December 9, 2019

Cleaning Class : 5 DAILY TASKS

Welcome to Cleaning Class! For this week’s cleaning class I’m going to teach you about my DAILY TASKS. You’ll find the information in two places – here on the blog on this post and on Instagram. I’m so excited to be sharing my tips and tricks for keeping a home clean and company ready with you!

I’ll be on Instagram quite a bit this week in Stories – make sure you’re following along and turn on those notifications!

Why am I doing this in possibly the busiest month of the year? Because a little structure and routine will actually HELP your December and not hurt it – really!  I’m not talking an hours a day cleaning routine, this is a minutes-a-day routine. If you add these tasks to your 2019, you will be so ready for 2020! Ready to get started?

If you think you are too busy to do a cleaning routine, I will disagree and tell you that you’re too busy not to do a cleaning routine. Try it out this week with me and I think you’ll find that just starting with the daily tasks brings order and calm to your home. If you work outside the home and are still skeptical, read this post and come back here.

We’re only going to talk about the 5 DAILY TASKS this week – there are four components to the Clean Mama Routine and this is component #1. Learn these tasks, complete them as you can every day and you’ll be off to a wonderful start!

What are the 5 DAILY TASKS?

MAKE BEDS
CHECK FLOORS
WIPE COUNTERS
CLUTTER
LAUNDRY

These five tasks are essential to the Clean Mama Routine and the secret to getting started with your clean home.

The Daily Tasks can happen in any order that works for you, I like to make beds first and get a load of laundry started first thing in the morning and the other tasks take place throughout the day, taking just a couple minutes each to complete.

Here’s a little CLEAN acronym to help us remember the DAILY TASKS:

Craft the beds – we do this in the morning, first thing so it’s done.
Laundry – just one load from start to finish and keep it going on the daily!
Edit the clutter – easy to do during the day, just a general sweep of the house usually works!
All the counters – wipe down every night while cleaning the kitchen and peek at bathroom counters to see if they need a quick wipe down.
Notice the floors – a quick check with a broom or vacuum will keep the crumbs away.

Three Ways to Start:

1. Overwhelmed? Start with one every day for a week and add a new task every week – make beds for a week and then the add check floors to the next week, and then the third week add wipe counters to make beds and check floors, continue until you have all five tasks incorporated.
2. My preferred method is to start on a Sunday and make your bed, then on Monday, make your bed and check floors.  Then on Tuesday, make your bed, check floors, and wipe counters.  Continue through the week until you have incorporated all five DAILY TASKS.
3. If you’re used to do a cleaning routine and just want to try something different, start with all of them at once.

THE 5 DAILY TASKS EXPLAINED:

MAKE BEDS
Set the tone by making your bed daily. It will instantly make your bedrooms look more put together and in reality it takes under a minute to complete. Teach your kids to make their beds and this job is even easier. I find that by keeping the bedding simple this makes it really easy for even the youngest family members.

CHECK FLOORS
Most days I need to at least do a quick sweep of the hardwood floors on our first level. Sometimes I grab the vacuum cleaner and do a little touch up, but most of the time it’s just a quick once-over with my broom or a microfiber floor mop. My kids are in charge of crumb clean-up under the kitchen table with the broom and dustpan or the vacuum cleaner if necessary. When my kids were smaller, they loved this little broom and dustpan.

WIPE COUNTERS
I wipe the kitchen counters after each meal and I check the bathroom counters daily and give them a quick wipe if they need it. I use this method for kitchen counter clean up and keep bar mop towels in a cute jar for easy access and great wipe-down capability.

I have a little Nightly Sink Scrub ritual that entails making sure that the counters and sink are clear and then I finish it all off with a little DIY sink scrub.  People always ask why I don’t clean the kitchen in my cleaning routine and I have to chuckle because I clean it every day after each meal and then do a little sink scrub at night too.  Daily kitchen cleaning falls under WIPE COUNTERS.

CLUTTER
Clutter can be toys on the floor, stacks of mail or papers to file, or just stuff that should be put away or tossed. Some things that work for us: toss any flyers or unnecessary mail at the door, open and file any bills that need to be paid, and bins and file folders in a filing cabinet for kid papers. In our house we toss (recycle) most worksheets and keep the special artwork and papers. Clutter is different for every person and family. Every day we take care of the daily clutter by doing a quick clean up before bed and by making an effort to put things away as we are done with them. If you have a big clutter problem you could use this item on your list to get some decluttering done every day. Make a list of all your little clutter areas and then every day spend 10-15 minutes checking them off your list. For me, I use this time to sort through daily mail and papers. I need to deal with paper clutter every day to keep up with it and not let it get out of control. If you struggle with paper clutter, check out this post for how I organize paper and keep the piles away.

LAUNDRY
I do at least one load of laundry every.single.day. I know it sounds annoying and monotonous, but for me it’s the only way to stay on top of the potential piles and piles of laundry. What’s the key to making one load a day work? Actually starting AND finishing a load of laundry every day. Don’t let it pile up in a corner or on a table or couch or bed or outside the laundry room. Start and finish it. It’s a great process to master because you will have clean clothes at the ready at any time and you shouldn’t have to iron as often or at all if the clothes are put away right away. If laundry every day sounds daunting, check out this post for more ideas on Laundry Day vs. Laundry Every Day. If you have kids, check out my post on teaching them to do laundry. I am super passionate about SAFE cleaning and have found that laundry is one of the worst offenders – here’s a post about 4 simple laundry swaps if you’re interested.

Make sure you’re following along on Instagram and turn on those notifications!

Go make your bed and get started!