Friday, December 12, 2008

Entirely Domestic

About a month ago I had a realization that I really, really needed to start treating cleaning the house like I would at a job. My first job out of college was at a spotlessly clean Montessori school where mopping the floors and cleaning toilets were just part of the day there, and I never really minded. I decided I need to adopt a similar mindset about cleaning my house by making a cleaning schedule, but I only got as far as scheduling Monday's tasks, which were cleaning the bathroom and vacuuming half the house. So every Monday for the past month I've had a clean bathroom and vacuumed first floor, but that's about it. This post is probably more for my own personal benefit than anyone else's, but here I go, here is my brand new Get It Done! cleaning schedule:

Monday: Clean upstairs bathroom, Vacuum living and dining room, sweep kitchen and foyer.
--1st Monday of every month: scrub tub

Tuesday: Vacuum stairs and hallway, Dust downstairs, wipe down coffee tables, etc.
--2nd Tuesday: vacuum furniture

Wednesday: The kitchen wipe down: Sink, counters, dish drainer, stove, fridge, microwave (inside and out)
--3rd Wednesday: clean out inside of fridge

Thursday: Sweep and mop kitchen, foyer, and bathroom. Empty bathroom and laundry trash.
--4th Thursday: dust blinds and baseboards

Friday: Pick up bedrooms, change sheets
--1st Friday: organize closet clutter, sort kids clothes

Saturday: File papers,bills, bag recycling, clean kitchen trash can

That's it. (Not including daily tasks like washing dishes and my favorite cleaning method derived from a magazine somewhere, picking up with a laundry basket--one or two rooms at a time, put everything that's out of place and walk through the house putting them back where they belong)

Next up: figuring out how to schedule some structure in my spiritual life, because with two kids, waiting for some free time to pop up just doesn't cut in anymore. Actually, it probably never did.

1 comment:

Andrea said...

I admire this list, and I will admire you even more if you are able to do it all :-)

Have you read "A Mother's Rule of Life" by Holly Pierlot? I can't remember if we've discussed it before. It tackles just the issues are talking about and is a great "new year's" read. I've read and skimmed it several times, never quite getting it all together like she writes about, but it had helped form some of my thoughts about the motherly vocation and getting it all done.

You can borrow my copy if you'd like, but it's well worth it to purchase.