Housekeeping
O ne of my most common worries as a young wife was that someone would come by our house unannounced. Why? Because I had no idea how to keep our house clean. If someone was going to come over, I wanted at least enough warning to throw all our laundry in the bathtub and our dirty dishes in our car trunk.
Yes, I did that on occasion.
There. I said it. No, that was not an April Fool’s Joke.
Gulp.
I definitely had times where I lived with C.H.A.O.S.
{as Fly lady would say, Can’t Have Anyone Over Syndrome}.
Was I a hoarder? No.
Was my house completely out of control? No.
Would the health department have condemned us? No.
But, our house did get pretty messy sometimes.
I didn’t know about daily routines or keeping my house clean enough.
My two most difficult to manage cleaning challenges were probably similar to what we all face:
1) the dishes
2) our laundry.
Back then, we’d work or go to school all day, come home, fix dinner and then sit down late at night in front of our video recording of Days of Our Lives (um, ok, don’t judge. There weren’t that many options for good TV back in the day, right?).
Somehow, I missed the memo about my mom not being there after I was married to clean up the kitchen for me any more. Doh, I don’t know what I was thinking.
The next day when we headed off to work, the dinner dishes were still there on the counter. Annnnd, our laundry was piling up in the bathroom. I may or may not have been saving it for Saturday.
By Saturday, we were in C.H.A.O.S. Laundry piled high, dishes still waiting to go in the dishwasher (gah, we had a dishwasher and it didn’t occur to me to load it every night? I may not have had a fancy new dishwasher like I have now, but I HAD a dishwasher!). Saving my daily chores until Saturday was not working for me at all.
Thankfully I found Fly Lady and became a believer in daily house cleaning routines. When I finally started cleaning our hot spots like the kitchen DAILY instead of weekly, or doing our laundry every day or two instead of weekly … life was different. At first it felt like cleaning every day took a lot of time, until it became a regular part of our daily routine. Then it was second nature.
Suddenly we could have company at shorter notice, our housekeeping had a rhythm we could manage. And people could come over on short notice.
Do I still like people to call before they come over?
Yes. I do like some warning.
Is my house perfect?
No. Never.
Houses are for living!
Remember THIS scene in my family room turned playground?
And how could I forget THIS crazy but typical week in my life?
Time for a little CHAOS confession here.
Do you ever hide your dirty dishes when guests are on their way?
Don’t worry, we won’t laugh too hard. Confession is good for the soul.
PS. The above photo is my kitchen last summer, before my microwave handle broke off, the whole microwave stopped working and the freezer started making a mysterious clanging sound. Ha, so don’t be jealous of my new dishwasher. My other appliances might look pretty enough in the pictures, but they are dying before my eyes.
This post is part of a series sponsored by Electrolux as part of Homebuzz. I received an Electrolux appliance in exchange for my participation. The opinions stated in this post are my own. My old dishwasher is being donated to a worthy cause.
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My mother-in-law likes to show up unannounced and she lives 500miles away…. after numerous occasions of her coming into my pig pen of a house I realized SOMETHING needed to change. Either my husband needed to tell his mom she needs to give some notice or I need to have a clean house all the time. I went with the first option… that didn’t work so now I am on the latter. I clean up a little every day rather than one big clean on Saturdays… She would usually pick Thursday or Friday which are the messiest rather than tidy Sunday.
When my parents had their house reappraised about ten years back they couldn’t exactly keep the door to the master bedroom closed. So they filled the trunk of the car with all of the excess from the living room. They stashed a bunch of stuff in boxes and bins and tucked them into closets, basement, garage…. And then they took all the unfolded but clean clothes, spread them out on the bed, and laid the comforter over them so it just looked like a very fluffy bed. Needless to say I take after them and am fighting an uphill battle.
Mixed Strategy Household recently posted..The Kinky Play Party
I’m in love with the platter to the left of your oven! It’s similar to what I’ve been looking for to use in my kitchen.
It is from DaySpring! I love it too!
the one thing I have mastered is clean enough. Clothes go in pretty hampers and dishes go in the dishwasher. Having 4 kids means ALWAYS having someone handy to unload the clean dishwasher so the dirty ones have a place to go. SHUTTING cabinet and closet doors and drawers always makes a room look neater too!
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I usually fill the sink with soapy water like I am in the middle of doing dishes even though I have a dishwasher, that too needs to be unloaded. I can give a quick spray on the countertops with simple green and all is good with the world.
I love flylady! Kelly
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Love Flylady’s routines concept, but I can’t handle all the emails. I’m still struggling to get a handle on daily routines, after 8 years of marriage. Some weeks, I do really great, others, I’m horrible. I don’t think I’ve stashed dishes more than once or twice. Having a dishwasher helps with that. We run it every night, and I put nearly everything in it.
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Twitter: Najac
says:
It’s the pile of mail that gets me down. I’ve got a husband who won’t file or through them away until the pile is high enough….I still stash mail in a cabinet when company comes.
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Thank you for this gentle reminder Melissa…when I get busy it’s easy to forget how important it is to stick to my daily house routines! Time to get back to them now.
