January's Project: Simplifying my Cleaning Routine

Keeping the house clean takes longer than it should, even though I don't have that much stuff and it's only a two bedroom apartment. Being busy gets the better of me, and I put off chores until the house is a wreck. I then spend my entire day off cleaning, which is no fun for anybody. Some people genuinely enjoy housework. I am not one of them. So, in order to make more room in my life for living, I am going to minimalize my housework.

I'm already working on my cleaning products, so it's time to tackle the chores themselves. Regularity is the key to simplicity in this case, and so I will try and come up with a regular schedule for each chore so it doesn't consume my rare day off.

Weekly Chore Schedule:

Monday: Dusting sucks, but somebody has to do it. Lucky me!

Tuesday: I usually have half of the day free on Tuesdays, so this large block of time is devoted to my least favorite task: laundry. While the clothes are going, I will work on general tidying up and and hopefully gathering up more stuff to give away.

Wednesday: Thursday is garbage day, so I will gather up all of the trash and recycling to take out on Wednesday night.

Thursday: I also usually have half days on Thursdays, so I will use this time to clean the bathroom, as well as any residual laundry left over from Tuesday.

Friday: I have a bad habit of forgetting to use food that I buy, and I don't want this to happen. On Fridays I will take an inventory of the fridge, clean out anything that's gone bad, and plan meals for the next week. I will also do a general tidying up of the kitchen. This is a good day for it, since we usually go out for dinner, and I won't be dealing with cooking on top of the rest of it.

Saturday: I will get the grocery shopping done on Saturday. It has to happen fairly early in the morning because the supermarkets around here are a madhouse on the weekends.

Sunday: On Sundays I will attend to the floors. I love my hardwood floors but they show dirt and dust so easily. I guess it keeps me honest, but it requires regular maintenance. Once a week should work well.

A few other general habits:

• I once heard somebody say that you should never leave a room empty-handed, which I've found to be extremely true. There's always something that isn't where it belongs, and this helps to combat the chaos. I don't do this as often as I should, but I will make an effort to tidy up as I go about my daily life.
• My mother absolutely refuses to go to bed with dishes in the sink. I try to do this, but it's much easier when you own a dishwasher like she does. From now on, the dishes will be clean before I go to sleep, no exceptions.
• I will look for ways to make chores more fun, whether it's listening to music while I clean, or trying to get my fiance in on the action.

The goal here is to keep chores from overwhelming my life. As it is, whenever I'm not cleaning something, I feel guilty that I'm letting my house be messy. With the schedule, I know that everything will be done in a timely fashion. Once my chore of the day is complete, the guilt will be gone and I can enjoy a walk in the park, a good book, or a long phone conversation with an old friend. I'll report back after my first week of the chore schedule to see how it's going.