May 2020 Moms

Cleaning schedule?

Does anyone have like a weekly schedule they feel really works? I find myself on Sundays going through most of the big stuff and just think if I had a schedule that could space it out I wouldn't feel so overwhelmed and might actually relax some. 
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Re: Cleaning schedule?

  • I used to make a cleaning list.  I might go back to this.  Then I’d just tackle one thing a day and it was much better.  It was really broken into much smaller tasks.  Instead of clean bathroom I would just clean the toilet one day, shower one day, sink/counter/mirror one day.  It made it much less overwhelming.  Once I started cleaning it was easy to keep going often and do a little more, but it was easier to motivate to clean when I was only setting out to do one small task, vacuum one room, etc.
  • @pirateduck I think I might try that I mean some things are daily like dishes and laundry but I am worried about the not everyday tasks like this. I have been getting rid of a lot of things and am working on downsizing things because clutter is overkilling me. 
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  • Look up clean mama! She’s on Instagram,
    but also has a website. It’s a super simple schedule to start following and really makes life a lot easier, especially when you have multiple children and run around all day long. 
  • @mamaj1220 Did you clean at all yesterday?  I feel like I'm always playing catch up, but I did look at the clean mama's schedule and I'm gonna try to adapt it to my own life and not worry about cleaning tasks other than on the day they are due so I hopefully feel less overwhelmed.  Yesterday I cleaned some and kept thinking about the bathrooms needing to be done and just kept telling myself it's ok, it's not bathroom day, I don't need to worry about them now.

    I was also thinking that if these things get done more regularly, they won't be as gross and time consuming anymore because there won't be as much time between cleanings.  Good luck!
  • @pirateduck and @mamaj1220 You guys inspired me to make a cleaning schedule. I'm so excited - today MH is home and hes5in charge of dusting. Everything. I can't wait to go home, but I'll be surprised if he actually dusts everything I think needs to be dusted. This week will be the hardest because of the clutter and stuff that also needs to be dealt with.
  • @ruby696 I agree.  I think the first week will be hardest because we are playing catch up!  I also agree about the husband not dusting EVERYTHING.  I feel like my husband is totally blind to half the dirt in my house.  I think he legit doesn't notice it.  If I do give him cleaning instructions they have to be very specific.  I can't just say clean X room.
  • @pirateduck Same. I tell MH that once he puts something down, it becomes invisible to him. I legit had to explain to him that cleaning the kitchen after dinner did not just mean doing dishes. Counters are important too, and hello, how does he not notice the food bits in the drain trap in the sink?! 
  • @ruby696 OH MY GOD, the counters and the food bits in the drain catcher!  Drives me insane!  Like, this is how ants happen, dummy!  
    **TW**
    Me: 35 | H: 40
    Married Sept. 2013
    DS1: Nov 11, 2016 <3
    MMC: 11/16/18 (9w6d)
    CP: 2/3/19 (5w3d)
    BFP!  8/24/19
    DS2: May 10, 2020 <3


  • and the food bits in the stove burners and the grease around the stove (which is soooo much easier to wipe up if you get it BEFORE it dries on there)
  • @pirateduck yes I got a lot done yesterday, but still have more I want to do. I am going to try to get a schedule going this week and hopefully it will make things less stressful and not playing catch up all the time.
  • I started the clean mama schedule about 6 months ago. I’m an anxiety cleaner. My house would go neglected for a few days and then I’d have a meltdown over something and spend hours cleaning the house. Following the schedule really helped me dumb down my tasks and once I did it for a few weeks it became habit. I don’t use any of her fancy products, but I do like how simple she has it broken down. There’s also charts for the deep cleaning stuff and what gets rotated every month. 

