I recently read a blog post at my friend Stacy’s blog that really resonated with me. It was called “Maintaining Your Home in the Whirlwind”, and I’m seriously not kidding when I say I thought she was describing my house! Here’s a quote:
My house certainly isn’t perfect. Visitors often find they have to shovel a path to the couch. (Hey, it’s not my fault nobody ever visits after the chores are done.) However, we do have clean clothes to wear, the dishes are ready when the meals are, and after about 3:00 in the afternoon, you can usually see the floor. Life is better in a clean house, but how do we get things in order with all these little mess-makers running around?
I especially love that part about how everybody visits before the chores are done! Just in case you ever want to visit me, you should know that at 10:00 in the morning, I’m still running around the house in a bathrobe (or junk clothes, the modern wife’s equivalent to the housedress) sporting some awesome bedhead. Unfortunately, that seems to be the most popular time for maintenance men, repair guys, UPS deliverers and the like to show up unannounced.
And although I’ve done a million things by 10:00 in the morning – made breakfast, changed children’s clothes, brushed teeth, settled about a thousand sibling squabbles, checked FB and email, read my Bible, taught my son a little preschool, and who knows what else – it looks like I’ve been relaxing all morning eating bonbons and watching the dust bunnies hop.
It’s kind of embarrassing, to tell you the truth.
So this past week, I decided to do something about it. I still do my chores for the day after lunch rather than first thing in the morning, because that just seems to work the best with my schedule, but I decided that I should at least keep one room in the house clean all. day. long. That way, I wouldn’t feel like a total failure of a housewife when those unexpected visitors dropped by, because at least they could see my house wasn’t a complete mess.
I settled on the dining room. I would love to keep the living room clean all day long, because that’s the first room people see when they come into our apartment, but that’s simply not practical. One of the first things The Boys do when they wake up in the morning is drag their race track rugs and Cars 2 cars out to the living room and proceed to play with them there for a large part of the day. I would rather them play where I can see them – and mediate their frequent tussles – then leave them alone in their room, because trust me, that never turns out well. So I can’t keep the living room clean without boring them to tears.
I’d love for the kitchen to be clean all day, but once again, the issue is that it’s constantly being used. When you make everything from scratch, you generate a lot of mess and a lot of dirty dishes. The dishwasher’s always being run, and I’m constantly wiping counters and the like, but the fact of the matter is that for most of the day… something’s going on in the kitchen and it ain’t cleaning!
So I picked the dining room (I had already mastered keeping the hall bathroom clean, in case you’re wondering.). Here’s the thing: three times a day, two small boys run into the dining room, climb up on the chairs and proceed to fling food everywhere with merry abandon. The older one is better than the younger one, and doesn’t make quite as much of a mess… but that’s not saying much. Plus, the dining room is where I do my blogging and all household organizational tasks (budgeting and the like). My laptop sits on the dining room table whenever we’re not eating, and so does my household binder and other tools. Suffice it to say, the dining room generates a lot of mess.
one reason why my house looks messy!
BUT it’s not being used in a messy way all day long. Only 3 times a day. The rest of the time, I’m just using my computer, and not really generating too much of a mess. So my goal this past week was to keep the dining room clean and sparkling between meals. Toys were outlawed (and cleaned up promptly if they trespassed), and clean-up commenced promptly after every meal. The hand-vac was brought out with much more regularity (why does more food always end up on the floor than in their tummies?!) and the tables and chairs were wiped down with alarming frequency.
The result? A place to rest my eyes. In the hub-bub and, yes, whirlwind, of life around here, at least I can glance into the dining room throughout the day and see peace and cleanliness. The curtains open to a sunshiny view make the perfect backdrop for my pretty little centerpiece made with old bottles and silk flowers, centered on a neat table with four chairs nicely tucked around it.
And honestly, it doesn’t take that much time to go through the room 3 times a day and eliminate all the mess. Probably 5 minutes at the most. Those 5 minutes are the best time investment I make all day! OK, well maybe the time I spend giving hugs and settling squabbles is even better spent. But those 5 minutes bring a peace and relaxation to our home without stressing me out, and that is totally worth it.
And that’s the whole thing: while I regularly do all the normal housekeeping things like scrubbing floors, vacuuming carpet, cleaning bathrooms, and wiping down walls, I don’t stress out about the toys on the floor all day long, or the growing pile of dishes in the sink (Hey, I’ll get to them when the dishwasher finishes its current cycle!). Stressing out about an immaculate house is totally not worth it for me. It’s more important to me to make all the food from scratch and let the boys play their little hearts out than it is to have a constantly clean house.
But that little oasis in the dining room? Totally worth it.
What spot in your house do you (or could you) keep clean no matter what?
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I remember when my kids were little, I had a neighbor who always had a spotless house, even when the children were little. Her kids are now in their late teens and she told me that in hindsight she wished she had let the house go a little and spend more time with her kids rather than worrying about keeping the place spotless. She really feels like she missed out on something and, now that they were grown, it was too late.
Vikki, that’s nice to know! That’s kind of why I don’t stress about it now because I figure it’s not the most important thing.
Maybe I’m just nosy, but I kinda love this expanded peek into your life.
