@anj_p, our dishwasher habits are exactly like yours. :)

This thread escalated quickly. I guess I really was asking about "claintenance." Ha - but, as I am a full time working mom of two very young kids and a caregiver to a husband suffering disability after several severe injuries, EVERYTHING seems so, so very difficult to keep up with right now. I handle everything in our lives except a few physical tasks in the house, so I'm trying to make my life as easy as possible in the future.... appreciate lots of tips and entertaining discussion. :)

My comment on paper plates was really an attempt at humor. Hopefully it read that way :)

@Em my husband has all of his abilities (supposedly) but it generally doesn't seem like it when it comes to claintenance. Or childcare. Or cooking. So I feel you.

Are you building? The unfortunate truth is that maintaining a house and at the same time keeping the things that maintain your sanity from taking over your house (specifically looking at the kids here) while keeping your own head above water is a nearly impossible task. My best advice is to hire help if you can afford it (we have a biweekly cleaning person, and I wish I had a line on a good handyman - if I did, I would hire that out as well. I won't even tell you how long it's taken me to hang a curtain rod in my living room). Best of luck! It's hard.

I think some defensiveness comes because it seems there is a lack of understanding not only about what people prefer, but also what is easy vs. what is hard to different people/personalities/abilities. A recent blog post on organizing for adult ADD was an eye opener for me on the reasons a loved one, highly intelligent, successful in a very challenging career, CAN NOT (not WILL NOT)

put things back where they came from. This individual does not have an ADD diagnosis, but I sure wouldn't be surprised. The minute an object is not in use, it virtually ceases to exist for this person. Check out:

https://www.epbot.com/2022/04/organizing-with-adhd-book-review-my-top.html

also https://theholdernessfamily.com/ has a lot of info on living with ADD as an adult.

For my loved one? Yes, cleaning and picking up is hard, really, really hard. On the other hand, said individual found doing organic and inorganic chemistry at the same time during a condensed summer term while working full time no big deal. And still remembers it all twenty-five years later. I find it really hard to remember to take my grocery list with me to the store. Let alone remember what's on it. They find household repair-type maintenance not too hard, but cleaning impossible. I'm the opposite.

What's hard depends.

I can't tag people with a space in their name for some reason but I LOVE that you brought that up G W. That's such an important perspective and so true. My husband has both ADHD and has had multiple severe TBIs. Yesterday while he was trying to make a sandwich, when he was done, the Bread package was on one side of the kitchen, cheese package on the island, lunch meat package on the opposite side of the kitchen, and refrigerated condiments in the pantry! Even as a wife I have to remind myself it's not because he's a lazy slob ;)

So for us, all these tasks in and of themselves are not hard. It's the combination of some very unique life circumstances and ALLL of the "little things" combined that seem hard. After several brain injuries, my husband will never get on a ladder for safety reasons. I will not either, due to safety reasons and how important it is I remain able minded and bodied for my kids. So, any task that could potentially involve a ladder, though we coudl hire out, would then take the mental energy of hiring out when I have a lot more pressing things on my plate as a caregiver. So if we can minimize the need for ladders AND handymen, and be able to do most maintenace with a step stool... I'm all for it. So, simple tasks made difficult my unique circumstances.

Thanks GW for that perspective!!

"Is there no commensurate joy in gazing at clean and fresh and UN cluttered?"

Not for me; when I used to have a cleaning lady, I would hate walking in to my home after she'd left. Definitely no joy, and actually a feeling of discomfort - as if the place was devoid of personality and looked un-lived in. It was like walking into a hotel suite, not my home. Clean? Sure. Uncluttered? No.

"I need to wipe out the gasket of my Bosch washer every time, leave the door open, and still it smells musty."

A great way to get rid of that musty smell in your dishwasher is to take a bowl with white vinegar place it in the empty dishwasher. Throw a 1/2" cup of baking soda in the washer and then put the washer on rinse.

