How to Balance Housework and Homeschool

Balancing housework and homeschool is tricky. Balancing homeschool with anything is hard!

Homeschool parents have the equivalent of a full-time job while trying to also be a spouse, parent, housekeeper, and if possible, a person who has a few moments to shower every couple of days.

While housework isn’t the deep spiritual issues I usually tackle, if we don’t address it, it can become an area of spiritual disobedience or a thorn in your marriage. Taking some time to place housework in its proper place is an act of humility and servanthood, which are spiritual disciplines.

So, how do you do it all and not lose your mind?

I’ve been battling this for years and have come up with some easy ways to stay ahead of the chaos, while being present during homeschool. Really, my strategies work for any busy mom, but are especially helpful for homeschool parents.

First, lower your standards.

Seriously.

Most mamas that worry about keeping the house clean, lean towards being neat freaks. If you’re more chaos than control, skip to the next tip. But for me, I had to recognize that some dirt, disorder, and chaos is normal for a family home.

As a recovering control freak with perfectionist tendencies, I had to adjust my standards. How clean and organized does my home really need to be? Does my pantry NEED to be color-coded and labeled for me to be fulfilled as a wife and mother?

Were my standards Godly or was I missing Mary moments with my child due to having a Martha attitude?

Maintaining HGTV perfection was placing a level of stress on all of us that wasn’t healthy and was damaging our relationships. The house is supposed to serve the people, not the people serve the house.

If something had to give, it was the housework.

But I also find myself struggling with stress and anxiety when the house isn’t reasonably organized and clean.

So how do I balance both housework and homeschool without reaching my personal anxiety threshold?

Tame the Laundry Monster

Start a load of laundry first thing every morning, by the time breakfast is ready and you’re dressed for the day, the laundry is often ready to toss in the dryer.

Teach a lesson while it dries, then while your student is doing some independent practice, fold the laundry. Or practice folding the laundry together while reviewing spelling words, times tables, discussing an interesting lesson. One of the benefits of homeschool is that we can combine life skills with our daily curriculum.

Don’t leave the clothes in the dryer for days at a time.

It’s tempting to procrastinate and just keep fluffing them day after day, but using my method, even the most challenging loads only take about 10 minutes to fold.

Lay out all shirts and socks across the back of a couch or table. Fold underwear and pants as you go. Matching socks is much easier if you wash socks all together in mesh bags. Just have kids use the mesh bags as laundry bags for socks throughout the week (maybe clip them to hamper) and you won’t lose socks anymore.

Then you can hang or fold shirts fairly quickly.

After a week or so, you’ll be caught up on laundry and have smaller loads each morning. If you have to do two loads a day, alternate between clothes and towels or bedding because they take less time to fold.

ABC – always be cleaning.

It takes a lot less time to clean if I tidy up as part of my normal routine. Taking an extra minute here and there throughout the day keeps clutter from getting overwhelming.

Consider the age of your kids. Smaller kids make bigger messes and are less able to pitch in. Embrace the chaos as much as you can. Keep baskets or bins handy for quick clean up and keep toys with lots of little pieces to a minimum. Studies show fewer toys lead to happier, more creative kids anyway!

Don’t leave things out of place for long. Often the procrastination puts more mental stress on me that just tackling the task. Take two seconds to grab something on the way to the bedroom, bath, laundry room. I try to never walk through the house with empty hands.

My daughter needs a lot of supervision to do her work right now. I can’t leave the room for an hour an expect her to finish her work. We are working on building her skills, but I can only leave for about 10-20 minutes or I’ll find her terribly off track.

I learned to organize cleaning chores into manageable segments and include her whenever possible. Age appropriate chores for kids helps us manage the work and teaches responsibility, teamwork, and discipline.

Practice the 10 Minute Tidy

Set a timer if you want, but take ten minutes and organize or clean any area of your home. Do this a couple of times a day. You can clean most of a bathroom, wash a sink full of dishes, or can scoop up a lot of toys into a basket in ten minutes.

Leave out a small caddy of cleaning tools in whatever room needs attention. Then everything is at hand when you have a few minutes to work.

One day a week, I get out the dust rag and polish. When I walk through the room, I wipe down the table, then carry it to the mantel, then wipe down the bookshelf, etc. I spend five minutes or less and clean as I walk around the house, leaving the supplies in the next area as I go. Next time I walk past, I clean another area and so on.

If your student can’t ‘do school’ without your attention, have him do a ten minute tidy in his room or help you where you are. Taking a mental break can be refreshing for you both and actually improve attention.

Stem the Kitchen Chaos

Clean the kitchen while the kids eat breakfast and lunch. My child can make a bowl of oatmeal take 30 minutes. Instead of getting impatient, I clean the counter, put away dishes, prep for dinner, etc.

The last thing I want to do at the end of the day is dishes, but leaving them in the sink is a recipe for stress first thing in the morning. Even if it’s 11 p.m., I pray for five more minutes of energy and wash the dishes.

Paper plates are not a sin. Sometimes, they just make more sense. On leftovers nights, paper plates mean just a handful of silverware to wash. A mommy with energy to play is worth a few paper plates.

For the larger cleaning chores.

Divide them up into one or two a day. Using a chart may come in handy.

End your school day a little earlier and let your child spend 30-60 minutes of the day reading while you vacuum or tackle a chore that needs more than 10 minutes. Or give them reading time in the middle of the day! It’s a good mental break and quiet sustained reading improves attention span.

Make the tasks manageable – whatever that means for you.

God gave you these kids, this husband, this personality, this specific body even. And He didn’t make a mistake. Find the strategies that work best for you and your kids in this season of life that are consistent with who God calls you to be.

It’s a balance of grace, mess, love, planning, and discipline. Yours doesn’t have to look like anyone else’s plan to be just right for your family.