Let Someone Else Do It

By: Brooke Strickland

The laundry is all over the house, your kids are screaming, dinner is not even close to being made, and you just stubbed your toe on your daughter’s Barbie doll. Sound familiar? It’s no secret that running and maintaining a household is a lot of work. There may be days that you feel as if all you do is cook, or that you could fold laundry for two years and still never be done with it.

Maybe all you need is a push in the right direction—some tools that will help you organize your life and help ease the load. Well, we’ve got it all for you. Whether you need meals, a housecleaner, drop-in childcare, or a professional organizer, there are lots of choices in the Portland area that will help give you a much-deserved break.

Cook for me.

Sometimes the last thing you want to do at the end of a long day is cook dinner. Well, you’re in luck. We have options. SoupCycle is a nifty subscription service that brings organic and local soup, salad, and bread to your doorstep by bike every week. All you have to do is sign up, pick your favorite soups, and place your order. Check out the website to see if you’re in the delivery area. Another local option for dinner delivered to your door is What’s For Dinner?—a delivery service that gives you more than 300 dishes to choose from, with no weekly commitment. You can order your selections online and on the day you choose; they will arrive in freezer-to-oven containers. Even better: if you want to plan ahead, the meals can be kept in the freezer for up to three months. Bon appétit!

Clean for me.

We’re pretty sure that laundry and cleaning the house is usually the least favorite part of running a home. When we polled our Portland Family audience on Facebook, a lot of you responded that if you could have someone clean the house, your life would reach new levels of happiness. There are hundreds of options for housekeeping service, including Merry Maids and Maid Brigade, but we were particularly impressed in reading about Mr. Maid, a company that specializes in heavy work. Want someone to clean out air ducts, move furniture, clean your carpets, power-wash your house, or clean your crawl space? These guys do it all, and they do it well. Or maybe you’re just about ready to bury yourself in the piles of laundry that are littering your house. Check out City Dry Cleaner, an eco-friendly dry cleaner that offers free pickup of your garments and then returns them clean and pressed, in a personalized bag. It gets even better, though. The company has partnered with European Master Tailor, which allows them to provide tailor and clothing alterations. Sounds like a dream come true, huh?

Shop for me.

For some of you, grocery shopping is a way to get out of the chaos at home. But for others, you might as well have someone strap you to the cart and drag you through the store. Well, online grocery shopping surely isn’t a new concept, but it’s catching on with more and more people. Safeway offers free delivery on your first order, and New Seasons lets you shop online and then pick up your food at the store. Another local addition to the online grocery-shopping world is Organics To You, which lets you pick fresh, locally farmed organic produce for delivery to your home in trucks running on biodiesel. These guys embody sustainability and convenience.

Organize for me.

With shows like Hoarders on television these days, professional organizers are making a pretty big name for themselves, as they should be. These expert planners have a gift for putting systems in place for successful time and space management, and they’re gifted in helping other people manage the stuff they have accumulated. We spoke with Missy Gerber at Organizers Northwest, a company that employs consultants to help people move forward with their projects. Their team can help you get more focused, productive and organized, both at home and at work. If you have bills and papers strewn about, a garage stacked high with keepsakes that you need to go through, or a closet full of clothes that you want to donate, professional organizers are your friends.

Plan for me.

For new parents or parents to be, a baby planner might be just what you need. Itsabelly Baby Planners offers useful services that include baby-proofing, research into which nannies or daycares are the most recommended, nursery design, and baby registry completion. This is a great way to ease the transition into parenthood a little bit and get some helpful tools for the journey. If financially planning for the future is something you need help with, there are a lot of financial planners in the area that are trained to organize your budget and help you plan for your retirement. Places like Edward Jones, Morgan Stanley, or your community credit union are great places to start.

Babysit for me.

On the go and don’t want to drag your kids to a dozen places with you? WeVillage, in the Pearl District, provides drop ‘n’ go child care for affordable hourly rates. Maybe you are in desperate need of a date night—WeVillage offers childcare until midnight on Fridays and Saturdays. If you’re going out of town for a night and want to leave the kids at home, who do you call? Northwest Nannies Childcare Services, a service that’s been around since 1985, brings an in-home care specialist to your home to care for your kids for an affordable 24-hour sleepover rate. Pretty cool, huh?

Take care of my pet for me.

Maybe Fluffy and Fido are contributing to the chaos in your house. Hire a dog walker. Hot Diggity! Is a daily dog-walking service that lets your pet flex its muscles, play, and get some personal attention while you’re busy with other errands or at work. Or maybe your dog has some unmanageable hair and you simply don’t have the time to take him to the groomer. Take advantage of the genius idea of mobile pet grooming. Wash ‘n Roll Mobile Pet Grooming will come to your house, bathe your dog, clean its ears, cut its nails, and trim its hair. Now you don’t have to sit in traffic or try to wrangle a muddy, hairy dog to the groomers.

Landscape for me.

Mowing your lawn and weeding the flowerbeds are just two more things that pile up on your to-do list. If you’d rather have someone come out and cut your grass, plant flowers, pour bark dust, or build a retaining wall, there are lots of local landscapers and lawn maintenance service providers out there just waiting to get their hands on your yard. Make sure you work with a licensed and bonded company that has some reputable experience—after all, your yard often creates the first impression for guests visiting your house.

Finish projects for me.

Do you have some bathroom trim that needs to be touched up with paint? Maybe you’re selling your house and you need someone to help you around with the house with little repairs before you list it. Or maybe you just need someone to clean out your gutters, hang a cabinet, or touch up some trim in your bathroom. Well, consider the job done with RedVan Handyman. We’re pretty sure this service will be useful for anything you need completed around your home or yard. RedVan usually charges by the hour, but for larger jobs they will bid on with a fixed price.

A lifelong resident of the Pacific Northwest, Brooke Strickland is a freelance writer and editor. When she’s not writing, Brooke can be found in a comfortable chair with a book, or on the Oregon coast with her newborn daughter, husband, and two dogs.