There is also a filter that most people don't know they need to clean. Look at the bottom of your dishwasher underneath the roll out tray. There is usually something you can turn to remove a filter and the perforated metal drain. Clean all of that quickly with soap and water before you do the rinse.

That should keep everything smelling fresh

"I have never seen anyone load the dishwasher as they use dishes."

In our home, this is the only way we have ever done it. I abhor dishes in the sink or anything on the kitchen island. The dishwasher is the first thing to be emptied every morning, it's a no-brainer to put dirty dishes in it throughout the day.

I don't think it's that much extra work to keep your house clean and organized. I have worked from home for the last 20 years, and I literally cannot work if my house isn't clean, even if my office is. We have a large-ish home (5500 sq. ft.), and it's really not that much work. I do have a weekly cleaning service, but I also have two large dogs that shed a lot. It's all about having a schedule and not letting anything get too bad. I run the irobot every day. We have all hardwood or tiled floors, and I mop at least once a week (in addition to the cleaners). I try to do at least two loads of laundry a day, so that way all the sheets, towels, dog bedding, and regular laundry are cleaned each week. I organize and clean the refrigerator 2-3 times a week, etc.

My nieces husband's mother was shocked that he actually used the DW to wash dishes. He grew up where everything was washed by hand and the DW was used as an expensive undercounter drying rack. His aunts and uncles all did the same. They are from Asia and apparently this is something that has been talked about by first generation Asians on TV and internet.

Fascinating thread!

table to dishwasher = 1 step

table to sink + sink to dishwasher = 2 steps

Wow. Just wow.

paper plates = 0 steps !

We load the dishwasher as we use the dishes until it's ready to run a load, which can sometimes take a day or two depending on how often we're home for meals. I don't like them sitting in the sink, plus it seems like less effort to do it as you use them, mind games lol

I know I am an outlier... my mother would smack me sideways for putting an unrinsed dish in the dishwasher. Do people really take dirty dishes and pans and just stick them in the dishwasher without rising the food off and then leave it there a day or two until they can run it?

You do realize that the dishwasher runs on electricity right? You don't have to feed it.

---

We don't leave dishes in the sink, we clean as we go. When we cook, we will wash the pans and place them in the rack when we finish cooking with that pan. Before we sit down to eat, all cooking items have been washed. When we finish eating we all wash our own items and place them in the rack.

We mostly run the dishwasher for glasses, which are placed in the sink and loaded into the dishwasher by the last person to finish dinner.

I am not telling anyone else that they are doing it wrong... you do you. I don't do it that way.

---

ETA: Just to be clear, our rinsing never had anything to do with the ability of the dishwasher to clean items. It was just about "this isn't a pig sty, we don't have a slop bucket."

I've actually found that rinsing dishes before putting them in the dishwasher takes far more water and energy than putting them in lightly scraped. Plus, detergents these days have enzymes to break down the food particles and actually work BETTER than rinsing them. Of course, I'll never convince my MIL of this as she washes her dishes before she lets the dishwasher wash her dishes (insert eyeroll here). I've had both Bosch and Kitchenaid in the past 5 years and rarely ever have had a time where something came out dirty and needed to be washed again. Usually when that happens, it's because the kids didn't load the dishes properly to begin with.

Speaking of which, I have 4 kids and put two dishwashers in our new build 2 years ago. We run both every day. It's the single best decision we made in our build. Second is the stacked washer/dryer in the master closet for just my husband's and my clothes.

Anything remaining on the plate is scraped into the compost bin before being put in the dishwasher. If there's a particularly gloopy or fragrant sauce I'll give it a quick rinse.

Do people really take dirty dishes and pans and just stick them in the dishwasher without rising the food off and then leave it there a day or two until they can run it?

I don't usually have to wait a day or two until I run the dishwasher, but yes, the dishes and pans wait unrinsed until then. And, yes, my casserole dish with dried on old baked pasta comes clean in the dishwasher even 2 days later (3 Bosch dishwashers in the last 3 years in 3 different homes). It saves water and (my) energy too not to be washing/rinsing things twice.

