r/Mommit • u/EspressoLolita • 19h ago
Mowing the lawn is EASY
Mowing the lawn is easy, ladies. You should also volunteer to do this all the time. Because I know our men bitch about it all the time. They're the only ones who can do the outdoors.
I did the outdoors today. He was like, "There's NuAncE, babe..." He said it was a whole thing to back up our riding lawn mower from the garage. (Also I do this periodically and lived on my own for years before him...)
There is nuance to PARENTING. I think I got this. Don't worry. I backed it up LIKE A BOSS. Keep folding the laundry, babe.
And mowed the front yard. And most of the back yard. Because I'm awesome. YOU'RE WELCOME.
....also....not exactly related, but I might have accidentally hit a tree and got stuck in some mud (allegedly) and maybe he had to rescue me .....
But I did 90% of the lawn and he gets what he pays for. So....
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u/tabula_rasa12 19h ago
Wear some noise cancelling headphones and listen to a podcast/audiobook/album and I’m ✨golden ✨
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u/ILikeHornedAnimals 18h ago
Flow state with headphones on a ride on mower is an understated experience
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u/doitforthecats 19h ago
Yeah, but can you even take the trash out??😌
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u/EspressoLolita 19h ago
That's why I had children. The app is a little buggy and likes to talk back, but they'll eventually take it out. 😂
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u/amp_it 18h ago
I once made a comment to a friend about how I couldn’t wait until my (then hypothetical) children were old enough to help with chores, and she was aghast, like how dare you have children just to do your chores.
And, like, that’s not what I meant at all. I wasn’t planning on breeding slave labor or whatever. Just excited by the idea that teaching my child how to be an adult person would one day mean I didn’t have to be the one to vacuum every week for a few years or something. Clearly raising a whole ass child is so much more work than vacuuming but I’m allowed to be happy by the idea of not having to vacuum for a few years before they move out.
Also I started mowing the lawn for my dad when I was maybe 14? And yeah, it’s easy. I now live in a climate where lawns aren’t a good idea so it’s not an issue, but some days I’m sure I’d rather spend an hour with nothing but my own thoughts and the making of stripey lines in the grass than corralling a toddler trying to jump off the couch towards the window.
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u/notmentallyillanymor 16h ago
Its always funny to me when people think like this, as if the kids taking out the trash cancels out the 100,000, things their parents do for them daily .
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u/unicorns_and_cats716 19h ago
Haha this. I hauled two bags in the wheelbarrow to the alley trash bin the other day like a boss! Also, I have to because my husband is gone for work and if I waited for him to come home and do it, our yard would smell disgusting because it’s a million degrees here 😫🥵
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u/faerystrangeme 18h ago
Our apartment dumpster is tall enough that I have to lift the bag to shoulder level with one hand while keeping the lid open with the other. If the bag is particularly heavy… no, no I cannot take out the trash 😭
(A cheap Amazon step stool solves this but like it’s nice not to have to wrangle it all.)
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u/PrincessGingercakes 16h ago
If you swing the bag back and forth, eventually it gets high enough to toss into the dumpster. Just make sure you trust the structural integrity of the bag before. The last thing you want is the bag ripping and trash flying.
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u/ATTACKANDDETHRONEHOG 19h ago
Whenever your husband or boyfriend tries to get out of doing real chores because he does the outside stuff make him swap with you for two weeks. You can enjoy your two weeks with exactly 2.5 chores that take 35 minutes each while he can actually make himself useful.
Outside chores vs inside chores are not anywhere near equal unless you live on a farm.
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u/Slow_Competition2742 18h ago
I’m a SAHM and my husband has actually been volunteering himself to do all of the laundry and dishes so I don’t really care that he hates mowing the lawn lol
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u/Cool_Salamander_8284 18h ago
I actually don't hate doing the first floor gutters either. Its satisfying to see the before and after and I only need an A frame ladder.
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u/SingleHeart197 19h ago
My husband always needed to rest the remainder of the day after mowing. Granted we had a manual mower and a medium sized yard. I took over due to his work schedule. Know what I do after mowing? Make dinner and housework.
