Wouldn’t it be a miracle to have a mostly tidy and clean house all the time?! No. It wouldn’t. It’s not a miracle. It’s something that takes hard work and you CAN do it.
We tell our kids that a miracle is “something only God can do.” God isn’t in charge of keeping house – He made us smart enough to get it done on our own. That means IT IS ATTAINABLE! Wahoo!
A day for cleaning
Ma Ingalls cleaned on Friday – I moved my date to Tuesday based on our schedule. You can determine which day works best for you. A lot of working mamas/homeschool mamas choose to make cleaning day Saturday because everyone is home and willing to help. Whatever floats your boat is cool.
In Little House, Mary and Laura helped with Friday cleaning day. They washed and wiped dishes, swept the floor and dusted. They were trained by their mother to do these tasks and I’m sure they participated in more.
In our home this summer we called it the #summerofchores. I documented our journey on Instagram with 30 photos. If you want to check those out, you can click HERE and see them even without an Instagram account. Children CAN help you clean house – they just need to be taught, mama. It takes time to do that – but the payoff is amazing! Take the time to teach your kids to clean…you won’t be sorry.
Why one day to clean?
Sometimes people choose to spread cleaning out all over the week. I’ve even been there myself. They vacuum one day, dust another. One day they clean the toilets – another they scrub the tub. For my children, I have separated these tasks out by day, but for my bulk cleaning I choose to make it ONE day.
I’ve tried to spread it out all over the week – but for me that makes it feel like I never finish. It’s nice to have one major day to take care of everything and be done until the next week except for basic maintenance tasks (which we will cover in another post).
When to clean?
It takes me about 2 hours to REALLY clean our home. Time yourself when you are doing it one day to see how long it takes you. Then you’ll know how much time to devote to the task.
I generally start cleaning in the morning during our school time when my children are working on independent tasks. But the down and dirty cleaning (pun intended) for me happens during the afternoon. This is when I have two children down for naps and two down for quiet time.
The reasoning for doing some earlier in the day during school is so that the two rooms needed for napping are free for that need. I can clean the rest of the house freely without being in a napping room.
Just choose the time when you have a solid block of time free to get it done with minimal interruptions (you know, like poops, “emergencies,” or boo boos that need to be kissed). Always take breaks for those.
What to clean?!
I used the break down deep cleaning from Large Family Logistics, but you can break down your cleaning as needed. Based on your home, you might need different areas to clean. For example – I include the front and back porch. If you don’t have a front and back porch, this isn’t necessary for you.
Every week in each room I tackle: dusting, vacuuming, tidying, cobwebs, baseboards, and ceiling fans. Maintenance is key here – if you do this weekly the time it takes you is much less than if you wait. So, the first time you do this cleaning it might take you longer. And that’s okay – it will pay off. I promise!
Once you’ve established your routine, “deep cleaning” is rotated for us on a 5 week basis. Here is how mine is broken down:
- Bedrooms (under beds, tidy closets, clean windows and sills)
- Bathrooms (cabinet clean out, drawer clean out, scrub shower, windows and sills, mop floors)
- Hall Closet/Porches (Clean and tidy closet, sweep and spray off porches, clean out toy tub)
- Living Room (cabinet tidy, wash slipcovers, clean windows and sills, clean front door, dust mantle)
- Basement (Tidy toy room, tidy pantry, declutter toys, dust, vacuum, windows and sills)
I’m tired and hungry
Lemme tell ya – after a cleaning day, you’re going to be super tired and super hungry. That’s okay! It’s good to reward yourself with something to fill your belly after all that work. Butter. Biscuits. Meat. YUM.
I always plan a really fast meal for Cleaning Day. For me, that means I plan a pressure cooker meal. It’s my goal to have dinner DONE in 30 minutes or less.
You can find pressure cooker recipes on Pinterest. I also have this Great Food Fast pressure cooker book that I like. And make sure you check out my Pressure Cooker Tutorial on You Tube.
