Hate to clean but need to get organized? Here's a ten step way that saves time and footsteps!
- Start in one corner of the room, and move in a circle around the room, picking up any items on the floor, or on the back of chairs as you walk along, including little knick-knacks and anything out of place.
- Pick up and place things into small piles, one for each room where they belong.
- Pick up each little pile in order, once you have picked up everything scattered in the room, and take it to its room.
- Put things away in their right place as you pick them up if it's in the same room. There is no point making a pile, unless you have to walk to a different room. Look at it this way, do you want to pick it up twice, once to pick it up and once to carry it to a different room, or do you want to fall victim of the greatest time waster of walking from one end of your house to the other time and time again just to put something away when you can take the whole pile with you.
- Get into a routine. As you walk around the room pick up items as you go along, then dust, vacuum, and then organize.
- Vacuum after you dust, otherwise the dust will settle and you'll have to do it again. Nothing will give a better impression of a clean room than freshly-vacuumed rugs. Don’t bother vacuuming the curtains or the upholstery. It will take too much time and it will pull you away from other, more important tasks.
- Dust the furniture, starting with anything that is dark wood, as dust shows more clearly on dark surfaces. Don’t use a dry rag; instead, buy wood cleaners or simply use a wet rag in warm water and a mild soap. Cleaning this way will prevent dust from flying around the room as you clean.
- Buy, or make, cleaning solutions that can be sprayed on and require no scrubbing. This way, you can spray them on and move on to clean somewhere else while you wait for the chemicals to work on a particular surface. Come around later and simply mop the dirt away.
- Stand in a corner of the room and pick up everything that's basically in the "square" and put it away so that one spot's spick and span. Then move on to the next little "square" and do the same. It's quite fun because you can see your progress behind you.
- Spray air freshener for a crisp, clean scent!