    I also have it printed and on the fridge. It’s laminated so it can be checked off. If I’m having a busy day I’ll ask MH to do the chart for me. He’s one of those that needs an exact task and how to do it so I have notes on the bottom with which cleaning solutions to use where and anything else I think he might ask about. 
  • sbishop426sbishop426 member
    edited December 2019
    My daily chores consists of dishes, sweeping the floors (messy toddlers so it’s a must), general tidying/picking up toys. I do a load of laundry (clothes) every 2 days or I get overwhelmed when it piles up. 1-2 times a week is vacuuming, dusting, mopping, clean the bathrooms. And washing bedding weekly. I don’t have specific days for the weekly chores but try to do them when my husband works so we can relax together on his days off 

    My 3 yr old loves to push around the swiffer and wipe down the table. We have a chore chart for him but he would totally do it without any incentive lol 
  • My husband was tired and wanted to snuggle, I told him I couldn’t until I finished cleaning the bathrooms and dishes from dinner.  I went upstairs to finish the bathroom and when I can down my husband was washing dishes for the first time in years.  Winning!
  • @sbishop426 I envy your cleaning discipline.  I don’t clean nearly as often and then stress because the house is a mess and then the cleaning seems overwhelming.  I hope to get back on schedule. 
  • Can someone link the clean mama schedule?
    DD #1: April 2017
    DD #2: May 2020
    Baby #3: EDD May 2023; MC October 2022

  • @catem07 Here’s the starting spot on the website. She covers a lot of different topics and offers printables and supplies, but the basic list is in the start here section: https://cleanmama.com/start-here/
  • I am jealous of all you who have your shit together! Ever since having DD my house is neglected. I feel like we can only keep up on laundry, dishes and general picking up. My master bath is disgusting right now. I cleaned the shower a couple weeks ago because it really needed it. DH cleaned the sink recently, but the toilet... ugh.
    _______________________________________________
    TTC#1 July 2015 
    • BFP: 9/16/15 — MC: 11/8/15 Blighted Ovum
    • BFP: 3/10/16 — Baby Girl born 11/20/16
    TTC#2 April 2019 
    • BFP: 9/12/19 — EDD 5/15/20

  • @m6agua That's how we've been too. But with soon to be four kids, I feel like I need to get it together. It's so hard since we both work full time, but I think once we get used to it and get caught up, it will start to be pretty easy. Hopefully. 😬
  • @m6agua same. It's a struggle. Every time I deep clean the bathroom I vow to try to do it more regularly but... it's hard. I feel like by the time DS goes to bed I have 1.5 hours to shower, pack lunch, do the every day chores like dishes and general picking up and then have like 30 minutes to myself. I'm not spending it deep cleaning every night.  :D
  • You guys are great. 

    My cleaning is just moving the toys so I don’t step on them 🤣 (granted, our house was just built and we just moved in 2 months ago). 

    I guess I should actually clean though since we’re hosting Christmas!
  • My shit is absolutely not together re: cleaning. We had a cleaning person 1x/month when we lived in Boston but we can't afford that right now. We do have a much bigger house, so clutter isn't as much of a problem because there's more of a place for things to go, but a bigger house means more to clean...The living room usually looks good, the dining room decent, and the kitchen sort of messy because we don't have a ton of storage in there so there's often stuff on the counters. And we have a small playroom that's always a mess. 
    DD #1: April 2017
    DD #2: May 2020
    Baby #3: EDD May 2023; MC October 2022

  • @m6agua Yes! I told MH last night that the good thing about starting now was that we wouldn't be stressed trying to get the house ready for Christmas. Now if only my MIL would stop buying my kids cheap crap every time she sees them. We don't have a lot of storage space and my kids have so much stuff. It drives me crazy.
  • @ruby696 omg yesss please for the love of god. We don't need 3 crappy reindeer hats.  :|
  • @rachelg777 As we were getting ready to leave my in-laws on Thanksgiving, I saw my son's arms full of random crap, saying he needed a bag. I seriously thought he'd walked around the house collecting things and I told him he needed to put it back. Nope. At some point, my MIL gave my kids a giant bag full of absolute crap toys. She gets them at discount stores and everything is cheap plastic/missing parts. Or duplicates of things we already have, like plastic piggy banks when the kids already have nice ones, so now they have two. It makes me so angry.
  • @ruby696 Oh man, that would drive me absolutely crazy!
  • @heatherlynn321 When they were younger, it was easier to get rid of it without them noticing, so I was a little more relaxed about it. It's getting harder now. I've declared war on the plastic snoopy piggy bank. I don't know how I'll get rid of it, but I will. Somehow. 

