Barter

As we all know housekeeping and I are not on good terms.  I try and try and still fall behind.  Then I get down on  myself.  Really I'm just not good at housekeeping.  I've said for years that the first luxury I'm going to indulge in when we have more money is a housekeeper.  Well we might not be making enough money to be able to indulge in such a luxury for quite sometime.  Not to mention the fact that I'm cheap and probably wouldn't really spend money on that even if we could.  It did get me thinking though and what I thought of was bartering, massages for housekeeping.  I have tried to set up a trade doing this before, a couple times.  It never worked out.  I think once it was poor communication (the lady I was trading with spoke very little english).  The second time the lady I was trading with got a night job shortly after we started trading and was unable to continue our trade.  I got discouraged and just dropped the idea. 

Fast forward about a year, I have a toddler who makes messes in a whirl wind and needs/wants constant supervision and entertainment.  I decided it was time to see about a trade again.  I was determined this time.  I just knew there had to be someone out there in the world who would love to trade house keeping for massages.  Sure enough there is!  She's a friend of mine.  She's been coming for almost a month.  It has been WONDERFUL!!!!!!

I think the best part for me is not necessarily that someone else is cleaning my house (although that is a very close #2) it's that I have to have my house clean enough for her to clean!  This means that Tuesday night my house has to be clean and tidy.  Everything has to be picked up and in it's place.  All counters, floors, tables, etc. have to be cleared off.  It's so good for me!  I'm not the best at finding the motivation to clean my house, but since I have to it gets done.  It also helps me to be motivated to keep it cleaner.  Since my home is so spick and span I want to keep it that way.  Since she comes every week if I get behind it's never more then a week behind, which is not that hard to recover from. 

The other day when she was getting her massage she said "I really think I'm getting the better end of this trade".  I told her "Good because I do to, so it must be a good trade!"  I've got my fingers crossed it continues to work out well for both of us!