I also want to add one more thought about “outsourcing” ‘home’ work; by having my “assistant” do daily chores, it greatly increases the amount of time I have to spend with my children, rather than saying, “I can’t, I have to cook/do dishes/do this laundry” etc

Bingo. This is our primary motivation for having cleaning help.

The other reason for us is that we cook and bake, and cooking a meal is a major part of our entertainment with friends. My husband is away a fair bit for work, and when we are all in town, we want to eat at home. We very rarely eat out.

If we didn’t have cleaning help, I would rely on eating out/convenience foods more often, to cut down on the kitchen mess. So what we spend in cleaning fees is partially offset by lower costs for food (as well as better nutrition value).

Much more interesting that way – it is just like when I drive a car, I practice polynomial interpolation, and more things no one wants to hear about (global optimization mostly).

I have resisted getting any kind of cleaning help over the years–my reasoning was that I wanted my children to see me working at home to keep our place clean, and also to teach them to do it.

Now, however, I’m swamped–homeschooling with six kids home all day; even with regular chores for all of us, there are some things I simply never get to, like gunky window tracks and dusty picture frames. So I’m thinking of hiring someone for two hours a week–and I think it will teach my children that when you need help, you get it, instead of stressing out and kicking yourself for not being able to do it all.

Another factor is that my husband served a mission, and I later lived, in countries where it would be considered selfish NOT to hire a cleaning person, because you’d be depriving somebody of a job.

My children absolutely do know how to clean house. Our cleaning specialist focuses on the kitchen, bathrooms, front hall and family room. Unless I request it, she doesn’t set foot in the living room or either office or the kids bedrooms, so there is plenty to do on the weekends. She also doesn’t do deep annual cleaning projects (windows, etc.). Also, she is a friend, and understands our values, so when I put a note on a stack of dirty dishes asking her NOT to touch them because a child needed to take care of them, she respected that.

We clean the chapel twice a year and don’t think cleaning is below us in the least. We just don’t have time to do it in the typical work week.

As to the “service” argument, we didn’t have a cleaning person with our older children and I didn’t see more frequent acts of service then, except from me:) and I never thought of it as service per se. Dad and kids still set and clear the table and do dishes.

My cleaning person is paid a fee that is about the same as our flute teacher, so I don’t think she is being taken advantage of–and indeed, she has thanked us for the work several times.

I don’t see any moral superiority in scrubbing one’s own floors.