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I try to straighten the house up every morning before I leave for work, but sometimes, I still have to throw all the dirty dishes haphazardly into the dishwasher just to get them out of sight and I still to all my laundry on Saturday. But, hey, I’ve been married less than a year, I’m still new to this.
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My home is more organized and cleaner than anyone’s I know, but I still love in CHAOS! I worry that I will have to answer the door with no makeup on or while wearing my comfy around-the-house clothes. I do read Flylady’s daily emails. I already have established cleaning habits, so it makes me feel great to read the daily chore and know that already did that. I like to clean more thoroughly than Flylady though. It drives me crazy when she says it doesnt have to be perfect. Why should I bother doing something half-way when I can do it correctly with very little additional time? It is nice to ne reminded of the non-daily habits though. I like Flylady’s rule of getting dressed to the shoes every morning, but it’s a habit I am still trying to form. Oh, and please dont think I am Mrs Perfectly Organized. You should see my car! We all have our areas of weakness.
When I was a newlywed I also couldn’t get a handle on the dishes or laundry. We had a generously sized laundry room which unfortunately meant that I would shove laundry through the washer and dryer and then pile up clean clothes on the ground because hey, I could shut the door! But the dishes were a whole different story. We did not have a dishwasher and the dishes were out of control. One day the dishes were overflowing from both sides of the sink and were all over the counter. When I finally buckled down to tackle the mountain of dishes, I found that the sink was leaking into the cabinet below and water was quickly pooling. I called my landlord but then panicked. The dirty dishes! I shoved them all into the oven. I thought it was the perfect solution … but I completely forgot they were in there. A few days later I preheated the oven and melted all of my plastic mixing bowls and serving spoons.
This was really a kick in the pants for me. Not only did I actually start doing dishes after the oven fiasco, but I never again lived in a place without a dishwasher.
I absolutely loved this blog! I guess growing up with a live-in Bulgarian grandmother who swept the floors several times a day, one goes on to adulthood 1)a neat freak of varying proportions or 2) one who completely ignores housekeeping….until others start to notice your messy/dirty house and tell you about it. LOL! I, for better or worse, became more of a neat freak.
I learned how to “do a little every day” way back when. Even when our two boys were small I did a bit of housekeeping daily. Did stuff ever pile up? Of course…we are human after all
But my “system” worked most of the time. In fact I’ve taught my “system” to people for housekeeping, record-keeping, organizing etc. Some people scoff, but hey, it’s worked for me for nearly 34 years of marriage and yes, for the most part, if someone calls to say they’ll be over in 5 minutes, or if they drop by totally unannounced, our home is usually ready for visitors. My favorite comment is from a lady who stopped by to pick up something at our house. She didn’t say anything while there but when she came back a couple days later she said, “I told my friend I’d been in your house and that it positively glowed!” Oooh…I loved that lady 
I can’t tell you everything about my “system” but one of the keys is music! Put on a CD that gets you happy and go to town cleaning, organizing, laundering, whatever. Life without music is hardly a life at all
P.S. I only had a dishwasher for a couple of years. When it broke we never replaced it. I actually found it easier
I’ve hesitated to do Fly Lady because the last time I checked her out I felt TERRIBLE when I didn’t do the stuff I was “supposed” to do. I’m wondering if that was just the phase of life I was in at the time as a newlywed… One would hope after 6 years of marriage and “homekeeping” while working full time that I’ve learned at least a couple of tricks.
But I confess I never thought of putting laundry in the trunk of the car. That? Is brilliant.
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Next time switch it out, dirty clothes in the car, dishes in the bathtub, with hot water run over them to let them soak while you have company. *Ahem. Not that I have ever done anything like that…. Once, I was at my sisters and found dishes in her dryer – lol!
I had this exact same problem when we were newly married! There may or may not have been an instance where dh had to drag a small plastic laundry hamper or dishes out to the lawn so we could use the hose to spray them off…
Now, I am so thankful for my bigger than a dinner plate sink, dishwasher, and I have learned that cleaning as you go really does actually save time and stress!
Ok, I am poking and poking around here….I’ve been reading you for a long time cuz some old posts are very familiar!! Either way, I have a renewed interest in home caring (I finally have some TIME to devote to it and I refuse to do it in any way that doesn’t bring me JOY, plus we’ve moving soon and starting a new chapter!) so I’m loving reading your stuff….I am a Fly Lady fan, too. Thanks for the inspiration–I’ve gotta “get my Fly Lady back on” AND pick up my old Alexandra Stoddard books–maybe that’s what I’ll do for myself for Mother’s Day!!
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I too love FLYLADY! She’s most definitely a kindred spirit! In fact, one of the sections in one of my books (circa 1997-2000) has an “Order from Chaos” chapter which I’ve since turned into an series on our blog. Sooo, I guess this means you’re also a kindred spirit!
Warmly,
Tracey
Tracey McBride~Frugal Luxuries ® recently posted..Garden of Earthly Delights- Planning and Inspiration
Thank you for mentioning Flylady on your blog! I had never heard of her before and her simple routines and habits are changing my life!