    I feel like I'm going to have to start telling my kids they can't have the things MIL buys them, in front of her, so she finally gets it. And I really don't think that's fair to my kids. But I've told her no more toys and she does it anyway. 
  • @rox7777 That's brilliant. I filled 5 garbage bags with toys a couple months ago and donated them. My kids didn't even notice. 😒
  • @ruby696 I really commiserate on the MIL front. Mine likes dollar general outfits and that stupid kid kraft brand from Walmart for toys. She has money, but she’s one of those that wants to show up to Christmas with yard bags full of presents rather than one really nice thing. Beyond aggravating for me because my anxiety is easily triggered by clutter.
  • @ruby696 @rox7777 My mom made a snide remark to me this weekend about how she had so many "restrictions" on what she could buy DS for Christmas, and I got really mad at her for it.  She keeps buying him huge toys, and we do not have enough space for all of it, so I asked her to stop buying him huge toys.  I also asked her and my MIL to stop buying him so many clothes because we have PLENTY already (and I HATE the clothes MIL buys).  Examples of huge toys he's gotten from then so far: a ride-on roller coaster toy, a miniature piano, a ride-on car that makes obnoxious loud honking sounds and plays music, a train table, a motorcycle pedal bike, and I had to ask her not to buy him a Power Wheels because we wanted to be the ones to get it for him eventually.  Our house is not that big.  The thing is she made this comment after seeing us pull three 50 gallon totes full of baby/toddler clothes out of our corner bedroom that we were storing all of the baby stuff in.  She kept saying "Wow, he has a lot of clothes" and I was like "I bought less than 10% of that myself and everything else was given to us and some was never even worn."  Don't make snide remarks about how you're not allowed to buy him stuff and then comment on how much stuff he has!
    **TW**
    Me: 35 | H: 40
    Married Sept. 2013
    DS1: Nov 11, 2016 <3
    MMC: 11/16/18 (9w6d)
    CP: 2/3/19 (5w3d)
    BFP!  8/24/19
    DS2: May 10, 2020 <3


  • @shamrocandroll It sounds silly, but that’s a big complaint for me. My mom and MIL go overboard buying clothes and I barely get to dress my kids. Now they’re competing to buy the baby the most clothes they can and taking the fun from me. They know how excited I was to have a girl and they’re so focused on competing over bows and clothes. Like please just buy the other crap and let me dress her for a little while. 😤

    My mom is currently guilt tripping me because I don’t plan on having a nursery for a while. Neither of my kids have had a nursery, we room share and I BF. Why start on the last freaking kid? But she just wants to decorate and take that over too. 🙄
  • @rox7777 Ugh, it's so hard.  My mom was like "I never put any restrictions on your grandparents on what they could buy you" and I was like "I wasn't the only grandchild on both sides and they never bought us anything big!!!"  My nana (her mom) gave me savings bonds, which is totally practical and awesome and paid for my books for a couple of semesters in college!  
    **TW**
    Me: 35 | H: 40
    Married Sept. 2013
    DS1: Nov 11, 2016 <3
    MMC: 11/16/18 (9w6d)
    CP: 2/3/19 (5w3d)
    BFP!  8/24/19
    DS2: May 10, 2020 <3


  • ruby696ruby696 member
    edited December 2019
    @rox7777 I shamelessly donate clothes with tags on them. IDGAF. MIL buys them clothes all the time and most are hideous. Sometimes I'll keep a few things as daycare clothes, but otherwise they go in the Goodwill bag as soon as she leaves. It's so annoying. Don't tell anyone when you start working on the nursery. Let them find out when it's done.

    @shamrocandroll Yes!! So much this! My grandparents didn't bring us gifts every time they saw us. We got a gift for our birthday and maybe a couple things at Christmas. What is with this generation of grandparents that they can't stop buying stuff? I finally told my mom she can buy anything she wants, it's her money. But she needed to understand that I have no problem donating it, if she buys crap, large items, or anything I just don't want to find room for. So as long as she's good with that, she can go crazy. That was actually pretty effective. I hinted at it towards my MIL. I may need to be more blunt.

