Each evening after Maggie gives up the fight and finally succombs to sleep I sit and look at the ruins of my house. I clean up the living room, run the vacuum around the house, throw the toys back into the toy basket, and finally get the dinner dishes in the dishwasher. And then I'm done. Its all I can do to get the "public" areas of the house clean. You know, so that if somebody drops by it will "look" like I have it all under control.Don't worry about the fact that the master bedroom looks like a prime candidate for an episode of TLC's Clean Sweep and the bathroom...well, we just keep the door closed and try not to think about how badly it needs a scrub down. And the basement... Dan's the only one who goes down there.
What I'd like to know is: How do you do it? Do you have a cleaning schedule where you do a different job each day? Do you clean up throughout the day? What works for you? You'd better get the comments comin' because I need a lot of help.
12 comments:
Sounds like you and I do about the same thing my friend! :)
I can usually only get other deeper stuff done if I know somebody's coming for a visit or something and I'll be desperately embarrassed.
So I'll check back to these comments and see if anybody has advice that could help me too!!
You vacuum every night? Good for you! We need to, but are always too tired, and we have a yellow lab that contributes to the need to vacuum like you wouldn't believe (whatever inspired us to get dark colored sofas and a yellow lab I'll never figure out).
I'm a bit of a neat freak... I like the house to be picked up throughout the day. I'm leaning towards Jeremy's way of cleaning... leaving it until the end of the day no matter what sorts of disasters strike. As a general rule, we clean up before we go anywhere because I hate coming home to a messy house. Now, deep cleaning is another story. I'm what you call a surface cleaner. If you ever come to my house, dont' look too closely!
Sounds like I could get advise from you! My bedroom is terrible!!! I hate it. But when its my scrapbooking and laundry depository and my kids favorite area to sneak into and reek havoc on its just that way it is. My sister gets maids twice a week!!! That's how she dose it and my brother works his kids like slaves cleaning their house and thats how he dose it. I work like a lazy housewife to keep our common areas inhabitable! :o) Megan, you are pregnant and you are working. Translation - be nice to yourslef!!!! You are doing so good!!!! If you only realized just how amazing you are you'd give yourslef a night to eat ice cream in front of the TV and day dream about how cute your next baby will be. You'd sit there indulging in the creamy heaven before you and revel in how great you are to not only be growing a very energy zapping baby but also keeping your families world going round, and your classroom thriving in your Megan genius!
Sorry, I know this is going to sound lame because I don't have any kids so I really have no authority in this area. I am a neat freak and Darrell is in some ways. Darrell tends to hang on to things. I have a rule that if I buy something new I have to throw something away (new shirt, throw a shirt away). Darrell has at least (literally) twice as many clothes as I do, he has shoes from before his mission - but that was 10 years ago. Yesterday we had a discussion and he admitted that he holds on to things for their sentimentality. Luckly I had a brilliant light bulb moment and suggested that we buy a special album for him, take a picture of the items and let him wirte a journal spot for each item. He seemed to like that idea - especially because then he wouldn't have to try and remember everything anymore and I love it because an album takes up way less space than all of his stuff.
I was writing a comment to ask you to ignore all my typos in first comment explaining that I had written my comment and then left the computer for sometime returning to find that the kids had hit enter and sent it in its very unpolished form. :o) and then as I was typing my excuse they hit enter and another retarded comment was posted. :o) So I deleted it and now I find myself writing this :o). Anyways, please excuse my typos and my kids! :o)
Do you remember the sign that hangs in the front hall of my house? It says "Dull Women Have Immaculate Houses." It also says, "A clean house is the sign of a misspent life."
What this means is that a person who has defined herself by what she does and creates and by the people she loves and serves is far richer than a woman who has spent the same energy worrying about a neat house.
Have any of you gotten diseases from any nasty surfaces in your house? Clutter>deal with it when the kids are grown.
Besides, people who keep things geometrically orderly miss the synergy that happens in chaos - things that are accidently thrown together often inspire new ideas, new creations - and new things to write about.
So, don-worry-aboutit.
I hate having a messy house, but I also think you could spend all day cleaning and the minute your kid wakes up from his/her nap or your husband comes home, it starts all over. I try to pick up throughout the day- but boy does it get tiring sometimes!
In Relief Society they talked about "doing less" and basically spending more time on things that "matter!" So --to that I found out that if I make a goal to clean the bathrooms once a week or whatever- stick to it and don't sweat it! There are things more important than a spotless house!
Hi Megan! Remember me?
Some interesting comments here for an interesting comment. My kids are older (6,4 & 2) so the older two help. They each have a daily chore. I have a schedule that I keep on the fridge so I know what I need to do each week. I don't do laundry everyday, instead I do it twice a week. I also clean bathrooms on Wednesday, change sheets Saturday, spot mop the floor on Friday, etc. Of course, I am not nearly as on top of it as I should be.
On a different blog I was reading with a similar topic, one suggestion was once or twice a day setting a timer for 15 and working fast/hard and then being done when the timer dings. I bet we would be surprised at how much we could get done in 15 minutes!
I found you through Ginna. Tell your Mom and Dad hi for me!
Megs,
here's what I do: I only vacuum once a week, even if the floor gets dirty again. I only sweep about 2-3 times a week. If it's a good week, I clean the countertops everyday. I do laundry every other day. Then, I write in my planner deep cleaning items for the entire year:
fridge and blinds get cleaned every six months
bathrooms get cleaned every two weeks
sheets get laundered once a month
mopping gets done once a month
Since I like crossing things off my list in my planner, I'll usually get these items done sometime during the week they're written down in.
Final note: www.flylady.net
It's a really cool resource that I like to read through to get good ideas about cleaning. And after I read through it, I'm totally motivated to clean the tub that's been dingy since we moved in. Plus, when Emily posts about how she deep cleans something, it ruminates in my mind until I do the same chore myself. (keep posting, Emily!)
Also, your mom is always wiping my counter (and more) for me while I'm at work. Next time she comes up, maybe you could leave a really big list of chores on the table next to your basket of cleaning supplies. You never know what might happen while you're gone, right Meridee?
P.S. Get used to it.
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