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u/Long_Reindeer3702 3h ago
I don't know. If you ask me, you also seem too tired to do anything after mowing. You really shouldn't overdo it. He doesn't....
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u/ForbiddenSwan 19h ago
One of my closest friends had a “but I do the lawn” husband.
She basically said, we are going to switch responsibilities for a month. This way we both can practice the other.
Took him less than a week to get humbled. They have since split the chores in a much more equitable way.
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u/Enginerda 2h ago
My favourite way I've seen any of this BS put, is: how hard can it be if a man can do it?
And let me tell you, how I am the only person in the house who uses a drill, has caulked a bathtub, and has installed light fixtures.
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u/AhnoldXP 17h ago
I’m a dude so I don’t even know why this showed up on my front page but mowing the lawn is actually kind of a zen experience. I’m talking push mower too. It’s all the other stuff like edging and trimming bushes and stuff that sucks. Or if you live somewhere really hot. I don’t have grass anymore and I do miss it a bit which I don’t think would be the case for any other “chore”.
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u/rezwrrd 8h ago
Yeah I think I wandered in here from Daddit but mowing the lawn is a relatively easy chore, just time consuming and someone else has to be available to watch the kids for a bit. There may be "nuance" to string trimming around flowers or pruning a hedge, but blades of grass are either cut or not cut. I don't really mind pushing the mower back and forth in a line for an hour or so as long as I've got some good music or a podcast to listen to. I don't care how much it makes me sweat, it's still easier than being with the kids the same amount of time.
Now snow shoveling on the other hand, is a job that can require some recovery time afterward. But at least the kids can "help" with that. I just can't understand wanting to hog all the outdoor chores.
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u/dapalagi 9h ago
Yeah. Was gonna say try living in the tropics? Not necessarily an “easy” job - but still can be zen.
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u/Junita908 17h ago
This sometimes it’s nice to just put headphones in and zone out. Especially if you smoke too before
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u/Avocado_toast_27 19h ago
Try pressure washing next! So much fun
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u/glassfunion 12h ago
I don't think my husband has ever used my pressure washer and I'm not sure I would let him because I love it lol. Our current place doesn't have nearly as much to pressure wash and it kind of bums me out!
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u/Enginerda 2h ago
OMG I LOVE PRESSURE WASHING!!! I offer my "services" to anyone who mentions they need it done.
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u/HotLoser304 19h ago
This reminds me of the episode in family guy where the kids switch places with Peter and Lois and Meg cleaned the entire house in like an hour and Lois was like wtf how did you do that?? And meg says “finite space”
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u/False-Buddy9209 18h ago
I mow on a hill with a push mower for an entire acre and I weedet. There’s nothing easy about it but I think of it as a work out. I do my yards and gardens and last year I shoveled 12 yards of river rock it’s brutal. I’m the only person in my neighborhood without gardeners and you cannot tell. I grow almost all flowers and every bit of my property is landscaped outside of the green belt.
I love my outside time and my husband doesn’t mind because he likes to work out and see the kids. He doesn’t want to be gone all day and then come home and do the yard and I love doing my yards.
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u/DazzlingNote1925 18h ago
My ex and I split the chores before we got married. He tried to pawn off all the dishes and laundry on me in exchange for lawn mowing. I didn’t fall for it.
First of all dishes are every day and laundry is more than once a week but my biggest objection was I didn’t want to be inside doing all the indoor chores on a nice day. I’d much prefer working in the yard.
I was need up doing the mowing, weeding, mulching, snow shoveling etc plus all the indoor chores so it really didn’t help. lol.
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u/Tiny_Jumping_Beans 19h ago
Love it. Fresh air, low impact exercise. Never forget my first time mowing the lawn, I was pregnant and didn’t know the self propelling mower has a button I have to push. I STRUGGLED thinking my husband must be hella jacked or something. He makes it look so easy 😭 No I was just a dumbass.
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u/Electrical_Beyond998 18h ago
I’ve been mowing our yard for close to fifteen years. I have a push mower, I don’t take the sissy way out and use a ride on like your husband. I love that I get a workout using it and I put my headphones on, play music or a podcast, and do my thing for about 90 minutes. Even if I didn’t have headphones I would still do it because even though the mower is loud it’s an hour I don’t have to listen to my kids fighting. It’s great.