I rinse because if I don’t, the dishes don’t get clean. Much more energy being wasted posting on these silly discussions than giving a few dishes a quick rinse.

Supposedly if you don't rinse dishes the dishwasher cleans better because the grit of the food acts as a scouring pad on the dishes while it's blasted around with high pressure water but usually I don't test that theory out because I'm always afraid of putting too much food in the washer which leads to clogged drains.

@shead Two dishwashers? At that point I would just get one of those commercial washers with the conveyor belt. Maybe give the kids waiter & waitress outfits too.

@kculbers Yeah, there was some show with those tiny homes. They never talked about cost of buying land, property taxes, zoning... Sounds like building and selling them is a lot more fun than buying them.

@nickel_kg about energy star dishwashers taking too long. Yes. I usually start our dishwasher between 10PM and midnight and then it gets unloaded the next morning or later. One time I made the mistake of pushing all the wash option buttons and it took 8 hours (!!).

@ShadyWillowFarm If you live in a place with water restrictions (or even on city water where you pay for your water as many do), it is impactful and a waste of resources to rinse the dishes.

Henry M, my complaint is about clothes washers and not being able to do multiple loads of laundry in one evening. Dishwasher run time I don't care about. But 8 hours, yikes, what was it doing all that time!

Em

I'm sorry to hear about your husband, I'm something in the same boat, hubs was diagnosed with stage 4 cancer during pandemic, I've turned into the full time exhausted caregiver, and it doesn't help that we still live a very quarantine lifestyle, always home, except for walks, exercise, medical appts, etc.

This is where having something of a smart home has been invaluable, he can still "do things," mostly voice command, and feel like he has a sense of control.

I truly hope you are able to find balance.

It’s not wasteful to rinse dishes when the dishwasher doesn’t get them clean and you have to hand wash them as you unload them. Freakin virtue signalers…

I love bry111's comment about the "slop bucket." I have two of them! One for the chickens and one for the compost bin! I don't have a dishwasher or a clothes dryer. Use paper plates/bowls on Sabbath.

"It’s not wasteful to rinse dishes when the dishwasher doesn’t get them clean and you have to hand wash them as you unload them. Freakin virtue signalers…"

If your dishwasher doesn't get them clean, THAT'S what's wasteful. Why use an appliance that doesn't work properly? And none of it is virtue signalling......not wasting things doesn't make someone better, it just makes sense.

Stuff that makes my house-life easier,

in no particular order: landscaping with native plants with no lawn; hiring someone to clean the house as often as is affordable; every object having a ’home’ and parents and kids holding eachother accountable for tidying; keeping up with preventative maintainence; saying ’yes’ to help from friends, family, neighbors neighbors, etc.; doing and sticking to meal-planning; understanding and accepting your financial situation, whatever it may be.

i’ve been talking to my husband about selling our house and building a small house utilizing a lot of these ideas. He isn’t on board. But i’ll save the thread for my reference - maybe it will be a house for one.

My family and I finished our new house two months ago. Since then, we have had to sustain some small maintenance. When we made the plan for the house, we took into consideration the monthly maintenance. An Indianapolis roof contractor helped us with some advice on how we should build the house to make our life easier when the maintenance time comes. We started using LED bulbs instead of incandescent ones for cheaper maintenance of the light system. Some small modifications to the bath were benefic.

By the way, I remember hearing about a woman who back in the 1970s invented a house that was basically a giant dishwasher so she didn't have to clean anything by hand. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/first-self-cleaning-home-was-essentially-floor-ceiling-dishwasher-180964115/

Henry M. That’s quite an interesting article!! I wonder if all that automated cleaning with all that water would create issues with mold.

@Henry M, well, I have four kids and we live on a 1000 acre farm. We eat 3 meals a day in our kitchen and I cook from scratch 99% of the time. That means I have a lot of pots, pans, and dishes throughout the day to wash in addition to all the other hundred tasks I have to attend to each day. So yes, I have two dishwashers and I have two washers and dryers. Usually, the pots and pans are in one and the dishes are in the other. We rarely use paper plates or disposable cups. But, why the heck I'm justifying any of it to an internet stranger, I'll never know.....lol.

