March 8, 2021

Spring Clean with Me! Week 2 : Dusting + Wiping

WEEK 2: DUSTING + WIPING
Homekeeping Planner | Citrus Cleaning Cloth | Glass Spray Bottle with Color Coding Band

It’s Spring Clean With Me month! This is our first big week of our spring cleaning challenge and we’re going to get started with lots of dusting and wiping our homes’ most-touched surfaces. If you have any questions, feel overwhelmed or don’t know where to start, please reach out and ask me for help.  I am here to help you succeed!

I planned out my week in the Homekeeping Planner to correspond with the Weekly Tasks – I’m sharing that method with you in case you want to structure your week like that too. If you do the Clean Mama Routine you know that it’s a whole home approach – assembly line style. Instead of cleaning room by room, we tackle one task every day – Monday is Bathrooms Day, Tuesday is Dusting Day, etc. This is more efficient, it saves tons of time, and it keeps your home clean all week long.

Monday – WIPE SWITCH PLATES, WIPE DOOR KNOBS (Bathrooms Day)
Tuesday – DUST EDGES + CORNERS AT THE CEILING LEVEL + GROUND LEVEL / DUST VENTS DUST /  LIGHT FIXTURES + FANS (Dusting Day)
Wednesday – VACUUM BASEBOARDS (Vacuuming Day)
Thursday – WASH BASEBOARDS (Floor Washing Day)
Friday – CATCH UP ON ANYTHING THAT DIDN’T GET DONE (Catch-All Day)
Saturday – (Sheets + Towels Day)

Dusting + Wiping

• Get started with wiping switch plates and door knobs – I use a microfiber cloth and pour a little rubbing alcohol on it. Wipe switch plates and then wipe door knobs with your cloth, rinse and reapply if needed.
• Dust Edges + Corners at the Ceiling and Ground Levels – use a long handled duster with an extending pole and work from the top down and left to right. As long as you’re going, dust the top of the door frames too. If you feel like you are kicking up a lot of dust while you’re doing this, do a quick vacuum or if you’re doing this on Tuesday, vacuum tomorrow. If you don’t have a long handled, extending duster, you can find my favorites here or you can also put an old t-shirt over a broom and dust away.

• Dust or vacuum vents – I like using my vacuum cleaner to clean vents, you can dust them or you can also remove and wash them.
• Vacuum edges of baseboards + Wash baseboards – While you vacuum on Wednesday, take the extra time to vacuum baseboards. When you wash floors on Thursday, wash the baseboards too. Wednesday and Thursday will feel like a lot – you can definitely save some for Friday!

• Dust light fixtures and ceiling fans – use your duster to dust your light fixtures and fans. Doing this on Tuesday is going to keep all the dusting/dusty jobs on Tuesday.

How to Spring Clean When You Don’t Have Time

Spring cleaning will take time, but so does regular cleaning. It’s maintenance and when you spend a couple minutes every day doing a little bit of cleaning, it WILL save you time all week long. I know in our house, spring is when the kids’ activities start up and schedules fill up. If you want to clean or spring clean, how do you make time for it? Look at your schedule or your day and look for a couple time slots that you can move around. Think you don’t have time? Look at your phone usage and I bet you have at least 15 – 30 minutes during most days that you can spare. Think about the time you spend not as time wasted, but when you clean and declutter, you actually end up saving time in the long run and you’ll actually feel better too.

Make the time. Decide when you’ll make the time to spring clean and jot it down. Gone all day and exhausted when you get home? Choose 2-3 days a week when you’ll do a task or two before you leave for work or when you get home. Ask your family members for help. I’ve been known to pay in the form of ice cream or a special toy in exchange for help. There’s nothing magical about the days of the week – if you want to set aside Saturday mornings for the month of March and tackle the cleaning, do it. Home all day with littles, decide on what the optimal time is to get some spring cleaning done, but realize that it might not happen how you planned it. Be flexible and realistic. If you have kids of preschool age and up, make them a spring cleaning bucket (wand duster, water in a spray bottle, and a microfiber or cotton cleaning cloth) and have them help you.

