All About Life Without Maids

[chloecube]

Hi everyone,

i do have a maid now, but i am always prepared that i will go without one one day. i just want to be mentally prepared the day that my maid leave. she has been with us for coming 2 yrs and i just renewed her contract in Mar 2011, thus her next contract will end in Mar 2013.
i have no idea if she wants to continue with us or to leave Singapore for a better and higher paying job.
she is a smart and good worker, i believe she can do more than just being a maid.
i am not worried that my houseworks will have no one to do after she left as i think i am capable of doing all these (i am maidless for 1 yr before she came)but more worried abt who to take care of my kids if she were to leave in 2013, my children are still young, they will be in P5 and P2 then. so i doubt they are old enough to be home-alone yet. their school is also very far from my house, so they need school bus or my DH to fetch them after work. their school offer after-school care thou.
my MIL has already implied she is not keen to help me, both my parents are working. i have to either send them to student care or look for other care-giver.
i just want to know how the parents here with young kids and how you manage without maid. who take care of ur kids?how u manage your life with work, family, housework, kids homework.etc…
to be honest, i have no intention of looking for a new maid after my old one leave.
hope to get some advise and encouragement here.

[fifiyeo]

Hi Pandan,


You can either get a part-time maid or if you chose to do it yourself, you can get a window glass wiper cum vacuum from Karcher ($99.90). It is a hand held wiper that vacuums at the same time. So there is no messy water dripping all over.

[fifiyeo]

Hi Chloecube,


I used to work and had to drag the kids wherever I went. I guess I was lucky in the sense that I could take my kids to work and work flexi hours. But it was quite a crazy life. Sometimes I had to work late into the night after the kids went to bed since I had to mend them and take care of their needs + schoolwork during the afternoons. Those were the days I had a maid to take care of housework. But since I don’t trust the maid with my kids, I never leave them with her.

My mom works and lives on the otherside side of Singapore. My MIL believes in leaving everything to the maids and doing her Tai Tai stuff. So we had to sort out most of our problems ourselves.

Since my last maid left last year, I’ve also stopped working. My boys are in P5 and P1 this year, so school wise is also more demanding. I think it’s good to consider taking time off work for awhile if you can and rejoin the workforce when they are bigger. It’s also a good chance to spend time with the kids. Next thing you know…they are all grown up and out of the house.

[Awonder]

Hi, I’m a SAHM and just had a new Indo maid for about 2 mths but we find that she is not suitable for us and thinking of sending her off. Previously had a Philo maid but left for her hometown after 2 years with us.


I am thinking if I should get a new one again as I would not know how the new maid will be like and had to teach her all over again also, really tiring. My this new maid had been giving us much frustration and I also heard that Indo maid got more attitude problem.

I dont really feel like getting a new maid again but at the same time also worry if I can cope at home with 3 kids, one in P3, P1 and a 21 mth toddler. I had no maid when taking care of my 2 elders till my 3rd child came along. Before my this new maid was here, we were thinking if we can actually go w/o maid but there were sure lots of chores to do and it took me about 1 mth to actually get back the routine of taking care of everything at home but of course its very tiring, thus engage one again. Intend to have for another 2 years till my younger ds reach 4. Having a maid can really spoilt you.

Now I was thinking if there are other alternative of taking care of everything should I decide not to engage a new maid again. At this moment, I do not think that this maid help me in any other way except the housework. I still can’t leave my younger ds with her if I fetch or pick up my 2 elders from school (they take school bus but had CCA and sub-class at different time so had to fetch them myself) so my mum had to come to my house whenever I need her, still cannot trust her and I still rather do the cooking myself cos she pick up quite slow and don’t want to follow my instruction. My ds also don’t want her to feed him milk.

One option is to put my ds in childcare so that I would have more time to finish the chores at home and do the cooking also…only worry if he would get sick often cos had experience with my eldest boy. But I really hope that this is the best option cos all the while we do not like to have maid at all, cos of privacy.

But we also do not put off getting a new maid totally cos we had a good one previously and you really appreciate her being around once you find that she is a great help to you. But it all depend on our luck to get a good one.

Hope to get some pointers from any experience mummies here who share the same situation as mine.

[pandan]

fifiyeo:

Hi Pandan,


You can either get a part-time maid or if you chose to do it yourself, you can get a window glass wiper cum vacuum from Karcher ($99.90). It is a hand held wiper that vacuums at the same time. So there is no messy water dripping all over.

Hi fifiyeo,

Thanks for your reply. I used to have a part time auntie but she won't clean the external window panels. I am looking for a tool that can help me clean the external panels from inside. I am not comfortable half hanging myself to clean the outside and most of the time I can't reach the far corner which make the windows look unclean and the water marks are everywhere. Its like efforts spent are all wasted.

Thanks.

[Autovacstore]

IJJ:

I have a dishwasher. Yes, it cleans well. Love it. Contemplating to get a dryer, but did not really like the texture of clothes after drying.


Now, I am thinking of the robot vacuum.... skunk, can share your verdict of its usefulness? Does it vacuum corners well? Is it noisy during operation? Do you have to change the filter bags frequently? How costly does each replacement bag cost?

TIA!

I would recommend a roomba as a start. It projects reasonable noise out of the vacumm but for me, i still can watch tv with it still moving around the house. Not so much of an issue for me.

No filter bag, just a bin that stores all the dust, just a clip and the bin is removed from the cleaner. There are some filter thou. Its resonably cheap, a normal bin filter cost only $5 each. And can last up to 6months to a year. I have been using the same filter for 9months and I don't really see a need to change it yet.

There is a brush attach to the cleaner to scrub the floor, all of this little parts can be removed and rinse it so it is very easy to use. Visit youtube and you can see how nice and classy this little vacumm looks like

[starlight1968sg]

I want to buy a good broom!

[LOLMum]

starlight1968sg:

I want to buy a good broom!

haha, i just need someone to cook dinner that's all. the rest i can handle myself.

[Autovacstore]

LOLMum:

starlight1968sg:

I want to buy a good broom!

haha, i just need someone to cook dinner that's all. the rest i can handle myself.

Haha, what if the someone cooks the same thing everyday? Anyway, hire a maid and she can settle your dinner everyday!

[fifiyeo]

Haha, what if the someone cooks the same thing everyday? Anyway, hire a maid and she can settle your dinner everyday![/quote]


Well, not all maids can cook or like to cook. Just watch what some of them cook for themselves…gosh, I don’t think you’ll even want to think about putting that stuff in your mouth. I’ve had maids like that before. So my maids never had to cook when I had them.