Here are the daily tasks –
Tonight and every night hereafter –
No matter how tired you are, don’t leave a sink full of dishes and overflowing garbage to great you first thing in the morning. How depressing is that? Not the way we want to start our day.
Try to do the dishes immediately after dinner. If your kids are old enough, it’s time to integrate good habits into their lives. Delegate clearing the table, putting away the condiments and leftovers, rinsing the dishes and putting them in the dishwasher. My daughter is a mini clean freak in training. She actually takes pride in keeping things clean.
But help or not – No matter how tired you are, do the simple daily tasks before going to bed.
This only takes a few minutes, and it will give you a much better start tomorrow. Get into this habit starting tonight.
You will thank yourself in the morning.
Clear the kitchen sink every night. Wipe down the stove. Wipe down counters. Total time- up to a half hour depending on how big a mess you made making dinner, and if you don’t have a dishwasher like me.
Keep clothes picked up. Total time- seconds.
Keep mail and papers picked up. Total time depends on the amount of mail and paper coming into your house.
Squeegee or spray shower/tub walls with shower spray. This should be the responsibility of the last person out of the shower. Total time- 30 seconds. It works best if the shower or tub is already clean before you start this maintenance step.
Wipe down bathroom counter(s). I do this every night on my way to bed. Sometimes I do a quick once over in the morning too. Total time- 30 seconds.
Try to do a load of laundry daily – all the way through, folded and put away. Come on …you can do this during commercials. The laundry pretty much washes and dries itself. Folding it and putting it away really only takes 10 minutes or so.
2X Week:
Take out garbage and newspapers as needed.
Water plants.
Quick feather dust as needed.
Weekly: Monday
Dust. Start at the highest point. Feather dust ceiling fans, window treatments, blinds, wall pictures and art, silk plants, and window sills.
Make sure to wipe or feather dust picture frames. Clean glass and mirrors as needed. Often you can get away with a feather dust or a quick wipe with a dry rag. Don’t forget to check doors, corners, and light switches for dust, cob-webs, fingerprints and smears.
Clean wood furniture with Pledge sprayed on the cloth, not on the furniture. The spray polish, not the oil. The oil builds up and dirt actually sticks to it. If you like oil, use Weiman’s or one of the other lemon oils sparingly. The orange oils are too heavy. Endust also does an OK job.
If you have many different surfaces in your home, you can use the Pledge Multi-Surface Cleaner. It does a decent job, and its faster than having to change out cleaners.
Pro-Tip– The Swifter tools do a nice job, but they cost a lot and are not environmentally friendly. I have found the other dusting wipes to be a total waste of money. Cut up t-shirts are still a great tool, and a great bargain. Don’t use cut up towels for dusting. They leave behind too much lint.
When my schedule allows, I like to treat myself to a clean bed on Monday night. Change sheets and spray pillows and mattress with FeBreeze to freshen. To save time, tear the sheets off, wash and dry them, and put them right back on. Then you don’t have to spend time folding sheets, and you don’t have piles of dirty sheets laying around.
Ahhhh, Well Done!
Weekly: Tuesday
Kitchen –
Check light fixture and ceiling fan.
Clean stove. Either throw the grills and drip pans into the dishwasher, or soak pieces in warm water with Dawn to loosen grease and stuck on food. (Oh! There isn’t any cuz you’ve been good and wiped them down every night? Cool!)
Glass top – use glass top cleaner and buff well.
Don’t forget to clean under the knobs!
Wipe refrigerator, range-hood, microwave (inside and out) and cabinet fronts.
Clean all counters, move objects and appliances and clean behind and under.
Unplug the toaster. Dump crumbs out of toaster. Wipe outside. Plug it back in when dry.
Wipe outside and rinse out garbage can.
Clean sink with Soft Scrub.
I know it sounds like a lot, but honestly it only takes one person about a half hour to clean a client kitchen after 2 weeks. Since you’ve been keeping up with it, its a breeze – isn’t it?
Pro-Tip– Finish by wiping everything down with glass cleaner to make it shine.
Pro-Tip- Shine chrome with rubbing alcohol.
Empty Fridge –
You can either do this on kitchen clean day, or garbage day. Empty out all the leftovers over 2 or 3 days old, fruits and veggies done bad, and expired foods. Wipe shelves and bins as needed.
