Yard Work..House Chores...Never Ends...Are They Your Hobby?

[HeatherC]

Time, money and energy seem to be the biggest obstacle in getting stuff done around the house. True for anyone else?

While I love my house because we built it new and raised our kids here, I think I am getting closer and closer to liking the idea of downsizing to a smaller house and yard.

Most of our neighbors, though, seem to love working on their yards...every single day. It is pretty much their hobby during the evenings and every weekend.

Is your house your hobby?

 

[tvguy]

Mostly still a chore, but some things in the yard in particular are becoming a hobby.
I think that may change when I retire.
I know when my mom retired her first priority was getting the house and yard in order. When she retired she had lived in that house 25 years, and a lot of things got put off while she was working. She had a 1/2 acre yard, with lots of lawn and bushes and fruit trees. It took her several years to get things in order, and she enjoyed 28 years of retirement, 27 of them in good health. Keeping up her yard brought her hours of enjoyment, and provided us with many jars of home made guava jam from her guava plants, lots of oranges, tangerines and lemons. She did have the plum and peach tree cut down. She thought the plums were more work than they were worth, and the peach tree just never really took off.

 

[ronandannette]

Time, money and energy seem to be the biggest obstacle in getting stuff done around the house. True for anyone else?

While I love my house because we built it new and raised our kids here, I think I am getting closer and closer to liking the idea of downsizing to a smaller house and yard.

Most of our neighbors, though, seem to love working on their yards...every single day. It is pretty much their hobby during the evenings and every weekend.

Is your house your hobby?

Heavens no. We maintain our home in suitable condition to be warm, inviting, attractive and comfortable. In doing so, we don't spend any more money or time on it than is necessary.

 

[xlxo]

Thoughts....

• I was going through a similar dilemma.... then I discovered cordless tools from Ryobi, Dyson and Worx. Without gas/oil or an electrical cord.... cordless tools makes cleaning so easy. Fav tool is the Ryobi 40v leaf blowers. Cleaning takes minutes, I even clean my neighbors sidewalks. Worx just came out with Hydroshot.... no more scrubbing.
• I considered downsizing.... but the strata fees were as high as my property taxes. Suddenly weeding does not sound so bad.
• the scary part about downsizing from a home to an apartment... what is the future of the apartment? Repairs? Leaks? Break-in's (mail theft? underground thefts?). Sudden sales from other building owners forcing you to sell?
• @HeatherC: To clarify what do you have now and what are you considering to downsize to?

 

[Bianca and Bernard]

Time, money and energy seem to be the biggest obstacle in getting stuff done around the house. True for anyone else?

While I love my house because we built it new and raised our kids here, I think I am getting closer and closer to liking the idea of downsizing to a smaller house and yard.

Most of our neighbors, though, seem to love working on their yards...every single day. It is pretty much their hobby during the evenings and every weekend.

Is your house your hobby?

No.
I have to keep it clean and maintained (to the best of my ability).
I don't like cleaning, or mowing, but I do it.

 

[Southernmiss]

If a hobby is doing stuff that has to be done, then my hobby is cooking, hauling DD 15 to practices and games, laundry and grocery shopping. No yard work and house keeping is not my hobby. Just things that have to be done. And I did not have time to work on the hobby of yard or house keeping this weekend and won't next either.

But to me a hobby is something you enjoy and loose track of time doing and are surprised when you realize how long you've been doing it. I see no time for a hobby in the near future!

 

[quandrea]

This is timely. I weeded the front yard this morning. I absolutely loathe the task. There is seriously nothing else in my life that I like doing less than weeding. I watch others working in their yards and marvel at their ability to derive some pleasure out of it. Next Sunday I'll be out back weeding again. And hating every second of it.

Now cooking, baking and even cleaning--I enjoy those tasks for the most part. Baking is a passion.

But Disney is my hobby!!

 

[adisneyaunt]

I did downsize, considerably.
A hobby is something I enjoy doing at my pace If/when I want too. Not something that Has to be done.
Maintaining a home is not a hobby to me...
now I get to Choose if I want to .. do ANYthing but all outside areas are taken care of and downsizing cut back immeasurably for inside the home. ...Downsizing was a great decision.

 

[Luv Bunnies]

I don't like yard work. DH doesn't like it either. We have a landscape guy who comes once a week with his crew. They mow the lawns, front and back, trim bushes, keep weeds at bay and whatever else we ask them to do. It's worth the cost to keep our yard looking nice without having to do the work. I have most of the summer off (after working two weeks of summer school). My plan is to get the inside of the house organized, which will be no easy feat. Younger DS is heading off to college in August. His room is a mess. We need to go through his clothes and make piles to keep, toss, and send to school (in Florida so the heavier stuff can stay home). Then there's older DS's room (ugh), and a spare room upstairs that DH has been promising to organize for the past 20 years. I seriously think we could toss half of the stuff in this house and hardly even notice! I would love to downsize someday, but that will be difficult in this area where housing costs are ridiculous. I keep looking at real estate in other parts of the country. We could sell our house, buy two outright somewhere else, live in one, and rent the other for the income. With no mortgage payment, we could do OK. But, we want to stay in this area so that won't happen!

 

[amberpi]

Nope.

