How to Simplify Cleaning Your Home

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By Amanda C. Strosahl
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Simplify Cleaning Your Home

Even if we are intent on keeping a clean house, longer work hours and busier schedules make it very difficult to keep up with everything or make us too tired to think about cleaning. How do we fit it all in and still have time to rest, relax and have fun? The key is to have a good schedule and do a little at a time.

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

A list of priorities
A schedule

Step 1

Figure out your priorities:

Decide what you need to keep clean in your house. Do you or your family members suffer from allergies to dust or pet dander? Do you have young children that drop and spill things at an alarming rate? Are you a messy cook? Do you have ’dump and go’ family members who leave a trail of shoes, coats and books in their wake? Find your problem areas and focus on them, then let the other things fall into place around them.
Step 2

Plan a daily schedule around your priorities:

At my house, our problem areas are dust and pet allergies and my less than tidy husband. Taking those aspects of home life into account, my daily routine looks like this:

Morning -
Make my bed (mom drilled it into me)
Feather dust the main rooms of the house
Vacuum the main areas of the house
Clean the bathroom sink and toilet
Wipe the bathroom floor with a baby wipe

Evening -
Spray and wipe the kitchen countertops and table
Spot clean the cabinet and refrigerator doors
Make a quick run through the house and put away anything that is out of place
Scoop out the cat’s litter box

The morning cleaning takes me about 10-15 minutes. The evening cleaning takes about 5-15 minutes, depending on what my husband was up to that particular day.

Whatever you decide, always try to include keeping the major surfaces and fixtures of the kitchen and bathroom clean. The health of your family depends on it.
Step 3

Focus on one room per week for deeper cleaning:

Rotate the rooms of your house so you only worry about one per week. Set a schedule that takes each room in order or one that alternates between your most used room and others (kitchen, bedroom, kitchen, living room, kitchen, etc.)

Once you have your rotation schedule, you need to decide what type of personality you have: 'Get it done' or 'Spread it out.'

The 'Get it done' person will jump in and do the entire room in one day, that way they have the rest of the week free for whatever.

The 'Spread it out' person will do pieces of the room each day: Wash the windows one day, polish the furniture another, vacuum in the corners the day after that.

For those who find themselves procrastinating because they do not want to spend hours cleaning, the 'spread it out' philosophy is better. Set yourself a goal of cleaning for 10-15 minutes, do your scheduled task for that day, then get on with your life.

Either way you decide to do it, you will have one sparkling clean room to enjoy each week.
Step 4

Tackle the big tasks a little at a time:

If you have a room that is completely overwhelming, such a garage, storage room or office that collects everything, tackle it one of two ways: 30 items at a time or 10 minutes at a time.

The 30 items method works better for my husband. He will sort through 30 items, whether they are socks that need to be tossed into the wash or pieces of paper that have to be filed.

I like the 10 minutes at a time. I will set the timer or choose two or three songs on a CD and see how much I can get done during that time.

Both methods set a limit that makes the job easier to handle emotionally, as you are giving yourself permission to walk away once you have reached the reasonable goal. It may take a few days (or weeks) to finish the job, but it will eventually get done. In the mean time, you'll see progress each day that will inspire you to continue the project the next day.