You could also plan a crock pot meal or just make sandwiches – my family is quite giddy over PB&J.
That’s it!
That’s what a cleaning day looks like for us. Start to finish. And it makes it super easy to quickly tidy our house for company, if needed.
Just a note – to make this more pleasurable, I usually listen to podcasts while I clean. It’s like a reward for scrubbing stuff.
How can you adjust this to make it work for your family?
See other posts in this series:
- Wash on Monday
- Bake on Wednesday
- Town on Thursday
- Office Day on Friday
- Get Ahead on Saturday
- Chores to do Daily
- Chore FAQ
- Each Day Has Its Own Proper Chores
- What Would Ma Ingalls Do?
- Embracing Your Inner June Clever
Great ideas here. Thank you! This weekend we had to quickly clean the house for company coming in an hour and with the help of two little boys, we knocked it out so quickly. I have taught my kids and they are capable. But you inspire me to get them on a good schedule…and myself!
Sometimes we work best on a tight deadline. Ha ha!
Just curious, how do you listen to podcasts with your kids around? I’ve tried, but I seem to have constant interruptions and end up missing key parts of the audio. Plus I have to touch my phone with my hands and get cleaning stuff on it. Yuck. And with headphones on, I feel like I’m going to miss hearing something my kids have just done. How do you manage it with four?
I use the LG Tone headphones. They hang around my neck and I can easily pause them with those buttons if needed. I only keep one bud in so that I can easily hear what’s going on.
I’m so glad this is Monday and n
NOT Tuesday.
Would it be possible for you to send me Last Monday?
I’ve lost it and I’m saving all these posts.
All posts are located under the blog tab any time you want to go back and read them. 🙂
I noticed you wash slip overs, and I’m wondering what kind of slip covers you have. I’m having a hard time finding slip covers that stay put.
I have the Ikea Ektorp sofas and they have slipcovers. 🙂
Do you have a copy of your cleaning sheet that you held up on your scope available to look at on here?
On a side note, I was crying from laughing at your “licks” comment. That was hilarious!
That’s just a printed daily schedule I have in my home management binder. It would vary from person to person.
And yeah – I’m still rolling my eyes at that. What on earth will Stacy say next?! Who knows. It’s a mystery.
Ok. Thanks. I just couldn’t read it well. Was trying to glean some ideas from it. ?
When the series is over, I can chat about how my daily schedule goes? Sound good?
I was just going to write and ask if you could show us your daily schedule after this series. Or, even a walk-thru of your home managment binder? Pinterest searches of homemaking binders is SCARY and overwhelming!
I’m gaining so much from this series, can’t thank you enough!
Will do, chicky.
Stacy would you do a scope on what a day generally looks like for you? We know you get up at 5:00 for your study and reflection time.
Sure thing!
Stacy, thank you so much for doing this series. I am taking your advice and moving right along with the chore list, according to the schedule you have posted. I’ll probably adjust it later, but for now my goal is to develop a good habit. My mother and grandmother did not teach me how to be a homemaker, but I am so thankful for the work you’re doing here on the blog so that we can learn.
Oh yes – adjust as needed! I’m always adjusting and tweaking mine to make it work for our current season! 🙂
I love how your lists are simple and not overly extensive (aka overwhelming!) This makes the task of home management seem much more attainable! Thanks for sharing!
P.S. I’m loving your scopes! I don’t often get to comment as I have littles crawling all over me and have to watch replays frequently, but they are wonderful! Something I look forward to daily!
Thank you, Kaitlin! Ain’t nobody got time for overwhelming stuff!
Loving this series! Tackling home management ike this is so much more digestable and take away the overwhelmed /intimidation factor!!!
I’m so glad. I didn’t want to overwhelm anyone, so I was a little worried about doing it all at once. 🙂
I’ve got to get some sort of cleaning routine down, so this is great timing. I try to keep it tidy, but am failing miserably at the deep cleaning. I may give this a try and see how it goes!
It’s easy to put deep cleaning off…ask me how I know. Ha ha!