimes lol (lol?)

 

So, DH likes to be a helping helper who helps and he's a night own.... So for a while he was doing dishes at night after I went to bed. So grateful. Two thumbs way up. Et cetera.

 

But I'm so sensitive to noise, I was getting so furious because the baby wakes me up ENOUGH. I don't need to be woken up from kitchen cleaning noises. It happened so many times. And I kept thinking man why won't dh get a clue and just stahhhp eet!?

 

But then I realized, hey dummy, if the dishes are clean he can't wash them! So if at all possible I've been doing them before bed of late. I'd live to say that was his plan all along haha, but it was not. Plus he still cooks in the middle of the night in weekends and it still infuriates me to no end...

[Ellie]

I would really like to have the kitchen clean every school night before we go to bed. I just find that if I have to start the day and am already behind with a dirty kitchen then it's a bad start. Dh thinks I'm legalistic about the clean kitchen. He thinks if we're tired we should let it go (which is easy for him to say, he's not the one cleaning it in the morning!) So, do you go to bed every night with a clean kitchen?

 

Absolutely. Without fail. Always.

 

And yes, it is easy for Mr. Calizzy to say that. There is nothing like coming out in the morning to a clean kitchen. It's worth any extra time spent the night before.

[Peaceseeker]

I prefer to start the morning with a relatively clean kitchen if possible, but I am not religious about it. There are weeknights I am just too tired or whatever and the dishes stay in the sink overnight. It's no big deal to load them up while the water boils for my morning tea.

 

I am a chronic dish rinser/counter and table wiper though, so nothing looks all gross or crusty even if I can't get to it right way. I don't like waking up to food encrusted counters and food dried on dishes, but a sinkful of rinsed dishes and a cooking pot soaking overnight doesn't bother me.

[Shellydon]

Yes.  We load and start the dishwasher right after dinner, all food is put away.  When the dishwasher finishes, I unload and re-load and start it again.  I make sure all the counters are wiped and I put up all the kitchen chairs so the Roomba can run over night.

[Pawz4me]

DH and I clean up after dinner. He loads the dishwasher and wipes down the table. I put away any leftovers, wash anything that needs hand washing and put them in the dish drainer. I wipe down all the counters, scrub out the sinks and clean the stove if needed. Before I go to bed I put the things that were drying in the dish drainer away.

 

DS18 isn't a snacker and if DH gets anything it's a single serve ice cream and he'll put his spoon in the dishwasher. So there's usually no more mess made after we clean up. If DS21 is home from college I might get up in the morning and find a few crumbs on the counter or a little drip of salsa or hummus, but nothing major.