Time management for cleaning

As you know from my previous cleaning posts I like to chip away at my cleaning and do a little each day. From reading and watching lots of vlogs from mothers sharing how they manage to have a clean house, I realised that the time of day that you tackle jobs is so important.

This was a lightbulb moment for me and suddenly everything fell into place and I started to make progress with my house rather than feeling like at best I was treading water and at worse drowning.

I know it sounds silly but which time you choose to put your dishwasher on can be make or break. You need to put your dishwasher on at a time that works for you to avoid dirty dishes piling up by the sink. For me this time is straight after dinner or while dinner is cooking if I know there isn’t any room for the plates. As soon as it has finished I empty the dishwasher and load up the dirty dishes if I have any. This means when we get up in the morning after breakfast is finished, the bowls can go straight into the dishwasher and I don’t start the day with a stack of dirty crockery. For a while I used to put the dishwasher on last thing before going to bed but never found time to empty it in the morning. So the clean dishes would remain in the dishwasher until I got home from work and the dirty dishes continued to pile up on the side and when I did get around to changing it all over I had more dirty things than I had space for.

My new rule is that I don’t start a task unless I know that I can finish it. Before I implemented this rule I would bring down the bins upstairs and empty them and leave them at the bottom of the stairs to go back up. I would bring down a load of washing and place it on the floor outside the washing machine to go in after the other load had finished. I would take the washing off of the airers and pile it on the table to be put away later.

All of the above did two things to my motivation. One – I never felt like I was completing anything as there were always half completed jobs all around me, which was really demoralising. Two – My house always looked messy because there was stuff out everywhere, just waiting. I also didn’t feel like tackling any of the jobs as it was all a bit overwhelming and so the pile of washing on my kitchen floor would sit there all day. It was all so counterproductive.

Once I decided to be realistic about the amount I could do in one day everything changed. My washing basket for example is emptier now than it has been in a long time. There are no piles of clean clothes waiting to go away as I wash and dry them when I know that I will be able to put them away after. I know you are thinking but if I wait until I have the time I will never start the washing and will have nothing to wear. I was worried about that as well. However, when your clothes are running low then washing becomes a priority. When something is a priority it happens. It happens because you have the space and time to do it because you aren’t half finishing a million other jobs at the same time. Better to do one job and see it through than be surrounded by a load of half-finished jobs. Psychologically this way makes you feel better and because you feel better about it you end up doing more.

It’s a bit like the theory behind ten minutes of exercise a day is better for you than an hour a day. Ten minutes seems doable so you start it. Once you’ve started it, you realise that you actually like exercising and may even do more than ten minutes because actually the problem was the getting started. Whereas, if you have to find an hour of time you come up with a lot of excuses as to why it is impossible to do an hour of exercise and so you end up doing none at all.

When you feel a sense of accomplishment by completing a job, you are then more likely to start and finish another job. Before you know it you’ve completed way more in a day than when you look at a long to do list.

I read a tip in Good house keeping that I have found really useful. It was to clean by type and not by room. For example if you are going to hoover, hoover the whole house. If you are dusting, dust the whole house. Since doing my cleaning this way I have found that I do more jobs and the house looks cleaner and tidier and I achieve more in a week than when I clean room by room.

Of course there will be weeks when your house looks better than others. I like to remember the quote “those who matter don’t mind and those who mind don’t matter”. It’s true if you are only coming to my house to judge how clean it is then you really don’t matter to me and aren’t the kind of person I want to be friends with. If you are my true friend then you come to see me and understand the struggle of working, raising kids and trying to keep the house clean and tidy and really aren’t bothered by the mess.

Above all on their death bed I’m sure no one said I wish I spent more time cleaning my house and less time playing with my kids. And if they did I feel sorry for them not living their life to the full and realising what is really important.