{something home sweet home} a simple cleaning schedule

I work long hours. Jv works long hours. We used to spend the weekends cleaning every room in the house. Then, sometimes, the weekends forgot their responsibility. But no sprites or brownies were sneaking into our city bungalow to magically make it sparkle. So this former brownie girl scout, it seemed, had to take matters into her own hands.

Solution: one schedule, one day, one room. 

Our house is small. So the solution turned out to be rather simple. And with the week nearly over, I must say it was a simple success. There's no reason we don't have time to clean one room an evening, with essentially two days {Tuesday and Saturday} to sit back and relax a bit.

Mondays we clean the powder rooms. 
This involves using my Alice's Wonder Spray on all surfaces, washing the bath mats in the laundry, freshening the towels, and organizing the medicine cabinet or closets if they need it. It also means recycling magazines that have been read and moving any items that don't belong to their rightful place.

Tuesdays we water the plants. 

Right now, all I have are the autumn mums on the front porch. Come summer, I will include watering all the herbs, flowers, and landscaping. But for now, this is almost a day off. I suggest finding a simple day like this to work into your routine to avoid burning yourself out.

Wednesdays we clean the living room. 

This involves dusting the tv, bookshelves, window ledges, side tables, and tv stand. I wish I had a more eco-friendly way of dusting, but nothing works like pledge. So I use that, the anti-allergy kind. Other than that, it's a simple room. I might involve washing the blankets if they need it or running the vacuum. But my overall plan is to vacuum one day, Saturday. Mainly because our vacuum is heavy. I also straighten any books, coasters, and frames. Oh. And I sort through mail if it's still sitting around, recycling what needs to recycled, responding to what needs response. Sometimes we need to clean the windows, too. 

Thursdays we clean the bedroom

This involves dusting and organizing the dresser and night stand tops. It also means moving any dirty laundry to the laundry room, changing the sheets and pillow cases, and hanging up any clothes in the closet that found their way to the floor or dresser top. 

Fridays we clean the dining room. 

This involves clearing off the dining room table and dusting and polishing it with pledge. I also clear off the bar, side table, and buffet. Then I restyle any dining table centerpieces and bring items to rightful places if they don't belong in the dining room. This day is fairly simple. But it needs to be done every week because we use the dining room table for too many items that don't belong. This room also needs a quick vacuum on Saturdays.

Saturdays we do laundry and vacuum. 

This means washing the towels from Monday, sheets from Thursday, and any kitchen towels already piling up. We also attempt to wash any clothing, but we can usually get by doing this every other Saturday. The only other thing left to to is to vacuum the rooms upstairs, which takes about 20 minutes.

Sundays we clean the kitchen. 

This involves decluttering the countertops and using my Alice's Wonder Spray on all surfaces--counter top, fridge, oven, and dishwasher. It also means applying my Counter Top Magic to our counters. We may also need to clean out the fridge, unload the dishwasher and load it {this one does need to be kept up others days, too}, move any items from the kitchen back to their rightful places, and scrubbing the floor. Sometimes we need to clean the windows, too. 

I hope this can bring some simplicity to your days and some sparkle to your rooms. My current cleaning supply wishlist includes a dustbuster--to not have to always carry the heavy vacuum--and some time to sew some more flannel dusting/cleaning rags.

If you have any simple cleaning tips or ideas, we'd love to hear about them in the comments.

xo
katie