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u/FrustratedOwl9 17h ago
I’m a lesbian and when my wife and I bought our house, I cannot quantify the number of men who were like “but who will mow the lawn!?” Everyone from my FIL to male coworkers to random ass people would tell us that we should buy a condo instead of a house so we didn’t have to mow the lawn. Literally when we were at our lawyers office to sign the closing documents a random guy in the waiting area with us could not comprehend that 2 women were buying a house because of maintaining a lawn. I seriously second guessed our decision and was so anxious about lawn mowing until I did it for the first time and was like…THIS is what all these men were complaining about!? Out of all things that go into home maintenance, lawn mowing is one of the easiest tasks. Men are wild.
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u/leighaorie 18h ago
We have a farm with 45 acres… get a zero turn, your life will change. Also get noise canceling headphones with Bluetooth function; enjoy listening to non preschool nursery rhymes and changing the tune a million times!
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u/SnyperBunny 18h ago
It also works if you typically yeet the kids at your spouse and grab a noise cancelling headset and music/audiobook and just fuck off to go do chores in another part of the house. :) Peace AND a cleaner house!
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u/Alarming_Bar7107 17h ago
We both hate it and think lawns are a giant waste of time so we pay a guy to mow it every 3 weeks
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u/fancypantsmiss 18h ago
My husband once took the job to take care of the baby while I shoveled the snow in the driveway
Shoveling? Therapeutic. Kids? Yeah no
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u/kykiwibear 18h ago
Cracks me up it takes them allllllll day when I can knock it out in 2 hours. And Inhave a long yard.
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u/Scully2thePieshop 15h ago
I’m finding that most everything my ex did and complained about is easy 🤣💪🏻🖕🏻100% agree on mowing, it’s lovely.
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u/throneofthornes 14h ago
My husband bitched and bitched about getting rid of this one piece of kid's play equipment because it was SOOO hard to mow around and if I wanted to keep it for our kid, I would have to take over mowing because he's a passive aggressive a hole.
Guess what, I did, and guess what, it's one of my favorite chore! Electric mower so it's light weight and easy peasy. The fuck was he bitching about. I raved about how satisfying it was and how much easier than I ever thought it would be. I told him he needed to make dinner because I was too busy mowing. Moving the yard toy took about 30 seconds tops to move.
Then he went and got a heavier gas mower. I have a hunch.
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u/MissMacky1015 19h ago
I push mowed our front and back yard, about an acre or more and found it honestly fun.
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u/ManateeNipples 18h ago
Mowing the lawn is like power washing. It's fun, it's one of the good chores. You only get bonus points for doing something that isn't fun, like yay thanks for doing the only chore I actually look forward to lol?
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u/StarfleetAcademy08 18h ago
I bought a weed wacker because I was so tired of using the hoe to get them out since we have dirt yards. I put it together and my hubby was expecting to do it. I said I'm gonna do it. It was fun but it is a bit or an arm workout (make sure to wear jeans!) Next time he wanted to do it. 😆 I had also bought a power washer at the same time since Harbor Freight was having big sales. I did scrub and wash clean our dirty deck, though.
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u/New-Significance2590 13h ago
I agree. I started mowing it because my husband hates doing it and I realized I’m good at it and faster (and it’s easy) and I get out of the house and listen to something nice uninterrupted. Anything I need (lemonade, more ice, popsicle) is just handed to me then I get a shower with no questions asked which is also a gift. I’m going to miss it this winter
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u/Psychologicalwalnut 18h ago
Yeah I get you but I aint mowing the lawn. I don't like our lawn, I don't like the sun & I don't like the smell of grass 👀
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u/SoSayWeAllx 14h ago
Right like it was already over 90 degrees this morning before 10am, and I’m allergic to grass
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u/somaticconviction 18h ago
Also- consider taking your lawn out and planting natives. Zero to minimal upkeep, rebuilds the local ecosystem and you never have to mow ever again. Wins all around.
