Keeping your home clean is the quest of all mothers, stay-at-home or not. It is a quest that is defied by children, lazy husbands and rogue pets.
And yet a clean house can be attainable, even amidst a busy schedule. Here is how even the busiest moms and wives (and husbands, hint hint) can really keep a home clean.
The biggest, most important tip I can ever give you is this: constantly clean your house. Sure, it sounds exhausting but it truly is the best way to keep your house clean. Now, I do not think you should wear sweats all day and rubber gloves to clean anything, but you should keep up on your mess. If you continually work on your home, it will never reach the point of no return. But when you keep saying, “ah, I’ll clean that tomorrow…” tomorrow will turn into years and you will get yourself into a hole.
There are many different ways to continually clean your home. And different personalities relate into different cleaning styles. If you are an all or nothing kind of cleaner, give yourself a good 2-3 hours on the weekend to just knock out your entire cleaning list. Even better if you schedule it on a Saturday morning to get the help of your kids. If you are on the more organized scale, get yourself a cleaning calendar. Assign days of the week to different cleaning tasks and stick to it to ensure that your home always stays clean. My philosophy is a mix between the two: clean as I go. If I make a room messy, I should clean it up before I move onto something else. This way it never gets too overwhelming and I never end up with a sty.
The next step is to learn how to clean. Like really clean. Sure, surfacing cleaning daily is going to help your home not get messy, but some projects require a bit more time and some serious elbow grease. In addition to your daily cleaning duties (picking up clutter, doing dishes, laundry) you need to deep clean as well. Once a month swipe down your baseboards to avoid dust build up. Twice a year remove everything from your kitchen cabinets and wipe them down.
Clutter is the kryptonite of a clean home. My clutter problem seems to be in the form of paper. And it multiplies every time I turn my head.Usually my clutter comes from the mail. The easiest way to stop your mail from reproducing is to take care of it when you receive it. Pay all bills instead of waiting until later. Throw away junk mail immediately (shredded, of course) and put magazines and catalogs in the organizer. By taking care of your mail immediately, it will never take on a life of its own.
The final step is to enlist the help of your family. There is a good chance the entire family contributed to the mess, so the entire family must help clean up.