Consider your mindset. Be positive and do your best and most of all, have some fun with your cleaning. Spring cleaning is time well spent – your home will be ready for spring and summer and you’ll feel better about your home. Don’t worry about how long it takes you to do the cleaning, do your best, work at your own pace, and enjoy the process.

See all the posts for the Spring Clean with Me series here.

Instead of looking at a big to-do list of all the things you don’t know when you’ll get to, think of it more as a day-to-day approach to spring cleaning. Just like the Clean Mama Routine, you’re going to think, ‘everyday a little something’. It doesn’t have to be everything but if you add a task or two every day that you can during the month of March (and April if you need to), you’ll find that you almost tricked yourself into Spring Cleaning. I love, love, love Spring Cleaning and I love sharing my tips and tricks with you. I want you to find a little joy in the process too.

Here’s your checklist to get started:

• FOLLOW: Make sure you’re following along on Instagram @cleanmama
• SUBSCRIBE: If you haven’t subscribed to the blog – you can do that by putting your name and email address in the FREE PRINTABLES PAGE
• DOWNLOAD + PRINT: Once you get the password (you only need to enter your email address in ONE time), grab the Spring Cleaning Checklist on the FREE PRINTABLES PAGE – this is what we are following for the month of March.

Want to add this list to Cozi + Clean Mama? Click the button below!

ADD TO COZI + CLEANMAMA

Don’t have the Cozi + Clean Mama app yet?  Cozi is the #1 family organizing app. Sign up for your FREE account first. Cozi + Clean Mama adds Clean Mama Daily Tasks and Clean Mama Weekly Tasks to your shared family calendar and sends automatic reminders for all tasks! Click here to find out more and download Cozi + Clean Mama. 

TELL YOUR FRIENDS: Spread the word on your social media and tag me so I can share too! Cleaning is always more fun with friends!

WATCH FOR A NEW POST EVERY MONDAY: Every Monday for the month of March I’ll lay out the plan for the week, tell you how I’m approaching Spring Cleaning and then I’ll have a post or two during each week that helps with the tasks for the week. Make sure you’re following along on Instagram for DAILY updates from the Clean Mama HQ 😉 (my house).

SPRING CLEANING IS THE MONTHLY FOCUS FOR MARCH: You can find the Monthly Focus in the Homekeeping Planner and in the Homekeeping Society subscription. If you want to work with a small group, join Homekeeping Society for the support!

SPRING CLEAN WITH ME SCHEDULE – I’ll link the posts as we go!
WEEK 1 : Prep Week + the Laundry Room
3 DIY Cleaners to Spring Clean Your Whole Home
How to Clean a Laundry Room
5 Must-Have Spring Cleaning Tools
WEEK 2 : Dusting + Wiping
How to Clean those Most-Touched Areas
WEEK 3 : Kitchen Deep Clean
WEEK 4 : Windows + Bathrooms
How to Wash Windows
WEEK 5 : Beds + Floors

NEW? START HERE!
Follow the Clean Mama Routine – if you haven’t tried the Clean Mama Routine but you want to do some spring cleaning, start with the Daily Tasks and add the spring cleaning to those OR set a timer for 15 minutes each day and do what you can. I developed and refined the Clean Mama Routine throughout the past 15-20 years – the final tweaks that you see today are what came from working 60+ hours a week, traveling for my job, starting Clean Mama, and being pregnant with our third. When the routine helped us keep our home in order during that chaotic time when the last thing I wanted to do was clean, I knew I was on to something. You’re too busy not to try it – trust me! Here’s a post that will help you figure out how to do the routine with a busy life.

As you become familiar with the Clean Mama Routine it will take less time and you’ll be building habits that will help you keep your home consistently clean. I share my Weekly Tasks every day on Instagram – follow along here: @cleanmama

You can find these downloads on the Free Printables page, go grab them if you need a full-how to:

The Clean Mama Routine is also available in the Cozi + Clean Mama app. Go here to sign up!Are you ready to get started! I’ll be back later this week with a post on my favorite DIY cleaning recipes for spring cleaning, a sale in the shop, and more!