Cleaning Schedule Makes for a Happier Home

I know, I know—you have a million reasons why you don’t want to clean on a schedule. You’re a free spirit. You’re pregnant. Your spouse works odd shifts. You’re an artistic type and sticking to a schedule would dampen your creativity. Trust me; in over 10 years of teaching these skills, I have heard every rationale ever offered for resisting this truth. But truth it remains. There’s only one reason to schedule housework: because doing so gets the job done fastest and most easily.

Little and Often
Housework delayed is housework multiplied. Dust the breakfast nook weekly, and it’s a quick-swipe, two-minute job. Wait a month, and enough air-borne grease has settled over the dust to require (a) oil soap, (b) elbow grease, and (c) an energetic half-hour to return the furniture to a state of clean. Better to schedule two easy minutes a week than to play catch-up with a sweaty half-hour once a month.

Whatever your mental roadblock to the idea, consider establishing a cleaning schedule. By scheduling chores so that they’re performed regularly—before the problems mushroom exponentially—the house stays cleaner, and the house cleaners do less work to keep it that way. Use these sample checklists as a start-point to develop one that’s right for your household:

Daily Cleaning Checklist
Make beds
Place dirty clothing in hampers
Wash, dry, and put away one load of laundry
Clear kitchen counters and wipe down stovetop
Clean kitchen sink
Take out kitchen garbage
Sweep kitchen floor
Pick up family room and play areas (put away toys, stack newspapers, remove clutter)