As we often explain to our teenager, we can’t just take every weekend to relax. When you own a home, regular upkeep and chores to keep your home clean are essential to the health of everyone living there and for protecting the long-term investment of the property. So, if you’re not putting regular time and effort into trying to keep your home clean and organized, then the chore list and maintenance tasks can get out of hand.
Since the growing list of tasks happens a little at a time, it might not be too noticeable at first. Thankfully, you don’t have to settle for an inevitable stress pile and it doesn’t take a lot of effort to keep on top of home chores.
Instead, here are 7 simple strategies you can use to help keep your home clean and well-maintained.
Keep Your Home Clean: 7 Simple Strategies
1. Put Things Away As You Use Them
One of the biggest reasons why you could hate trying to keep your home clean is because there might be a lot to do. Thankfully, there are ways to get rid of this feeling. For example, just put things away when you are done with them.
By putting things away as you use them, you aren’t adding to the ‘later’ list. If something doesn’t need to be cleaned after use, then you’re free to just put it away where it belongs. It’ll prevent a mess from building up, getting rid of a few of the mental challenges associated with cleaning up.
You’ll have noticeably less to do when you need to clean up.
2. Wash The Dishes After Every Meal
Cleaning the dishes might be the most common chore you have to do around the house. Most of us have to do it at least once a day, and some of us—like me—clean up two or three times each day. We work from home a few days each week, and my husband isn’t a fan of cold food.
By washing the dishes after each use, we take a decent amount of the stress out of the pile that can happen in the sink. I find it frustrating to find a pile of dishes in the sink when I go to start making a meal for my family. I also run the dishwasher at night, so I can empty it in the morning. This way, my teenager and husband can’t use the dish-in-the-sink excuses of the dishwasher is too full or the dishwasher is running.
3. Tidy Up Before Bed
Every night, I put our house to bed. Sometimes I will even say those words out loud to my cat Rowdee: It’s time to put the house to bed. This includes tidying up small messes, putting things away, and locking the doors before I head to bed.
Cleaning up before bed helps make sure there’s less mess to wake up to in the morning. If you live alone, then you can guarantee no mess in the morning. However, I live with others who stay up a little later than me, so there is usually a stray dish or something out of place in the morning. But, it’s usually minimal.
The key here is to make sure you’re putting your house to bed consistently so the mess doesn’t build up and you develop the habit. Your morning self will thank you the next day.
4. Use The Right Cleaning Products
The cleaning products you use make a big difference in cleanliness and in your family’s health. It’s always worth making sure you have ones that are as natural as possible without sacrificing cleaning.
While most any cleaning options will do this to a degree, some of them can clean your house a lot better than others. While white vinegar, baking soda, and other household items can be mixed to create effective cleaners and rust removers, it’s also worth looking into options for pet hair remover for laundry and other specific household needs.
5. Wipe Down Tables & Counters After Meals
When you’re cooking and eating a meal, it’s natural to make a bit of a mess. It happens to everyone, and most will automatically clean the large messes as they happen.
But, don’t just leave it at that, though. Even if there doesn’t seem to be a mess, it’s still worth spending a minute or two cleaning the horizontal surfaces in the kitchen and dining room. Take a few minutes to wipe down and disinfect your tables and kitchen counters after you’ve had your meal. Sweeping the floor is also ideal, especially if you have trouble with ants or have little ones who are still crawling on the floor.
This shouldn’t take much time or effort, as long as you do it consistently.
6. Make The Bed Every Morning
We recently listened to the audio book called ‘Make Your Bed’ by Admiral William H. McRaven. He says that it’s a simple task that anyone can do each day, so that at the end of the day you can always feel like you accomplished at least one thing. I always make the bed as soon as I get up, because it puts away the last activity of sleeping and helps transition to the next part of the day. It also creates a calm and inviting vibe to the bedroom that I appreciate every time I walk by it and when I enter the bedroom at night.
Make sure you make the bed every morning. It helps with the overall tidiness of your bedroom, and you’ll feel a small sense of accomplishment and order.
It’ll only take a minute or two, and it could even help you feel a little happier.
7. Keep Shoes At The Door
When you get home from work or being out, it’s always possible you’ll drag in a bit of dirt. This usually happens because of your shoes, which is why they’re worth addressing. Thankfully, that doesn’t mean cleaning your shoes constantly, though it could be worth cleaning any clumps of mud or dirt from them regularly. Instead, you could leave your shoes at the door when you come home. It’ll prevent you from tracking in any dirt every day, which is helpful when there’s a household with kids and pets.
While we do take off our jobsite shoes or trail running shoes when we come home, we don’t have a shoe-free household because we are always in the middle of a renovation project at our old American Foursquare. Instead, we make sure to have a door mat. You can also use a mat or something similar to place them on to help keep the entry area clean and tidy.
Keep Your Home Clean: Wrapping Up
Taking pride in your homeownership is important, and keeping your home clean and tidy is an easy way to keep those positive feelings about your home. It’s usually just a matter of knowing how to keep your home clean and taking the few minutes each day to maintain it.
Doing a deep clean every once in a while also helps, but it’s not something you’ll have to do too often if you stay on top of daily tasks. By putting a little bit of effort into them every day, you shouldn’t have much to worry about when there’s a friend popping in to say hi or a holiday party coming up soon. You’ll have a consistently clean home to be proud of before you know it.
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