It can be difficult to ask family members to help with cleaning tasks especially when we have an agenda and they aren’t on board or don’t see the need for the agenda. I thought I’d share a couple tips for getting family members involved in cleaning especially now if you have extra family members at home and you’re struggling to stay on top of things during this uncertain time.

From my experience and from observations from others’ experiences, I have a couple ideas for you. Not everything will work for your situation but hopefully an idea or two will work for your family!

ASK FOR HELP Communicate with your family members about what you are working on and what you need. If you are frustrated with your spouse not pitching in, be specific with what you need and ask for help when you need it. This is not the time to try to do everything yourself – always, always ask for help when you need it!

TEACH DON’T TELL – This is especially important for kids and cleaning. Instead of telling your kids to clean their rooms, show them how to clean their rooms. Kids get overwhelmed easily and they might not necessarily know you mean by ‘clean your room’. Check out this post if you’re looking for how to show your kids how to clean with some age-appropriate tasks around the house that kids can do.

COMMUNICATE YOUR EXPECTATIONS – We all have ideas of what a ‘clean home’ looks like but our expectations might be different than our family members. It’s okay to negotiate and talk about what would make you feel better – a made bed? Help cleaning up after dinner? Talk about it and get it out there so you can move forward together. If you want the kitchen cleaned up immediately after dinner but your spouse likes to relax and leave the dishes until later in the evening or the next morning, instead of being resentful over that, talk about it!  Don’t assume that your spouse knows how much it bugs you.

USE A ROUTINE – Specific tasks on specific days takes the guesswork out of cleaning AND it lets family members know what the task for the day is. The Clean Mama Routine is perfect for this and I cannot tell you how many readers have reached out to me thanking me for my routine because they have specific tasks to ask for help with. Instead of saying, ‘The house is a disaster, who is going to help me clean up this garbage dump?”, you can say, “Hey, it’s Bathrooms Day – can you clean the downstairs bathroom and I’ll clean the upstairs bathroom.” See the difference?

If you haven’t downloaded the Cozi + Clean Mama app, this might be a way to share the Clean Mama Routine with your family members – you don’t need to nag, they’ll get the task sent to them via the app!

If you are new to Cozi, first visit cozi.com/clean-mama from a mobile device and install the app using the special link on that page – this is the only way to get Cozi + Clean Mama. 

If you already have Cozi, their customer support team will be able to switch your account to the Cozi + Clean Mama version. To do that, please visit cozi.com/contact-us. (If you choose to switch to the Cozi + Clean Mama version, all of your data will remain intact, and you will get the additional benefit of the Clean Mama Routine on your calendar.)

Here’s a video showing you how to assign tasks to family members in Cozi:

And a quick step-by-step of the process:

Go to the FAMILY screen

Select the CALENDAR

Go to the EVENT you want to add family members to.

 

EDIT the event

 

Select the family members that are GOING to the task

 

Select your changes to the repeating event

 

See who’s doing the events on your calendar

 

and on your HOME screen – it’s so easy!

 

To learn more about Cozi and everything you get with the Cozi + Clean Mama app, read below!

WHAT ARE THE EXTRA FEATURES OF THE COZI + CLEAN MAMA APP?

  • The Cozi + Clean Mama mobile app is simple and free.
  • The Cozi + Clean Mama mobile app includes:
    • Everything you get with Cozi, the #1 family organizing app, plus:
    • Daily Tasks from Clean Mama on your Calendar
    • Weekly Tasks from Clean Mama on your Calendar
    • Reminders for all Daily and Weekly Tasks
    • News and Updates from Clean Mama

What you get with Cozi Gold, the premium version of Cozi:

  • An ad-free experience
  • Additional premium features like Multiple Reminders, Birthday Tracker, and more.
  • All of the above, plus Clean Mama ROTATING Tasks
  • Cozi Gold is $29.99 per year

Go here to sign up!