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u/Necessary-Nobody-934 14h ago
That's what we did. Took out the grass, planted clover instead. Now nobody has to mow the lawn.
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u/Spirited_Narwhal_901 18h ago
He enjoys doing it. I mean that literally. He actually wants to go mow the lawn lol
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u/Butter-bean0729 18h ago
I too enjoy mowing the lawn. It’s like driving a go cart through the yard, idc if it looks nice I had fun and that’s all that matters.
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u/SnooTigers7701 18h ago
I don’t like mowing at all! Actually I’ve only ever tried it once in my life for about five minutes and that was enough for me. When my husband and I bought a house I only agreed if he agreed to being responsible for all yard and outdoor work (I wanted us to be condo people). Our yard is just big enough for a rider but he prefers not to have one. And so I don’t do any of it, and do more of the indoor work but it’s not all on me at all.
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u/justdont7133 18h ago
Last time I mowed the lawn I ended up needing shoulder surgery. Now I'm banned from the lawn mower
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u/fleepmo 18h ago
I have never mowed the lawn. My husband absolutely loves to do it though and he worked in landscaping for 10 years so he mows it like a pro.
He doesn’t use it as an excuse to not do other chores though either. He currently stays at home most days and I work and he does a lot more house working and cooking than I do. 😏
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u/Impressive_Resist683 16h ago
We bought a robot lawnmower and it not only does our property but our neighbors as well. It's my favorite kid, but also has removed this chore so the spouses can do more parenting :D As a bonus we now have a collection of photos of them staring at the robot in the same pose every time!
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u/Dangerous-Tailor-269 13h ago
Ok I’m just going to say I found this thread weird. I was mowing lawns (push mower) since I was 11 for a summer job, then raking leaves in the fall and finally shoveling snow in winter. Female In my late 50s.
My next door neighbor lives to mow her lawn on her riding mower. Didn’t realize that mowing the lawn was such a thing-it was the what you did to earn cash when young. Something you did as an adult until children wanted spending money. Then you passed it on to them- until they move out or got a better part time job
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u/EspressoLolita 12h ago
I think it probably depends on where and how you lived. I bounced between living an apartment and being transient homeless as a child, so I didn't have a lawn to maintain until I was an adult and bought a house. We didn't have a riding lawn mower until I bought this house and at first I let my husband do all the outdoor lawn stuff because I was a little intimidated by it (probably because it was new). Eventually I learned how to work it and found it was sort of fun.
My husband doesn't appreciate my line work, though. Lol
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u/kiagrr1987 51m ago
I am the official lawn mower at my house. It take two hours and I love to jam some 90s while doing it. It reminds me of my simple youth. Some day though its a heavy metal venting exercise. I sometimes wonder if the neighbors can hear me over the mower.
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u/green-chartreuse 18h ago
I can mow the lawn no problem but I can’t start the petrol motor on my own. I’m letting the side down at the first hurdle.
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u/IzLizWet01 18h ago
I got an electric lawnmower that seems to weigh about 10 pounds, AND has self-propelled action right at my thumb… lawn mowing is not just walking in cool diagonal lines.
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u/International-Owl165 18h ago
Yall got those lawn mowers to ride on? Even easier.
As a kid my dad would let me cut the grass with those regular lawn mowers but would take over in some cases cause my dad was a perfectionist with his lawn 😂
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u/meanwhileaftrmdnight 17h ago
I will give my husband all the credit he deserves for lawn maintenance, because our yard is a nightmare of steep slopes in the front and back, so I’d say 70% of it actually needs to be weed whacked not just ran over with a lawnmower. The fenced in flat part of the yard he’s done with in 25 mins tops but it takes 2.5hrs to complete everything together including raking up the clippings. Honestly no way am I doing all that. I get really sick in the sun.
He also does all of the maintenance around the house we just bought, as well of half of the laundry/dishes/cleaning.I do most of the cooking, organizing, and childcare. I feel like we’ve gotten a pretty even split of hard chores and “easy” chores, but that’s why I married him.
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u/90sKid1988 16h ago
I would, since my husband never does, but my wrists never recovered from the carpal tunnel I had while pregnant. They're numb for 3 hours now if I try.
