{"id":19078,"date":"2015-11-08T22:00:52","date_gmt":"2015-11-09T03:00:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/home-management\/?p=19078"},"modified":"2018-10-15T12:48:31","modified_gmt":"2018-10-15T16:48:31","slug":"find-a-cleaning-schedule-that-works-for-you","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/home-management\/find-a-cleaning-schedule-that-works-for-you\/","title":{"rendered":"Find a Cleaning Schedule That Works for You"},"content":{"rendered":"

Having shared some of the messy spots in my house<\/a> last month, it probably won’t come as a shock when I admit that I have struggled with cleaning my home for my entire adult life.\u00a0 One of my biggest stumbling blocks, which may also plague you, was that I just couldn’t find the right system for keeping my house clean.<\/p>\n

\"If<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

I think, however, I have finally figured out this house cleaning stuff, and I’ll share some tips with those of you that also struggle with keeping your home clean.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

My Most Important Discovery<\/h3>\n

I have tried many systems (too many!) for housekeeping.\u00a0 From ones that made me put on shoes in the morning to ones with lots of check boxes, from special apps for my iPhone to free downloads from sites — you name it, I may have tried it.\u00a0 Each would go fine for a while, and then I’d fall off the wagon.\u00a0 I couldn’t understand why I was always failing.<\/p>\n

Then, I finally figured out that I couldn’t use a schedule that somebody else has written.<\/strong> I needed to take the time to write out my schedule, with a mind toward tasks that were applicable to our household, as well as to the general schedule of our days.<\/p>\n

This is not to say that you can’t get inspiration from the schedules of others, but you will probably be best off to create your own after you’ve gathered the inspiration.\u00a0 I have set up a Cleaning Schedules <\/em>board on Pinterest<\/a>, which I will keep adding to, that you can browse for inspiration.<\/p>\n

Establish a Schedule (or Routine)<\/h3>\n

House cleaning is best kept up with when you are following some type of routine or schedule.\u00a0 It’s not be chance that homemakers used to have tasks assigned to certain days, such as washing day.\u00a0 In general, we tend to work best with routines.\u00a0 If you can get into the habit of each Monday being the day you clean the bathrooms, then you will have more of a tendency to keep those bathrooms clean.<\/p>\n

When I was recently trying to come up with a cleaning routine, this is what worked for me:<\/strong><\/p>\n

1. Write out a complete list of household tasks that must be done each week.<\/strong> Don’t get caught up in things that need to be done less often at this point.<\/p>\n

2. Write down obligations<\/strong> that you typically have throughout the week that are reoccurring.<\/p>\n

3. Assign your household tasks to specific days<\/strong>, taking care to put more time consuming items on days when you have less reoccurring obligations.\u00a0 For instance, in our household, we have our homeschool co-op and ballet lessons on the same day.\u00a0 This is a day, then, when I purposefully have assigned myself fewer household tasks.<\/p>\n

Keep in mind: Some tasks may have to happen every single day or multiple times in a week.\u00a0 On my schedule, I have loading\/unloading the dishwasher listed each day.<\/em><\/p>\n

Find a Way to Display Your Schedule<\/h3>\n

I’m going to go out on a limb and guess that if you struggle with housekeeping, you’re also the kind of person who benefits from visual aids.\u00a0 So, your next step is going to be to find a way to display your weekly schedule.<\/p>\n

Examples of Ways to Display Your Schedule:<\/strong><\/p>\n

1. Laminate papers with your schedule on them so you will be able to cross items off with a dry erase marker.\u00a0 (I used my personal laminator<\/a> for this, that way if I make changes later, it will be easy to just laminate a new page.)\u00a0 I have a separate sheet for each day of the week, because I also have school and work tasks on each page.<\/p>\n

2. Frame your schedule and use a dry erase marker right on the glass.<\/p>\n

3. Create your own printable daily or weekly schedule, and just print a new one up each day\/week.<\/p>\n

4. Write out tasks on index cards and set out the appropriate index card(s) prior to going to bed the night before.<\/p>\n

Follow Your Schedule<\/h3>\n

Now that you have a schedule, it’s time to start following it!\u00a0 Be gentle with yourself, and allow yourself some time to ease into it, especially if you haven’t been regularly following a cleaning schedule.<\/p>\n

Remember, also, that this is your schedule<\/em><\/strong>.\u00a0 Do you know what that means?\u00a0 Amongst other things, it means that you don’t have to be beholden to it.\u00a0 You are its creator.\u00a0 If something isn’t working, just know that you can change the schedule instead of abandoning it.<\/p>\n

What are things that you do to help you with your cleaning routine?\u00a0 Which tasks are typically included in your routine?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Angie, a contributing writer at The Happy Housewife, is a homeschooling mom to three children and writes about everything that happens in their lives between all the loads of laundry at Many Little Blessings<\/a>. She is also the founder of The Homeschool Classroom<\/a>, Catholic Mothers Online<\/a>, Tiny Owl Designs, and Just a Tiny Owl<\/a> {Etsy shop}.<\/em><\/p>\n

photo credit<\/a>
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Having shared some of the messy spots in my house last month, it probably won’t come as a shock when I admit that I have struggled with cleaning my home for my entire adult life.\u00a0 One of my biggest stumbling blocks, which may also plague you, was that I just couldn’t find the right system […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":19079,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[2555],"class_list":{"0":"post-19078","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tips-and-tricks","8":"tag-cleaning","9":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/home-management\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19078","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/home-management\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/home-management\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/home-management\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/home-management\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19078"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/home-management\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19078\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":31810,"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/home-management\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19078\/revisions\/31810"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/home-management\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19079"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/home-management\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19078"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/home-management\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19078"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/home-management\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19078"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}