Keeping Clean

As a stay-at-home mom, my entire job is loving and caring for my kiddos (one of whom is in school, but also high energy, and the other who hopefully starts preschool next year, assuming she can be potty trained this year), and keeping the house clean. Now, of course, all day is a long time to keep a house clean, and by myself I'm not very messy, but between a toddler that adores scattering books and toys everywhere, a boy who can't be bothered to put things in their place, and a husband that seems to have no concept of the idea of not using every dish in the house when he cooks, or where the hamper is, or putting things back where he got them, it's often a lot of work. A couple of years ago, I just had the worst time trying to figure out how to get myself in order and have the house in such a state that it wasn't a messy, overwhelming shock all the time. I didn't like doing giant cleaning days; they were too much. But I couldn't figure out a system of my own, so naturally, I went on Pinterest to find a cleaning schedule, and I came across this weekly schedule, and this monthly schedule, also pictured below. (I know in the second link, she has a daily schedule there too, and by all means, try that if you like it better.)

So on Fridays and Saturdays, depending on what's going on and what the rest of my month looks like, I might pick a couple of tasks from the monthly cleaning schedule to accomplish. I've added a few other personal needs, such as bleaching my toddler's sippy cups and the kitchen scrub brushes, cleaning up the basement, and a few other assorted tasks. There was a time when I had both schedules printed and posted on my bulletin board, but ended up not being able to keep with it; I need the satisfaction of actually checking an item off. So I ended up moving them, the whole schedule, to my bullet journal, which of course will be another topic in this blog for another day.

The thing I like best about these schedules is that they've become reliable and they're still quite easy to manage. I know on Mondays that I am going to be cleaning the kitchen. I know that means that my fridge will get cleaned out, and my appliances will be wiped down, my floors will be vacuumed and mopped. I know on Tuesdays my bathroom will be cleaned, which means the two rooms in the house that use towels will now be cleaned and I can run a load of towels without worrying that I'm running a towel load too soon. On Wednesdays I clean all 3 bedrooms, which is one of my favorite days; E's books are all put away and her kitchen is back in order, and therefore her floor gets vacuumed and the whole room looks like an adorable girly wonderland. J's room is cleaned up and vacuumed, deodorized (he is a boy, after all) and freshened up. And my favorite place of all to clean, my room. Normally it's the easiest because I never let it become a sty, but my room is my zen. It's full of my hobbies and comforts, it's fun to occasionally (or frequently) rearrange and organize. I love the look and feeling of a clean bedroom, where everything is as it should be. The hallways outside the bedrooms get vacuumed as well. And then on Thursdays I attack the living room, just in time to have it clean (at the beginning, at least) for the the weekend. Everything is put into it's place, vacuumed, dusted, and it looks like civilized people live here....until J gets home from school at least. And because I focus on a room a day, that means when some things get out of order during the other days of the week, it's not a huge effort to clean. It means when I'm sick, or caring for a sickie, or we have a party, it's not a huge issue to get done what needs to get done. It's easy to catch up when everyone's healthy, and it's easy to focus on finer details and polishing when we're expecting company. It's easier to care for my family when I'm not stressing out over things that constantly. Keep your house functional, folks!

If you need a reminder, watch Hoarders. OKAY I'M JOKING. Kinda. I do watch Hoarders and the purge the heck outta my house.