    Eta: tag
  • @ruby696 Yes, exactly!  He's the only grand kid on both sides, so they both just shower him in gifts every time they see him, which is at least once a month.  It's infuriating!  They also do this thing where they give the stuff straight to him, and then he gets attached to it and I would feel awful taking it away from him when he did nothing wrong.  But I should just start donating clothes.  
    **TW**
    Me: 35 | H: 40
    Married Sept. 2013
    DS1: Nov 11, 2016 <3
    MMC: 11/16/18 (9w6d)
    CP: 2/3/19 (5w3d)
    BFP!  8/24/19
    DS2: May 10, 2020 <3


  • @shamrocandroll OMG why do they give it directly to them?! My in-laws showed up at 8:00 one night with a box of pastries/desserts and started to open it for DS. I had to get mad at them because apparently they thought it would be okay to give a toddler a mini galette at bedtime?? That's also the reason why I have to figure out a way to get rid of that damn snoopy piggy bank. They gave it to DS when I was out of the rooms, so of course he loves it. Like his shelves aren't cluttered enough??
  • Yes to all of this! I don’t really like the clothes my mom picks out but my son is one of 12 grandchildren on that side so he doesn’t get a ton and it’s pretty much always on appropriate holidays like his birthday and Christmas. 

    However with my IL’s he is the only grandchild so whenever they visit they bring so. much. crap. 

    @rox7777 I was just venting about this the other day- I wish people would only give gift cards so I could solely dress my kid in the clothes I like (or as he gets older, he likes)!
  • Those of you with the kids/toys issues.  A few ideas I’ve gotten from others.  My friend doesn’t let the kids get news toys unless they donate some (now that they are old enough to somewhat understand).  Before that she would take toys they hadn’t played with in months and donate them herself.  They rarely noticed something was missing.  I’m not sure how far you live from your in-laws/parents, but perhaps suggest that if they want to buy toys to store at their house so the kids have fun activities when they visit that they can do that.  If they have to store the toys themselves they may scale back the buying.  If they buy cheap quality toys, perhaps they will last longer because they don’t get as much use.  My mom has a bookshelf full of books/toys for the grandkids at her house, but I’m sure she doesn’t want that to grow, but the kiddos love it when they visit her.

    im trying to follow the clean mama schedule.  Yesterday got skipped with my trip to the city, but hopefully I can just make it Friday or it can wait until next week.  We’ll see how it goes.  It did get me to tackle my absolutely disgusting bathroom, so that’s a win.  
  • Yay @pirateduck for following the schedule! I looked at it, but I think I will have to tweak the days things are on based on our family schedule. Yesterday I did pick up clutter, finished the laundry, emptied and loaded the dishwasher, did the trash and recycling, swept and vacuumed. No clue how today will go as we have swimming lessons and I think DH and I will decorate the tree after bed time.
    _______________________________________________
    TTC#1 July 2015 
    • BFP: 9/16/15 — MC: 11/8/15 Blighted Ovum
    • BFP: 3/10/16 — Baby Girl born 11/20/16
    TTC#2 April 2019 
    • BFP: 9/12/19 — EDD 5/15/20

  • @m6agua I’m gonna try it for a bit, then tweak it so the most time consuming tasks fall on my days off work.  Instead of Sunday rest day I have Sunday for outside chores, since when I get home from work on weekdays now there’s not enough daylight left for outside chores.  I also have weekly tasks I already attempt added in, water plants, take out trash on trash day, drive to recycling center, drive to post office.  They are all easy enough but bad if I forget them and take a little time/planning.
  • According to clean mama today is the day I’m meant to mop my floors.  This is a job I literally NEVER do.  I have to confess it’s been months, maybe longer.  I just don’t see the point with two dogs and a husband that works in excavation, they are filthy again in 5 seconds.  I sweep and vacuum and spot clean, but hopefully after work I have enough energy to give it a go.  I did buy a new mop head recently before this renewed commitment to clean, so perhaps mopping is my destiny.
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