Housekeeping is a hard task, let’s not fool ourselves. If you’ve just recently started to be the one handling the chores in your house, or if you already have a few years trying to nail it without too much success, you should probably admire your mom now more than ever. At least we do.
Either way, there are ways to become better in this daunting task, and help your house look great (even if you’re not dedicating 8 hours per day to cleaning and organizing). So buckle up and get rid of disaster, dust and grime with our simple guide.
If you want more specific cleaning tips or suggestions about natural cleaning products, read our other articles for more information on the issue. For now, we’ll just tackle your strategy.
Simple housekeeping tips
Designate a space for everything
We know it sounds daunting, but we promise this is easier than what it seems like. Having a designated order will help you to deal with disorder quicker, since you’ll only have to do the physical work without dealing with the mental load.
What do we mean by this?
If you know all shoes go next to the door, for example, you’ll only have to pick any shoes you find and put them there, instead of figuring out where are you going each time. Even if it takes just two or three seconds, there’s an effort that will end up tiring you in the long term.
This is also a great idea because it’ll help you to keep everything organized in the regular day. Organizing the living room can be a nightmare, but throwing the kids’ toys in a basket is simpler and won’t take as long.
Make sure every space is convenient and actually close to where the mess usually appears. If you find you’re not using your cupboards as intended, maybe you need to change the storage places and stop trying to do something that doesn’t work.
Another great tip is to use organization spaces such as baskets, boxes, etc. Even if it’s messy inside them, this is self-contained and will be easy to find afterwards, so it counts as organizing for the busy people!
Don’t do the work all by yourself!
Teamwork is extremely important. Long gone are the days when a single person was in charge of the perfect house. No one has enough time to do so now, so stop forcing you to bite more than what you can chew, and get help from your family, roommates, etc.
Don’t expect people to help out of the blue (it would be ideal, we know. But it usually doesn’t happen that way). The best way to tackle cleaning is by assigning specific tasks to everyone, and taking care of your own household chores.
Make sure to avoid criticizing, because you’ll only repulse others from said tasks. It’s better to let people tackle them on their own way, even if it’s not perfect or how you would do it. Folded clothes are better than clothes thrown around, even if they didn’t use Marie Kondo method.
You have to be willing to work as a team and compromise on what you want. Even if everything isn’t perfect, it’ll help you to avoid stress. If you really need a task to be done in a specific way, pick it for yourself or explain it to them and listen to their alternatives. Maybe you’ll discover their method is better! (Maybe.)
Other pro-tip: even toddlers can start helping around, and it’s a good idea to teach them so since the beginning. Picking up their toys after playing, for example, will save you the effort to crouch down to organize, and it’s a simple task for them.
There are no excuses to clean alone anymore! Housekeeping by yourself is overrated, anyways.
Consider your cleaning schedule
How often do you clean? Maybe two or three times per week? Or just one? (during your precious, precious weekend, perhaps?)
There’s no wrong answer (this varies from family to family, after all), but perhaps you’re not working under the most effective schedule. Deep cleaning is great, but you shouldn’t need to do so each time you grab a broom.
Consider how dirty does your house get, and if you can get by doing regular cleaning during the week, so you only deep clean every 7 or 15 days (depending on the mess). Don’t punish yourself too hard on this: if you already got help from your housemates, you should be able to reach your cleaning day without too many messes. If you need extra help, consider contacting a maid service in Los Angeles.
Is it time to change your habits?
Changing habits can be hard, but also very rewarding. If things are getting dirty extremely quick, there’s a reason, and usually, a habit is behind said reason.
A great example of this is sweeping often: if your floors are always dirty, maybe you should enforce a shoeless politics to avoid bringing dirt into the house. If you keep staining your furniture with food, you need to create a different space to eat so you’re comfortable without creating disaster, and so on.
This will vary depending on your family, but don’t feel afraid to explore your options and change old habits. The less you need to clean, the better you’ll be doing! (As long as everyone in the family is involved, of course. Don’t worry too much about the pets, though.)
These tips are pretty simple, but as long as you make sure to really integrate them into your housekeeping routine, you’ll discover a change. If you also make sure to clean a bit every day, your home will start looking like it never did before– in the positive sense.
If you’re looking for the best residential cleaning services in Los Angeles, contact Marianna’s cleaning. We offer personalized house cleaning services to meet your cleaning needs.