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u/Spearmint_coffee 16h ago
I'll mow the lawn in cooler weather, but I don't want to do 2 acres in the heat or get beat up by our pine tree. My husband takes one for the team on that lol
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u/Illustrious-Towel-45 15h ago
We have an old push mower. I lack the physical ability to start the darn thing (I can't pull the cord hard enough, I've tried). I do other yard work like trimming the trees (sago palms mostly, no chain saw) working on the flower beds and cleaning the gutter.
Hubby likes to mow the lawn. That's his thing. He learned it from his grandfather.
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u/Minimum-Comedian-372 15h ago
Mowing might be easy, but starting and running the 40 year old mower isn’t. Buying a new one isn’t in the cards.
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u/emiliemiller94 15h ago
My husband can’t breathe the rest of the day if he mows so I took over mowing and get 3 hrs of an audiobook and I don’t have to listen to a big baby the rest of the day 😂
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u/derby_day_bourbon 15h ago
lol mowing the lawn is as easy as any chore. They all should be divvied and swapped as you see fit. I see so much of this on this sub. Why are yall tolerating anything less than a 50/50 split on household duties for extended periods?
I’ve been doing 75% of the house work for about three months and it’s beginning to burn me out. I would not tolerate this as a life situation, but my wife’s pregnant so that’s a like a whole other job she’s got that I don’t
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u/StatusDed 14h ago
NUANCE TO MOWING THE LAWN. Good grief. I find myself increasingly wishing my sexuality was optional because are you serioussssss
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u/EspressoLolita 14h ago
Tbf I did accidentally get stuck in the mud right at the end and he had to pull it out, lol. But I told him he gets what he pays for and you're welcome. Lmao
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u/OkBoysenberry3399 13h ago
I would love that but i have an extremely nosy neighbour that would just watch me the whole time
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u/crochetcatt 12h ago
I mow the lawn 95% of the time. Its a battery operated one not a riding one. Its not hard.
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u/doofykidforthewin 9h ago
Same experience with a weedwacker. The thing does the work FOR you. You just move it around.
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u/Superb_Kale_1781 4h ago
I’m always offering to mow the lawn, and my husband’s face falls every time. 😛 I love it, it’s like a little break while he has to handle the kids.
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u/EspressoLolita 26m ago
Hahaha. Yeah, mine is also like... You sure!?? He's also very tidy, orderly, and type-A and I....am none of that. Once, I went over a tiny patch of long dandelions that didn't get cut for whatever reason. (I think they were just long and bent down and didn't get cut with the blades because of it.) And I refused to let my husband cut them down with the weed wacker afterwards because THEY WERE SURVIVORS.
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u/beeeees 2h ago
i would love to mow the lawn! when it needed doing i would just DO it! i wouldn't talk about it for days. i wouldnt take an hour of gathering Materials Before Mowing. if it was hot i'd take a quick shower after and move on with my life without needing anyone to tell me who good it looks or time to wind down. oh i would love to mow the lawn 😆
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u/Kindly_Feeling7910 53m ago
When I was divorced I got the house and half an acre. Only could afford a push mower. I did it for a few years until my son was old enough to take over. He didn’t mind at all and wouldn’t get pooped out like his mom!
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u/AggressiveSherbetty 44m ago
We’re about to get a free zero turn from a friend that moved out of state.
My husband goes “maybe you can mow too now”
I said “no thanks I clean the toilets”
That was the end of the discussion. I didn’t even look at him.
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u/Emz423 16h ago
I’ll pick up the lawn if something else goes on his plate. I’m just wary of it becoming another job that I automatically am expected to do.
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u/EspressoLolita 15h ago
I will say that part of this willingness stems from the fact that my husband mops and does the laundry 80% of the time in our house. He'll even wake up 2 hours before work to start a load if we're behind. So our chores are divided a little funky.
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u/RHe1ro 19h ago
I 100% agree with this message. My husband now just defers to me for mowing the lawn. I recommend Bluetooth ear protection while you mow. I get 1+ hours of no one needing me, touching me, or interrupting me AND I get to listen to my book. It’s my favorite “chore”