Take Inventory –
This is also a good day to do inventory and make your shopping lists since in most areas the sale papers arrive on Tuesday or Wednesday.
If you order online, gather your lists, order groceries, household items and office supplies.
Weekly: Wednesday
Bathrooms
Feather dust lights, window and treatment, fan. Check for cobwebs and dust on walls and ceiling. Clean when needed. Remember to never clean the lights when they are hot. Clean them during the day when they are off and cool.
Do a once over on the shower and tub with a good soap scum remover like Scrubbing Bubbles. If you are using your shower spray or squeegee every day, this step will go quickly. Finish up with glass cleaner to make everything shine. Shouldn’t take more than 5 minutes.
Clean toilet. Clean tank, seat, and bottom with bath cleaner. Don’t forget the back side. Once all of this is wiped down, spray toilet cleaner under the rim, all the way around. Plenty will drip down to clean bowl. Make sure the under rim is is cleaned. If the toilet brush doesn’t get all the way in, you can use a paper towl, and if needed, a pumice stone. If you are keeping up, not much is needed.
Now clean the mirrors. Take your paper towels that are wet with glass cleaner and wipe the towel bars, handles, and toilet paper holder.
Next, clean your counters and sink. Use glass cleaner to shine up the faucet.
If you have a smallish bathroom you might want to just sweep and wipe down the floor now. Some people leave the floor and do it on floor day. You’ll want to at least sweep or vacuum to get up all the dust, lint and hair that accumulates in the bathroom.
Pro-Tip– If you have a mold problem- spray mold in grout lines and on shower curtain with Clorox Clean-up to control mildew. Just spray and walk away. Let the cleaner do it’s work. Just be sure to rinse it off any chrome immediately.
Pro-Tip – Plain white Bounty or Brawny paper towels work the best. Viva leaves behind a lot of lint, and leaves streaks that are very hard to remove. They cost more and are less effective. Save your money. Printed paper towels also leave streaks.
Weekly Schedule: Thursday
Vacuum & mop floors.
I like to do the floors on Thursday to have them ready for whatever the weekend brings. The better the vacuum job, the less dust you will have floating around the house. It is important to do a thorough job at least once a week, with a good vacuum.
- Use the floor attachment to do tile floors.
- Use your crevice tool for the edges and your window and patio door tracks.
- Use the duster attachment for baseboards and cob webs.
- Use the carpet head to vacuum carpets.
Pro-Tip– The duster attachment can also be used to dust table tops, behind furniture, mini blinds, picture frames, lamps, walls, corners, and vents.
As an alternative to changing attachments- you can also carry a feather duster in your back pocket to brush off baseboards, vents, and cobwebs as you vacuum.
I occasionally like to use Glade Fresh Scent or Carpet Fresh to add a nice fragrance to the room. I know, now they are saying that is bad too. If you don’t have a good vacuum, carpet fresh will do more harm than good. Only use it if you have a vacuum that will pick it all up. Febreeze does a nice job of freshening and brightening carpets too, but gets a little more costly. None of the knock-offs work in my opinion. Now with all the buzz about these fragrances being toxic, I have cut down on these practices. Bummer. I like the fragrances. You can sprinkle plain old baking soda on your carpets before vacuuming to remove odors.
Now that the floors are swept, do a quick wash.
Pro-Tip– Vinegar will do fine in most cases. It’s handy and you don’t have to keep changing the water for different floor surfaces. Too much vinegar can leave sort of a haze on wood floors. Use only 1/4 cup to one gallon of warm water.
If your tile floors get really dirty, the Method Lavender Floor Cleaner smells really good, and works fairly well- as well as Mr. Clean or Pine-Sol. With Method cleaners, you get the additional benefit of aromatherapy while you clean.
Pro-Tip– Swifter Wet Jet, Pine-Sol, and Mr. Clean leave a sticky residue. If you are using Pine-Sol or Mr. Clean, use sparingly and only on tile floors.
REMEMBER: Never mix cleaners!
Weekly: TGIF!
Do a touch up vacuum. Spot clean floors. Feather dust where needed.
Now enjoy your clean house for the weekend. Go have some fun!
Now that you’ve made it through the first time, keep at it. I find that most people feel proficient after about 3 weeks. You’re better at it, things are cleaner before you start, and it all goes a lot faster. After a few weeks, you will notice that things look great when you’re done. Don’t stop now!
The results are so worth it!
