I will tell you that Millies was very high maintainence in the very begining. I wanted her 100% housebroken so I did the work required. I can tell you that it does get better, the older they get. However, Millie will still wake up in the middle of the night (about 2am) and want to go outside to potty. I usually have to get up myself anyway to go at least once in the night, so we both do our potties and go back to bed. (I think this may be a forever thing, but I can live with it and yes both my husband and I work all day, so my rest is important, but for me waking up once a night is no big deal.) On weekends, I wake up at 2am to do our potties and my husband wakes up at 5:30am (our usual waking up time for work-week) takes Millie to potty again, because she is just used to going at that time during the week) and back to bed until 7:30 -8:00am.
As far as potty training I would recommend the following:
Make their stay-at-home-by-themselves area smaller. The kitchen may be too big (for now) until you get them potty trained.
1. You can either x-pen them which allows just enough room for their bed, crate, food and water bowl (although, I would not recommend leaving water or food out when you are not there, if you can limit their intake you can limit the out-take, if you know what I mean) toys and peepads. I would peepad in any empty area in their confined area. That way, no matter where they potty, it will be on the peepad. At some point, when they begin to perfer a pee spot over another, you can start eliminating peepads until you have only one or two left and they are using them consistently. If they start going potty in "non-peepad" areas again, you have removed the pads too quickly and you will have to put them back and start again.
2. Or you can crate them during the day when you are not there. (I did this with Millie) Make the space in the crate only big enough to turn around and laydown. No more room than that. They should be able to hold their potty until you get home, if you are getting home between 8 and 9 hours later. I don't think they can hold it much longer than that. No food or water during the day, when you are not there. (however, if using this method, I would not crate them during the evening when you get home. If you need to contain them, because you are busy and cannot watch them, then you should confine them in the x-pen. Make sure there is just enought room in the xpen for their food and water bowls, toys, bed and crate (with door open). I would not put a peepad in there. They should hold their potty until you take them out. (so make sure, they have just gone potty before you put them in there and take them to go potty when you take them out)
Make sure the x-pen and crate are in an area of the house that gets a lot of traffic, so the puppies feel part of the family interaction, when you leave them in there when you are home.
I would also designate one area and one area only for the peepads. I would take them to this area every 1-2 hours while you are home. and make sure you give them the potty command and praise and treat when they go.
I would NOT give them free range of the house. Keep them contained in one room at a time and it should be the room you are in so that you can keep your eye on them. Someone, (husband or you) should never take your eyes off them while they are out of the xpen or the crate. If you are taking them to the potty area regularly, there should be few times they will need to go outside of their schedule, but if you keep your ever vigiliant eyes on them, when they start to squat you can pick them up immediately and take them to the potty area. The whole objective is to make more correct behaviors then incorrect ones. You are establishing a habit for them to potty on pads, not the rest of the house. But if you allow mistakes, then you are unconsciously establishing a habit for them to go where ever they want. So remember, you want almost 99.9% correct behavior and the only way to acheive this is to watch them at all times, or confine them when you cannot.
When you are home, you don't need to keep them in the crate or x-pen alot. Only when both you and your husband are unable to watch them. Since they have been confined all day, they do need the time with you and outside the crate/pen. They also need to practise good potty behavior.
It is a massive amount of work and requires ALL your attention when you are home. I know how tired you are when you come home and you just want to sit and relax, but until they are potty trained, you are not going to be able to. However, I can tell you that once they get reliably potty trained and you start introducing more rooms in your house and they can start being more independent, you are going to enjoy them more and more. Millie was really less work about about 8 months to 1 year old. She was reliably potty trained about 6 1/2 months old. It has only been recently (she will be 2 years old in April) that we have allowed her out of the crate at night and into our beds or her pillow bed on the floor next to our bed. She is doing great!
It's all about serious restrictions of what they are allowed to do with lifting of those restrictions (a little at a time) as the earn it with proper behavior.