How to Keep Your House Clean Enough to Avoid Embarrassment

It can be a challenge to keep your house clean. With kids, pets, and work to manage, housekeeping is often the first thing to slide when things get hectic. When that happens, unexpected company is almost guaranteed to show up. Here are some tips to keep your house clean enough to avoid embarrassment, no matter how crazy your days are:

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Instructions

1. Pick up after yourself. This is the single, most important thing that you can do to have a cleaner house. If you put everything back where it belongs and toss your trash all day long you will have virtually nothing to pick up at the end of the day.

2. Eat every meal in the kitchen. This is especially important if you have kids. It's a lot faster to clean up the kitchen table than it is to scrub oatmeal off the couch and spaghetti out of the carpet.

3. Vacuum or sweep every single day. If the floors in your main living area are clean you've won half the battle. It doesn't have to be perfect, just aim to get the worst of the mess up.

4. Wipe down your bathroom everyday. If you have more than one, then at least make sure the bathroom that guests use is neat and tidy. Wipe down the counters with a damp cloth, swish the toilet, and put out a clean hand towel.

5. Tidy each room once a day. This should take no more than 15 minutes. Go through each room quickly picking things up, putting things away and wiping up any messes that you find.

6. Put your laundry away as soon as it's dry. This will save you so much time in the long run because you'll know where everything is and you won't have to iron it before you wear it.

7. Clean up the kitchen before you go to bed. Put all food scraps in one container to dispose of, then pile the dishes either in the sink or load into the dishwasher. When they have been washed or the dish washer is running wipe down the table, counters, and stove with a damp rag. It's so much easier to clean up before the food dries and it's wonderful to wake up to a clean kitchen.

Tips & Warnings

• If you notice something lying around where it shouldn't be, take it with you to put away the next time you are headed in that direction.
• Encourage your family members to pick up after themselves as well. Gentle reminders tend to work better than nagging.
• Don't look for the perfect system or schedule to make sure your house stays clean. The only way to keep it clean enough to avoid embarrassment is to actually clean up your messes.

[djackman]

on 10/23/2009 housekeeping is essential but these tricks help 5*

[centexmom]

on 7/6/2009 Great article!