I'm at least tolerating my horribly outdated excuse for a kitchen a tiny bit more.
Actually things are going fairly well. I'm not opposed to messes being made throughout the day, but they absolutely have to be cleaned up before another mess is made. This is the rule for myself as well. Although sometimes I would really love to 'leave it and come back to it later' I try to remind myself that if I just take five minutes now it will save me time later. Basically, rule number 1 is take care of it immediately.
My second big rule is that I no longer clean up after anyone other than myself. I started noticing that half of my time was spent cleaning up what my kids (or possibly husband) left behind, which meant that I didn't have as much time for things like laundry and bathrooms. Now, I spend five seconds explaining to the kids what they need to take care of and the rest of my time can be spent on more important things like blogging, I mean laundry.
Other than that I just make sure there are no dishes left in the sink at night or shoes by the front door. Oh, and a container of Clorox wipes under every sink really helps out a lot, especially in the bathroom.
Only 351 days to go!
2 comments:
Way to go Sally! I always keep antibacterial wipes in the bathroom and in the kitchen. That way there is no excuse for anyone not to clean up the mess they make in either of those rooms.
Also, a friend of mine told me that she always cleans the bathroom while her little girl is in the bath. I started doing that and it really helps keep it clean. If I wipe it down and pick it up every bath time it is never super gross which makes the job easy.
As for the kitchen I always make sure the dishes in the dishwasher are clean in the morning, so that way it's a quick job of unloading and then all dirty dishes get put in the dishwasher through out the day and not in the sink.
Freddy is not even 2 and already has his jobs. He must help pick up his toys after he's finished playing with them and he is also in charge of throwing things away, like his diapers, or garbage mail or whatever else I find around the house. I figure if you start them young they won't be surprised later when you ask them to pick up after themselves and help out with the other household chores.
I'm only going to say this because I know how much you hate it! "It's easier to maintain cleanliness than to clean up slopiness." (our mom's motto when we were growing up). It's really true though. If I pick up as I go throughout the day it's so much easer at the end of the day.
I need to do better about giving me kids jobs, like Amy does. They need to learn the habit now.
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