Cleaning (I know, exciting, right?)

Warning: this post is less exciting and more... informational. I know you usually stop by for the thrills, but this post is titled "Cleaning", so I guess if you've made it this far, you might as well carry on.
I don't know if it's just in my blood, if it comes from living with messy roommates for years, or if my professional-cleaning mother finally rubbed off on me, but I've realized since owning my own home that I tend to get a tad  OCD organized when it comes to cleaning.
My problem is, the way I clean generally looks like this. (From the scary perspective of inside my mind:)

The kitchen is dirty. I need to clean that.
No sense cleaning the kitchen until Dayen has a snack.
Shoot, this pantry is a mess. How old are these goldfish? I better clean this out while I'm at it.
Now I filled up the garbage. Better take that out.
Garbage day tomorrow. Take it alllll the way out to the curb.
Come back in. Forgot to empty the bathroom garbage. Might as well take that, and the office garbage out.
To the curb. Dang it.
I have passed this random fuzzy thing on the ground 50 times now but I'm just scared enough that it's a spider that I don't want to pick it up. Or get too close. Guess I'll just vacuum.
Everything. I'll vacuum everything since it's out.
Dayen finished his snack now.
And by finished, I mean he threw it on the ground. So out comes the vacuum again. I get him situated in his room, which I'm just now noticing needs to be dusted, and his toys need to be picked up for the thousandth time.
Do all that. Head to the kitchen because I'm starving, and realize it's a mess.
I should probably clean that.

Now I realize I'm probably a little crazier about this than your average bear. I know a lot of people just don't care about cleaning. But if you can empathize with me at all, then I have good news: I'm here to help.

A few months ago I was at a training with the wonderful photographers I work with. We were talking about goals, and one of the girls mentioned that she used to spend her entire weekends cleaning instead of with her family, so she started following a cleaning chart so that she could have weekends off.

After that, every Saturday that I found myself cleaning instead of hanging out with this cute family of mine, I thought of that. So I finally sat down and wrote out a cleaning chart, and made myself follow it.

Guys, I know how pathetic this is going to sound, but it seriously changed my life. Here's what my chart looks like:

I know it looks like a lot, but this was basically everything I was doing during the week anyway (only usually all at once, or more than once) PLUS all those things like pesky baseboards that I never got around to, because ain't nobody got time fo' that.

After the first week, I noticed a huge improvement. My house was all around a lot cleaner. When I did clean, I spent a lot less time every day. I finally got weekends all to myself. And best of all, whenever I noticed something was dirty, I just let it go. Because I knew I would end up cleaning whatever it was within a week. So I could keep focusing on whatever I was doing, rather than wondering how long it had been since I cleaned the toilet and worrying about it until it happened.

And it gets better: I don't follow it perfectly anymore. But because I've gotten good at doing almost everything on my list every day, I can skip a day here and there and not really notice. Like last week, we were on vacation Tuesday-Thursday. Rather than trying to do all those chores when we got back, I just left them for this week. No big deal, because they were all done the week before.

Go ahead and make fun of the cleaning nerd in me, but I have loved it. When I am struggling to want to clean that day, I just do my daily chore and then know I can be done for the day and still feel accomplished. Plus, did you notice? Those months with a 5th week, you don't have to do a monthly chore.

I know, it's the little things.

I finally got around to typing up my list, so I made a blank one for those of you who have been reading this post with rapt attention, because you can deny it, but I know you're out there. It took me awhile to get my schedule down in a way that worked for me, so feel free to steal things off my list or completely disregard it and find what works for you. I doubt anyone else out there has a booth in their kitchen with handmade pad covers that have to be washed monthly thanks to their messy two year old. (It doesn't take him an entire month to get them insanely messy, but that's when the magic of turning them over to the clean side comes into play!)



Feel free to steal this photo and print it off for yourself- it fits all on one page, or you can shrink it for 2 to a page and give one as a Father's Day gift this week. They will love it.

Just kidding. Don't take my advice on that.