In the first part of this series, I shared how implementing a cleaning schedule into my weekly plan instead of trying to clean all in one day works for me. By focusing on one room a day, I am able to get my whole house cleaned with less effort and less stress. It took a little time and some adjustments to get my plan up and running, but it has been well worth it. After scratching out several ideas on paper, I finally came up with a workable routine for our family. Here is how I did this:
1. First I wrote down on paper all the rooms in our home. I grabbed a notebook and started at the entry way of our home and made my way around. These are the zones that I came up with:
Entry way
Kitchen
Dining Room
Living Room
Downstairs Bath
Foyer
Master Bedroom
Master Bath
Upstairs Bedroom
Upstairs Bathrooms
Stairwell
2. I then placed each room into a zone. Because I wanted to keep it to five days per week, and some areas are lower maintenance then others, I grouped some of the rooms together. Here is what this looks like:
Zone 1: Entry way/Kitchen
Zone 2: Dining/Living Room
Zone 3: Downstairs Bath/Foyer/Hall Closet
Zone 4: Master Bedroom/Master Bath
Zone 5: Upstairs Bedroom/Bathrooms/Stairwell
3. Once I had these zones established, I assigned a day. Zone 1 goes on Monday, Zone 2 is Tuesday etc. At first, you may need to adjust your schedule to allow time to get each zone completed. I needed to add in 1/2 an hour into my schedule each day.
4. I then wrote down the various chores that needed to be compeleted in each zone. I wrote every thing I could think of, and have had to arrange and adjust a couple times. I created a checklist in Word, printed it out and put it in a page protector in my home management binder. I keep it open to the zone we are in with a dry erase marker near it. My children help me with this, so they can just quickly reference the day/zone we are on, choose what is not already checked off, and do that chore.
5. I keep the list checked off for each day all week. Imay not get to all the things on my list everyday, but I do feel like I am getting a lot accomplished. I either try to get to what we missed during other snippets of time in the day or skip it until next week. It is so helpful in keeping track of what we did. At the end of the week, I wipe all the checks off and we are ready for the next week!
To give you an idea of what this looks like in my binder here you go:
As you can see, I got all my things on my list checked off on Monday but not on Tuesday. I always seem to have more gusto on Mondays! Also remember, I have my 3 children helping me so I can get a lot accomplished in a half an hour. You have to create a plan that will work for your situation. Keep it simple and fun. If it is overwhelming, change it or rearrange it. Eventually you will get a schedule that works well and you will get your house cleaned too! I have tweaked and adjusted this plan several times, and I am sure that will continue as our family changes and throughout different seasons of life!
Do you have a cleaning schedule in place? How did you create it? Do you clean weekly or daily? I would love to hear what works for you!
{ 1 trackback }
{ 10 comments }
you do it the way i do it. in fact your zones are similar to mine. takes an hour a day. easy peasy!
This is exactly what I’m working through right now. And I’m so glad you said you “scratched several ideas down” on paper… I keep doing that, and it gets a little better every time. Large Family Logistics helped me a lot, and Raising Olives has a great plan, with a similar number of children. What I’m working on now is the basic before breakfast chores, and the table/kitchen cleanup and that’s going more smoothly after rearranging the chores and assigning them to different children. I grew up in a family of 2 children, so we usually just cleaned in one fell swoop on Saturday mornings – DOES NOT WORK FOR MY FAMILY !
What’s amazing is how I fall back into that routine if we don’t get much cleaning done through the week – I feel like it HAS to all be finished by Saturday. I’m just about ready to re-introduce a daily cleaning time. Thanks for the encouragement to keep at it, and to keep tweaking. I like to plan on paper, and then it usually falls apart a bit (or a lot) when I implement it and sometimes I give up. I’m learning to just be analytical and see why it falls apart, and change it. The side benefit to this process is that as I explain to the children the how/why I’m making changes – they become comfortable with trying different things (i.e. following a different list each day!) until we all find a solution.
Cardamoms Pod’s last blog post..Not Me Monday: Spills and Scissors
So, here I am 9 days later and was so frustrated with my HN that I was ready to chuck it and just wing it….which would negate the whole Planning part of the 4 P’s
So I took a tip from Miss Stephanie here and just worte a simple list of the rooms in the house. Then I stopped to think about what I really did when I was cleaning, and laid out my daily routine (which is pretty set now); then thought about HOW I tackle the rooms when I do the heavy cleaning…and HELLO – Lightbulb moment – THOSE are my ‘zones’. So while I was waiting for my truck to get serviced after work today, I simply wrote the zones out on sheets of notebook paper.
Once I got bak home I pulled up my ‘chore lists’; first thing I did was change their names to Home Blessings and had a ball revamping. The good thing is, I smile when I see them now (instead of cringing at all the work); and I think if I stick to the planning, I will actually be able to find time every other week to work on some of my craft projects again
*********************************
Penny,
That is so awesome! Keep us posted as to your new home blessing schedule goes!
Great idea!!! This is exactly what I was looking for. I will do the same thing with my cleaning and see how it goes. I will keep you updated after I get a week into it. You are such a blessing for this. WHOOO!!!
Okay – you saw from the blogging and such that I was working on my Household Notebook last night…Well – I pulled up all the documents and I know I already like the way my zones are laid out….then it hit me…I’m a list maker….Just having it listed wasn’t working. What attracted me to YOUR notebook is that you have space to actually CHECK IT OFF WHEN DONE….so, I brought my files in to work, used Word to create checkboxes and I will print them off at home tonight
See, I ALSO found out that I do NOT like my household notebook in plain old black and white laser LOL I like it in a different color ink, and a little bit of clip art. If I don’t make it fun….it won’t get done!
babysteps, babysteps, babysteps
I reread this post and I realised that you clean your home the same way my friend in Kansa City does it LOL. She also cleans 1 or 2 rooms a day and it works very well for her. I’ve tried several different approaches and it always feels like the ‘harder I work, the behinder I get’ LOL You’ve given me some food for thought here. Thanks, Stephanie…I am soooooo glad you decided to keep going on with Homemaker’s Haven!
I desperately need to get organized (and motivated!) in this area of homemaking. Thanks for the tips!
Looks a lot like my Household Notebook….but I never seem to get everything done. I’ve tried numerous Zones, Room by Room. Most times I think it’s just hopeless.
Any chance of getting you to link to some docs? PWEEEEEZ
THAT is an excellent idea! I have my own little cleaning routine, but nothing near as organized as this. I think having lists and notes like this reallly do help with getting things accomplished. Sometimes just “seeing” what you’ve accomplished on paper is a real motivator. Ok…I’m gettin’ motivated!
Thanks!
I have a cleaning schedule I follow as well. The difference, since we live in a smaller space, is that instead of dividing mine into rooms, my schedule is divided into jobs. For example, Monday is bills and paperwork, Tuesday is cleaning the bathroom, Wednesday is vacuum and mopping, Thursday is dusting and Friday is washing linens.
Comments on this entry are closed.