I pay for a yard service. I really enjoy having all my digits, and have never used a weedeater to that end

My house is super minimal, but very beautiful if you dig that kinda thing (Dwell over HGTV), and it makes keeping it spotless incredibly easy. I don't have knick knacks to dust around.

Its me and a tiny cat, even though I have a pretty decent sized house. I haven't even gone into my detached loft in months, so it may have some cobwebs, but its totally unneeded, so who cares.
I have an every 2 weeks cleaning service, I used to have it much more when I was married, but I'm not home enough to get the house dirty, and when it is, it's just my master suite, and piles of clothes/makeup. I can destroy that area getting ready for an evening out. I rarely cook at MY house, but cook/eat often at my folks. Cooking for 1 is a drag, so I help them, and they feed me a ton. Its nice.

Routine maintenance is outsourced to the appropriate professionals. I have 0 interest in spending a good bit of my time on that kind of stuff - there's internet, books, and news to read, workouts to be had, friends to hang with, and dates to go on. I try to to do the simple living stuff. I will say, I send out my work laundry but spend a lot of time on ironing. I find ironing while watching TV incredibly peaceful though, so that's ok by me.

 

[paisleys]

Yes, I truly feel that cleaning and organizing my never ending mess of a house has become my hobby. When I became a SAHM over ten years ago, one day early on I just started to notice things I never saw when I worked 40+ hours a week and had classes at night. Dust. Dirty windows...junk drawers etc etc etc. I developed a weird, almost OCD routine I need to follow or I cannot relax. Every MWF, no matter what, I clean the kitchen and entire downstairs. Once a week I hand wash the kitchen floors. Tuesdays are for upstairs and the bathrooms (I really need to add a second day as it gets dusty and the bathrooms seem filthy in a week). I can't take a shower without scrubbing the glass walls. Thursdays are my 'wildcard' days where I might power wash the back patio or garage, sidewalk etc. I feel like I should be wearing a uniform! I have tried to lighten up a bit, but then the house just gets worse. I don't know if we are just big slobs but my house still never looks or feels clean or organized enough. I try to just maintain over the weekend, but the house is usually a disaster on Mondays and I will spend hours on it today. I know things will ease up when my kids get older, but I don't want to think about the hours of my life I have spent on this never ending 'hobby'.

 

[cabanafrau]

We have been working towards a goal to make as many things maintenance free around the house as is reasonable. We're not there yet and do sometimes enjoy some projects around the house and yard, but we do generally plan as many projects with an eye towards easy to no maintenance going forward. We want to enjoy our home and surroundings, but not be forever in service to them. Too many other fun things to enjoy in life.

 

[lifesavacation]

Not at my house. I finally convinced my husband to pay for yard service. They've come once and he was pacing around while they were there. He doesn't have time for the yard, and he was obviously uncomfortable with someone else doing the work, so we'll see how long the yard service lasts.

 

[RedAngie]

I suppose gardening is a hobby of mine. We have a lawn service to mow, weed & feed, rake, etc., but I enjoy working in my perennial gardens and planting annuals in various beds. I didn't plant any vegetables this year, however. Just a potted tomato plant on the back deck.

 

[MIGrandma]

I don't really enjoy mowing the lawn, but it's a job that needs to be done. I do it if DH is too busy, but he does 75% of it.

We trim bushes once a year, in July, and do the job together.

I have a perennial garden that I do enjoy. Love seeing the plants come back in the spring, and they bloom at different times so there is always something blooming. We put landscape fabric down between the plants, and mulch, so there is very little weeding to do. We no longer have a vegetable garden, with just the two of us we just buy stuff at the local farmer's market.

 

[princesspiglet]

Both DH and I loathe yard work...which sucks because we have a big yard. Plus an inground pool that requires daily maintenance. We were just discussing downsizing last night while pulling weeds. DD leaves for college in 3 years and once she goes away, we will be selling the house and moving into a townhouse a few blocks from our current home. While we love our neighbors and development, we hate having to spend almost every evening and weekend working on something in the yard or house.

 

[Hikergirl]

Mowing, raking leaves, weeding- chore.
Gardening- somewhere between chore and hobby.

 

[Stacy's a freak]

I don't mind cleaning since we're all pretty good about keep up with things on a daily basis. So the weekly vacuuming, bathroom cleaning, etc. isn't awful and doesn't take too much time. I really like the idea of coming home to a clean house and I never want to be embarrassed if someone drops by unexpectedly. I joke that if I die on the road somewhere I would hate for someone to think that we live like slobs. So I make our bed everyday (I'm the last one up) and we leave nothing in the sink. But don't open the closets!! haha

As for yard work, I think I would like it better if I knew how to grow things. We can grow some fantastic looking weeds so the mowing/weed whacking happens by my husband or son each week and I'm the backup if they are both busy. Even our 11 year old daughter has learned how to do the weed whacking. But besides that, I don't have the eye for gardening. We have neighbors that are out there every day, hands and knees, picking weeds and preening. I don't get it but they seem to like it and their yards look beautiful.

 

[PollyannaMom]

Definitely not my hobby! We hire the yard work done, and clean only as much as necessary. I hate both kind of chores because they never stay done for long!

 

[Disneylover99]

I hate house work and yard work. Chores leave little time for hobbies.