Most all of us on here are more privileged than a large portion of the globe. What's excessive for one person may be needed /important / life changing for another. What we value / enjoy doing is all different.

It sure feels like some think only what they have is "appropriate" and anything anyone else has (if "more") is somehow either excessive, boastful or virtue signaling if they do something differently.

And we've certainly gotten off track about low maintenance / easy to clean.

We're all different.

As a wise friend said to me - "that's why God made chocolate and vanilla ice cream"

@shead I was just making a joke. It's not that serious.

@kculbers One problem is you have to have everything prepared for a flood at all times.. so furniture wrapped in plastic, books in water tight boxes & so on. Otherwise you would have to spend time preparing everything before each cleaning. So the stuff that goes in the house has to be compatible with being in a dishwasher or there's added pain.

Did I miss something here??? Possibly the original question was not a serious one??? I thought this would be an informative, up to date, loads of contractor, building information about building a new home that was a modern concept/material list of a house that was low maintenance??? Instead it is a commenter list of how people do dishes. I was hoping for a serious discussion. Not????

@Ed(Edwina) and Stephen Ci question was too vague. It wasn't narrow enough not to get jokes and comments about homemaking.

Right, the virtue signalers have to jump in and call someone else’s cleaning method “wasteful” without knowing diddly squat about the specific situation. Maybe someone’s older house has plumbing that doesn’t fit well with many dishwasher models, or the budget simply doesn’t have “new dishwasher” penciled in because the existing dishwasher works just fine if you give some of the really dirty dishes a quick rinse before putting them in the dishwasher. How much does a new dishwasher cost anyway? Let’s think about how much the carbon cost of buying a new dishwasher is; all those parts needing to be manufactured, the finished product trucked to its final destination, and what happens to the still useful dishwasher? A landfill? All so that really dirty dishes don’t need to be rinsed prior to loading. 🙄

That's not virtue signalling, it's stating a fact........yes, said without taking into account the reasons someone might have for being wasteful about that. People make choices that fit their circumstances, but nothing is gained by fooling yourself about them. It's OK to say "I'm being wasteful with water in this circumstance because of X, Y, or Z". Just admit it and move on. Virtue signalling is like humblebragging (which happens all the time on this site), but facts like water use are facts. I got all kinds of judgment for leaving my dirty dishes in the sink, but judging others is what social media generally devolves to. Sophie (for all the people who loved her) was horribly, sarcastically mean and judgmental to me; it happens. But it's not virtue signalling ;)

And you're not there measuring the water? I rinse. Why? Because it takes me four days to get it half full to run. That's why. I don't have tell you the number of kitchens I have entered that REEK. Why ? Waiting for a dishwasher to "fill " and nobody rinsed anything, and two days ago they had salmon........or waiting to the trash to be really full. I mean REALLY, really full.

If you believe any of these are saving Mother Earth? I wish you much luck, and fine to feel fuzzy wuzzy : ) Where's the timer for the shower? What is a "full enough" bath tub for a decent candle lit soak? Good grief. Rinse, don't rinse......who cares?

"It's OK to say "I'm being wasteful with water in this circumstance because of X, Y, or Z".

Water is not a constrained resource for many of us and so its use for dishes isn't wasteful as there is no extravagance to it.

Our household's water comes from surface water and about 95% of the water we use is returned to streams and lakes. Additionally, rain adds about 2.75 trillion cubic feet of water to streams and lakes each year, while only using 225 billion cubic feet a year for all consumer and industrial needs. This doesn't include rain that moves into groundwater or evaporates.

Ever cleaned kitchen cabinets Shaker or other? - my Dad ordered flat fronts so the dust wouldn't be visible in crevices - doesn't that make sense?

