I feel like a broken record on a lot of my posts...we're busy! I kind of left you hanging on the cleaning and organizing because we got super busy all of sudden. As soon as school was out for summer, we went on a week long vacation, began watching another child, started t-ball, and had a garage sale. Whew...glad that is all behind us.
I am not going to go into a lot in this post, but just wanted to get back out on the scene. So far we have looked at Daily Routines (morning and bed time with some help of the fly lady) and cleaning schedules for our Bathroom and Kitchen. We have also looked at ways to organize in each of these areas of our homes. Some areas take a bit more work (Kitchen and Bathroom), while other areas, are easier to maintain and organize. Let's look at an easier room: The Bedroom. For me this room is pretty simple. We sleep in it and that is about it. We don't spend a lot of time in this room so there isn't really a lot of clutter there (besides maybe the closets). I don't have a lot of tips on how to organize things in the bedroom outside of dresser drawers all having different types of clothing stored in them (one having socks, one having underwear type items, one having pants or shorts, etc). However, I do have a cleaning schedule that I use for this zone (which takes place on the fourth week of every month - outside of regular weekly cleaning). Every week I try to sweep and mop (we have hard floors) and even try to dust at least every other week. I do wash the sheets in there about every week or every other week. But on the 4th week, I use the below rotating list of things to take a closer look at. I date them when I complete them so that I am never wondering when I last did that task. The list is as follows:
~Clean under beds and under all furniture
~Go through sock/underwear drawers (get rid of things you don't wear or that have holes in them)
~Clean blinds
~Look up (for cobwebs, tops of windows and doors)
~Clean switch plates, light fixtures, knobs
~Ceiling fan
~Detail Dust
~Clean and pick up closet floor
~Closet "fling boogie" (go through closet and get rid of things!)
~Go through toy bins/books (kids room)
~Take a look around - floor/night stands/tops of dressers (get rid of garbage and things that belong in other rooms)
~Flip mattress
~Go through other drawers and get rid of things you no longer want/fit/need
~Baseboards
I do try and organize my closet some as far as hanging things in groups (tank tops together, t-shirts, long sleeve, dressy items, dresses/skirts, pants). I try to group them in colors as well as I feel like it's easier to find things when I am looking for them (maybe I should just get rid of more and I wouldn't have that problem).
When it comes to week 4, I usually focus on just my bedroom, but if things are going really well, I do the same tasks in the kids room (or assign them to the kids to do). Since my kids are smaller than I, I have them squeeze under the beds and wipe things down for me. If you are doing your daily and weekly routines for this room, the other stuff is a cinch (Daily - making bed; weekly - sheets, quick dust, vacuum/mop). That's it for today! We'll look at the Living/Dining/Entrance next which I also consider a pretty easy space before we tackle organizing kids stuff (playroom, etc).
