A House Full of Men...?
We knew coming into this situation that living in a house with 5 young adult men was going to prove quite the handful. A few of our roommates work night shifts; others don’t have set schedules at all—myself and my husband included. Undoubtedly, rules would have to be set and compromises were to be made. We had a Grand Roommate Summit after everyone had moved in, during which leases were signed and the Roommate Agreement was discussed. First and foremost lay the agreement of the Chore Wheel.
So this, surprisingly, was one of my most difficult projects so far. Has anyone tried dividing a giant circle into seven equal slices lately? I hadn’t done this kind of thing since high school!
The Chore Wheel consists of three layers.
Red- Monthly chore: the assigned roommate must complete this chore at any point during the month.
Yellow- Weekly chore: the assigned roommate must complete this chore by the end of the week.
Green- Daily: this is the assigned roommate’s duty for the day, anything from a one-time floor sweeping to washing the dishes all day.
My family never had a chore wheel in our house. We used a chart instead, the kind that we decided on at the beginning of the school year and stayed the same forever. One kid’s day to unload the dishwasher would be Tuesdays, Wednesday would be someone else, and Thursday yet another child (I suppose this would be where having the same number of children as days in the week comes in handy).
I didn’t want to employ this sort of set assignments in our house because of everyone’s randomized schedules. Something would have to be made that allowed for such things as night shifts or being gone all day, and we didn’t want to eliminate certain days from someone’s schedule because of chores.
We found that something that rotates would suit us best, since the bigger chores demanding a larger time commitment would only come once a month, or once a week. To account for this, one of the “daily chores” is simply to do your weekly chore. The best part with this system is that any given red or yellow chore will only come around every 7 months, or 7 weeks.
The red chores are much more time-consuming, and needed less often. This includes assignments such as cleaning out the fridge or oven, vacuuming out the couches, or cleaning all the windows. Yellow chores are things we can’t bother doing every single day but, when rotated, will still get done once a week, such as regular vacuuming and mopping. The green chores mostly consist of dishes and sweeping. Our house has a great deal of hardwood—primarily in the main living areas—and with the amount of traffic coming in and out, we figured a quick sweep needed to happen daily.
Included in these chores, but something that needed to be exterior to the Wheel itself, are bathrooms.
The house has 4 of them, but 2 are attached to corresponding bedrooms—one is mine and my husband’s, the other is one roommate’s personal bathroom that he will be responsible for keeping clean. So for everyone else, we just decided to make this a separate weekly chore, and the remaining 6 of us would simply switch back and forth between whose week it was to clean.
Below the Wheel is a small whiteboard on which I simply wrote the names of the roommates in a 2x3 box, with a magnet showing which person is cleaning this week.
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Another thing discussed in the summit was the Colored Sticker System. Simply put, every roommate has an assigned color. If there is food which they have bought themselves and do not wish for it to be eaten by anyone else, they simply put their colored sticker on it. If someone accidentally (or purposefully, we’re not judging) eats food that has been marked by another, they must promptly replace all of the stolen good (even if only a little was taken). It’s working surprisingly well so far.
All in all, it’s not too bad living with a bunch of guys. Today I came home from work and one was asleep in his room with his TV playing YouTube, two were playing games together, and two were in the basement singing along with the Google Home to a musical. So I guess I’ll keep them.
So this, surprisingly, was one of my most difficult projects so far. Has anyone tried dividing a giant circle into seven equal slices lately? I hadn’t done this kind of thing since high school!
Red- Monthly chore: the assigned roommate must complete this chore at any point during the month.
Yellow- Weekly chore: the assigned roommate must complete this chore by the end of the week.
Green- Daily: this is the assigned roommate’s duty for the day, anything from a one-time floor sweeping to washing the dishes all day.
My family never had a chore wheel in our house. We used a chart instead, the kind that we decided on at the beginning of the school year and stayed the same forever. One kid’s day to unload the dishwasher would be Tuesdays, Wednesday would be someone else, and Thursday yet another child (I suppose this would be where having the same number of children as days in the week comes in handy).
I didn’t want to employ this sort of set assignments in our house because of everyone’s randomized schedules. Something would have to be made that allowed for such things as night shifts or being gone all day, and we didn’t want to eliminate certain days from someone’s schedule because of chores.
We found that something that rotates would suit us best, since the bigger chores demanding a larger time commitment would only come once a month, or once a week. To account for this, one of the “daily chores” is simply to do your weekly chore. The best part with this system is that any given red or yellow chore will only come around every 7 months, or 7 weeks.
The red chores are much more time-consuming, and needed less often. This includes assignments such as cleaning out the fridge or oven, vacuuming out the couches, or cleaning all the windows. Yellow chores are things we can’t bother doing every single day but, when rotated, will still get done once a week, such as regular vacuuming and mopping. The green chores mostly consist of dishes and sweeping. Our house has a great deal of hardwood—primarily in the main living areas—and with the amount of traffic coming in and out, we figured a quick sweep needed to happen daily.
Included in these chores, but something that needed to be exterior to the Wheel itself, are bathrooms.
Below the Wheel is a small whiteboard on which I simply wrote the names of the roommates in a 2x3 box, with a magnet showing which person is cleaning this week.
**************************
All in all, it’s not too bad living with a bunch of guys. Today I came home from work and one was asleep in his room with his TV playing YouTube, two were playing games together, and two were in the basement singing along with the Google Home to a musical. So I guess I’ll keep them.
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