"Water is not a constrained resource for many of us"

Fresh water is a constrained resource for all of us, whether your local government or your visual abundance tells you otherwise. Yes, we all waste various things for various reasons, but at least make sure the reason outweighs the cost of the waste.

Yawn - go ahead and beat me up because I told people that they can't have everything they want without consequence, and that I stated facts that they don't like. it's like that old saying: 'Take what you want, but use what you take'.

Whatever.

@Toronto Veterinarian - I gave you facts and you responded with a few platitudes. Can you specifically explain how my using a very small portion of the 100,000 gallons of water that my property contributed to the municipal water reservoir in July alone, is wasteful, while your using electricity to run the dishwasher every night is fine?

People who are proud of the fact that they run their dishwasher every night fussing at other people for wasting water is the height of irony. If you need to run your dishwasher every night, fine. I assume that if you are that concerned about my water usage that you have other ways of protecting the environment and natural resources that offset the extra energy usage. All I am asking is that you afford me that same courtesy.

WHATEVER!!!!!!!!!!!

"It may be hard to believe, but a big electricity-using dishwasher is a greener choice than hand washing your dishes, if it is a newer model and you're washing full loads. So put away the sponge and take a look at these mind-blowing facts.

How much water does a dishwasher use?

This may appear impossible since it seems like dishwashers are constantly spraying water, but a newer one does use less water than hand washing. Getting them clean in the sink can use up to 27 gallons of water per load. An Energy Star certified dishwasher can use as little as 3 gallons per load (around 11 litres), according to the Natural Resources Defense Council. In fact, an Energy Star certified dishwasher can save almost 5,000 gallons of water per year.

How new does your dishwasher need to be to get these savings? In 2013, new standards were put in place that required dishwashers to use as much as 5 gallons per load. On the other hand, units built before 1994 can waste more than 10 gallons of water per load.

How dishwashers save energy

This one may be even harder to believe than the water-saving fact, but it's true. Think about it. Your water heater needs to make hot water for you to wash dishes by hand. Most newer dishwashers have heaters inside that warm up water more efficiently than your water heater. Overall, if it is Energy Star certified, it can use less than half the energy of washing dishes by hand.

And don't rinse by hand

Rinsing your dishes before you stick them in your dishwasher is majorly wasteful. According to Consumer Reports, prerinsing wastes more than 6,000 gallons of water per household every year. Most newer dishwashers can handle bits of food, so don't worry. Your dishes will still come clean as long as you scrape the big stuff into the trash.

Make sure you have a full load, though

These savings only apply to full loads. If you can't seem to fill up your dishwasher once a day, use the rinse and hold feature, if it has one. This will prevent food from drying and sticking until you get around to starting a load and will still help you be green.

A note for the holdouts

Still don't want to put your dishes' fate in the hands of a machine even though it's good for the environment? Consider this: It takes water that is 140 or 145 degrees Fahrenheit (60 to 62.7 degrees Celsius) to fully sanitize dishes. Your hands just can't handle that, and I'm guessing you don't want to turn up the heat setting on your water heater every time you wash dishes, either. So, let your dishwasher deal with the high temperatures while you sit back and relax".

No one said anything about the energy usage of running a dishwasher. I said something about bragging about how you run it nightly.

What I should have said is I really don't care about your opinion on my water usage. I have two swimming pools on one property... one for people and one for horses. How do you feel about that? Wait... I don't care. Seriously... don't care.

"No one said anything about the energy usage of running a dishwasher. I said something about bragging about how you run it nightly."

"I assume that if you are that concerned about my water usage that you have other ways of protecting the environment and natural resources that offset the extra energy usage".

Conclusion: It's not what you say, it's how you say it.

I still say.......WHO THE HELL CARES LOL

I am not implying "who cares" . I really mean ..who really cares?

For the love of heaven the repartee has been fun, but might be fun to give it a rest. Mother Earth will still be here tomorrow.

I'll ignore the fact that the "energy usage" info in the CNET article was ignored............

Mark Bischak, Architect LOL