We have an open floor plan for our living room/kitchen/dining room, and understandably, this is where we hang out the most. We probably clean it up 3-5 times a day; because I’ve made it a policy that all toys need to be picked up (and cushions put back on the couch… funny how often they’re on the floor) before we (1) play outside (2) leave the house (for the library or whatever), or (2) take naps.
Makes it a little less crazy, even when I have to stop what I’m doing to help the clean up.
We do clean up all the toys before my piano students come, and also every night. Plus any time it just gets out of control. I am also trying to train them not to take out more toys until they’ve put away the toys they were playing with previously, but that’s a work in progress! And yes, my cushions ALWAYS end up on the floor! I’m constantly telling them to put them back on the couch.
This sounds like a good idea. I’m the type that likes order but it’s impossible with a 14 month old. One neat spot to rest my eyes when things are crazy might just do the trick!
Yes, Margaux, I like order, too, but not at the expense of stressing out. I stress out about too many things as it is, lol! So maintaining one clean space really works great for me! When they’re older, the house will be kept cleaner for longer periods of time, at least that’s what I tell myself
I love to hear how others deal with their daily life at home with children. I like you on days we are home all day seem like it is never ending, the dishes, picking up. Even though I make work on things all day it is never “uncluttered”. So we are still working on de-cluttering. Thanks for sharing!
I think de-cluttering is a constant task that never quite goes away!
This is a great idea but unfortunately my house has a very open floorplan. The kitchen, living room, and dining room are basically one big room. Clutter drives me insane! So I’m often running around picking up stuff. We just have one little so it’s not so bad right now!
I hate clutter, too! Unfortunately it’s like swimming against the tide.
i keep my bedroom spotless so I too have an oasis. While reading your post a light went on in my head- thanks for the thoughts! I am home all day homeschooling and training 7 kids so a constant “running ” home is to be expected.
I should work harder at my bedroom; it’s not terrible but it’s not perfectly clean either. The problem is I spend so little time there! It’s definitely on my “list”, lol.
I don’t have kids but I run 2 businesses from home so I work 12-14 hours a day most week days then am gone with events, church & family stuff on the weekends so I struggle with keeping up with the house too. I do keep my living room tidy, but the bedroom and my office I struggle with, they tend to become catch all rooms… (P.S. Thanks for linking up at Motivating Monday on CEO of Me!)
I think it’s pretty good if you can keep the living room clean! And I find that the more we are away from home, the dirtier the house gets. That confuses me!
I love this! It sounds like a very workable plan to me. I’m so glad you provided some specifics. As a homeschooling mom of 4, ages 10 on down to 1, I feel like we are constantly in all areas of the house, and that cleaning is a losing battle.
I only have 2, but I know how you feel!
That’s a fantastic idea! I think I’m going to choose my dining room as well, since that is where I write. As long as I don’t sit facing the kitchen I can pretend my whole house looks like that one room – brilliant!!
Yes, having that one room clean is a stress-buster for me! Ours does happen to be our living room because the kids do most of their playing in the kitchen, basement, and their room. Their room actually stays pretty neat, too believe it or not, because they prefer to play in the same space as me.
The kitchen does get cleaned every day – but it’s definitely work! The one room that’s never ever clean? Our guest room! It’s a catch-all. 
I can relate to your post! I rarely shower before noon because I want to do it after I’ve done my cleaning, and I don’t care to clean in the morning either. My husband teases me about it. Our house has a formal living room and dining room as well as a family room and breakfast room. What I love about those formal rooms is they rarely get used, so when the rest of the house is a disaster area due to meals, homework, playtime, and general day-to-day chaos of a busy family of six, those front rooms stay perfect. I get stressed when the house is messy, so to calm myself, I head to those front rooms. And, I know what you mean about a house getting messier when you aren’t there! That happens to us all the time. Thanks for being so honest in your post. I have one about cleaning my house that you may enjoy at http://thedomesticatedprincess.blogspot.com/2012/03/is-your-house-clean.html.
Thanks, Bonny! Yeah, except for the days when I have to leave the house in the morning, I don’t shower until my son’s naptime which is getting later and later! I’m just not comfortable leaving my kids unsupervised even for 5 minutes in the shower. Bad things happen, lol.
It’s funny, but my son’s room is the cleanest in the house. He doesn’t play in there (his bedroom is for sleeping and changing clothes only) so it’s never much of a mess.
That’s nice! All my kids’ toys are in their room so as to keep them out of the rest of the house, so they do manage to make a mess in there pretty nearly every day, lol. We clean up all the toys every night, though.
I loved this post! I agree that is is so nice to have a little oasis for our eyes. If I have a small clean, clutter free area, I tend to keep looking at it or visiting it
Hi Anne!
Thank you for linking up this inspiring post in The Mommy Club last week! It was the #1 most clicked post. I really appreciate you stopping in and sharing this with my readers! It is a great mommy solution!
You are being featured on my my blog today and the new linky is up and running. I hoe you stop in and share more of your post!
Crystal
http://www.crystalandcomp.com/2012/09/the-mommy-club-share-your-resources-and-solutions-61/