katiefleck's Unofficial Guide to Surviving 3 or more children under the age of 6
Volume 3: Cleaning
One of my all-time favorite quotes is:
"Cleaning your house while your kids are still growing up is like shoveling the walk before it stops snowing." -Phyllis DillerIn other words, you're not going to have a completely clean house until you pack your youngest off to college. My kids have proved Chaos Theory here many times. And who wants to clean when there are babies to snuggle and chubby toddlers to chase? But since no one wants to live in messy, dirty house, compromises have to be made. If anyone here is a fan of FlyLady, some of this may seem familiar (more on her later). I'm going to discuss my cleaning routine, if you want clutter help check out FlyLady or go to Kym's, she just wrote an excellent post on organization.
Before I begin, I'd like to tackle the idea of "Have the Kids Help." This sounds good in theory but if you give little kids sponges and a bucket of soapy water, in five minutes you will be changing their clothes, mopping up their mess, and retrieving the sponges from the top of the book shelf. Save the majority of "Have the Kids Help" ideas for school aged children.
However.... At these ages, the kids are still willing to do anything you make sound fun so this is the best time to get them used to helping around the house. Imagine the frustrating fight that would ensue if you sprung a list of chores on a sullen pre-teen. So the trick is to pick very easy tasks without messy consequences if they goof or forget. Like making their beds (my kids call it "flattening the sheets"), dusting (not the breakables if you haven't taken my advice and packed them away), folding laundry (not sorting before wash, they will toss a red shirt in with your whites!), putting their non-breakable dishes in the dishwasher after meals (I threaten to not feed them their next meal if they don't do this one), putting their dirty clothes in the hamper (an easy night time ritual). And of course, picking up their toys. Do that one before meal time, they'll be hungry and pick up faster!
Here's my best suggestions to keep a relatively clean home but yet have time to enjoy those little kids.
- Do a little bit every day all day long. After every meal I immediately fill the dishwasher and wipe everything in the kitchen down. Spending 5 minutes a few times saves me from a half hour (or longer) clean up at the end of the day when I'd rather veg out on the sofa with the kids and their library books. Along this same theory, when I leave a room, I'll grab a couple of misplaced items and put them back where they belong.
- Do one big weekly cleaning session. Borrowed from FlyLady's Weekly Home Blessing Her plan lasts about an hour but with kid interruptions, mine is usually spread out over a morning. Make a list of 6 or 7 things that need done at least once a week and then pick a day to do them. My day is usually Thursday morning and my list is: mop & sweep the floors, vacuum, dust, water the plants, take out the trash, and bathrooms. You'll probably find yourself doing a few of those tasks more often during the week but it's a relief to know it'll get done at least once later so you can go back to kissing those cute baby cheeks now.
- Simplify. Get rid of clutter, you'll have less to clean up and around. Use less products, I mainly use 4: Clorox wipes, powder Comet, Windex, and Pledge. There are all sorts of fancy products out there but I've found that Comet and a damp sponge work better and faster than all those sprays. If you have special floors (Pergo mops up with hot water!) or surfaces then use what they suggest but in most cases try to get by with less. Less is more! Unless it's dandelions picked by your 2 year old.
- Accept it's not going to be perfect. The idea is to have a healthy "clean enough" house and plenty of time to enjoy your children. Sure the light fixtures may be "frosted" (my term for dusty) and there's some cobwebs along the ceiling but those never killed anyone. Pick the areas that are a priority for you to be clean (mine are the kitchen and bathrooms) and let the other things slide (like fingerprints on windows and dust on the mini-blinds). There will be lots of time to keep those clean when the kids are out of the house. *sobs*
Or do what I ultimately would love to do: Hire a maid!
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