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Thursday, January 7, 2010

More Wisdom

I hate cleaning house. Well, I actually don't hate it, I'm just really not very good at it! I'm really not! I can clean and clean and it not end up being as clean as I want it to be. But, I try!

I have posted about my cleaning acronyms before, but I thought I would post about it again in case there are any of you out there who have made a resolution to keep up with your housework better this year.

I copied this idea from a former neighbor of mine. And, honestly, it is the best system I have been able to come up with.

I do the following jobs on the following days ...

Monday ~ Mounds of Laundry and Mop it Monday. I do all of my laundry from the weekend and sweep, vacuum and mop my stained concrete floors.

Tuesday ~ Toilets Tuesday. I clean all of the bathrooms.

Wednesday ~ Wipe it Wednesday. I do all of my dusting and extensive kitchen counter disinfecting.

Thursday ~ Tidy up Thursday. I move all of the piles to their respective homes. And, I also use this day to catch up on anything I haven't gotten to earlier in the week (which happens all the time!)

Friday ~ Finish up Laundry and Floors Friday. I basically redo Monday, except I don't mop the floors usually.

This schedule is great for a couple of reasons. If I miss a day, I have Thursday to catch up, or I can really just skip it and pick it back up the next week. Two weeks without cleaning toilets isn't tragic! And, this schedule keeps the house pretty clean all the time so it doesn't get to the point of being disgusting and necessitating a full house purge and clean (although that still happens sometimes.) If we have company coming (like my mom) then the power cleaning isn't nearly as bad.

Another tip: I have a basket that I keep at the bottom of my stairs. As I find things all day long that need to go back upstairs, I toss it in the basket. Then at the end of the day I can carry the basket upstairs and deposit things where they go. (Then while I'm upstairs making that deposit, I can pick up all of the things that are supposed to be downstairs and carry them down to put them away.)

Lastly, there is a really great blog called Home Sanctuary. Rachel Anne has daily tasks that are worth points. You are on an honor system to keep track of your points and then you give her your total at the end of the month. She has monthly contests for great prizes! Her tasks are typically those "extra" things you don't regularly do, and she has cute inspirational stories that go with them. It's sure worth trying out, and I'm going to jump back in this year!

So, there's some housecleaning wisdom for you from someone who stinks at cleaning. So take it with a grain of salt!

6 comments:

  1. great list it is similar to how i do it too :) thanks for the link to the site off to check it out

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  2. I think we must be a lot alike. I'm such a neat freak (and totally type-A!) I have a very similar schedule: Mon-dust & laundry, Tues-vacuum & sweep, Wed-baths & kitchen, Thurs-catchup, Fri-mop & laundry. However, I'm usually going nuts on Thursday bc everything looks dusty again.

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  3. Thanks for the link! I don't really make a New Year's resolution but I do want to be better about cleaning & organizing this year. My personality is way too laid back to be a neat freak. I do prefer to have things clean & put away but I can live with clutter too.

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  4. I might have to adopt this schedule. I liked it last year when you posted it and didn't do anything with it. Now's the year!!

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  5. Cute way to remember what to do. I too follow Home Sanctuary and have never actually kept up with points, this year I will. I love her blog.

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  6. I like this. I like this A LOT! I am so going to write this down right now and start it next week. I need all the help I can get in this department:)

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