Housecleaning Strategies

With 3 children, my hubbys home business, and homeschooling, I never have time to really focus on a deep clean of any area. So my plan of attack is to do one piece of a room each day. For example, right now I'm working on the kitchen. Here's what it looks like:

Day 1: bleach grout on countertops (and splash some bleach in the sink while I'm at it)
Day 2: clean microwave and stove top
Day 3: scrub around edges of floor with an old toothbrush (you know...the edge by the baseboard that the mop doesn't quite reach) and wipe baseboards
Day 4: Dust knicknacks on top of the cabinets (and wipe tops of cabinets while I'm up there)
Day 5: clean out fridge
Day 6: Scrub fronts of lower cabinets
Day 7: scrub fronts of upper cabinets
Day 8: clean oven and the drawer under the oven
Day 9: Scrub front of appliances and pantry door
Day 10: Organize pantry (this might take 2 days...)

While I'm doing my job, I assign my 6 yr old daughter to re-organizing the insides of various cabinets. It rarely looks better than when she started, but it keeps her involved in the project!

Cleaning the bedroom might include pulling off bedding and window treatments and take to dry cleaner (this is a once a year thing for us), wipe baseboards, clean ceiling fan including light covers, dust & polish wood dressers and night stands, wipe down door and doorknobs, clean windows and sills (maybe even the blinds), vacuum with the attachment thingy all around the edges of the room and behind furniture, take cushions from rocker outside and beat them until the dust stops flying, clean mirror, put away any stacks of 'stuff', perhaps rearrange decorative items to give the room a new look.

So that's how I do it. I list all the things that I want to clean for any given room, then tackle them one each day. Each room usually takes about 10 days. I never do spring or autumn cleaning. I just rotate through my list for each room. To get completely through the house normally takes a couple months, by which time the first room is ready to do again.