I may not have gotten much further with Spring Cleaning, but I have surprised myself with how well I'm maintaining what I did get done. A lot of that actually comes from not allowing the rest of the family to fall back into their old habits.
ABSOLUTELY NO CLOTHES ON THE BATHROOM FLOORS. EVER. That's a new rule here. I'm sure other people have always had the rule and think I'm crazy, but it's just never been a rule.
I always encouraged people to not put them on the floor,.. but then the cat would decide they looked like a litter box and I'd get upset at the cat and at the kids or hubby... but it can ALL be avoided if they just STOP. Every bedroom has a hamper and there's a hamper just outside the bathroom door (no good place IN the bathroom to put one, but seriously, open the door and BOOM it's right there.)
I think the main bathroom looks pretty good now. So glad I got rid of the shelving unit that went around the toilet.
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| The girls have actually been using their personal shower caddies. It's solved SO many problems we had in this room. |
... In our master bathroom, since we just redid the floors (FINALLY) neither of us wants to see it all cluttered, so neither of us has let anything just fall on the floor and stay there. Our hamper is over my the walk in closet, so we do have to take clothes from the bathroom to the hamper, but it's just a couple steps and a toss. So far we've both been keeping it uncluttered, and I am happy to see it stay that way.
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| I know the counter is cluttered, but there's a mouse that keeps getting under the sink, so I don't want to store anything under there. I can't wait to get my new vanity. My cats need to work harder at actually mousing! |
Another thing that's really helped is my keeping up with the laundry, so hampers never really overflow.
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| How the laundry room look currently |
I managed to get it ALL done, so I could actually spring clean the
laundry room... and I've long been in the habit of doing laundry during
my breaks at work. So, when I don't have laundry in the laundry room to
wash, I get a little twitchy LOL.
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| All baskets are empty except the one for me and Christopher and the towels one. Those will get folded on my next break. |
If I don't do laundry at least once a day, the whole day feels OFF.
So, I am constantly hollering at the girls to bring me their hampers.
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| It's so weird to have the sorters empty more often that not! |
The sorters are usually empty though since all the hampers together
usually just make up about 2 loads, maybe 3 if there's blankets and
sheets too. But usually 2 loads gets everything.
(I don't sort
anything when I wash it. I wash everything in cold water together. If
some whites start looking dingy, I'll do one special load of whites, but
it's rare.)
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| The upper shelves have quite a bit of give-away stuff I need to bag up and take to the car so it can go to the thrift store. I've already taken so much stuff. Less clothes = less laundry hehe. |
When the clothes are dry, I sort them into the baskets of who they
belong to, then I pester and nag them until they come get their baskets.
Then I pester and nag them until they bring back the empty baskets.
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| I keep the sheets to our bed on this shelf so it's easier to grab them to change the bed, and seeing them there reminds me I do actually need to change them once a week. |
I actually have them all trained pretty well now. I just have to tell
them to get their baskets, and they come get them and usually even bring
them right back, emptied. I'm sure they're just dumping them on their
bed or in a pile on their floor... but that's their prerogative.
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| The picnic, Dollywood, and lake bags. Yay! |
Their whole lives, I have showed them how to put their clothes away,
purged their clothes, bought extra dressers, put away their clothes FOR
them,.. if they want to sort through a pile of wrinkled clean clothes
every morning, then go for it.
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| These sock drawers are STUFFED. I do need to go through them and purge a ton of them. When I cleaned up in here, I found so MANY socks! The egg cartons are for Faelyn starting seedlings. She's our little gardener (not so little.) |
Eventually they'll get tired of it and act like normal humans LOL. I can't wait to see how living in a dorm affects Rhiannon and her laundry habits.
The kitchen is simply an ongoing process. The dishes are seriously never ending. I don't think I've EVER gotten ALL the dishes clean at ONE TIME. There's always a dirty dish, somewhere. I just try to keep up with it, so the dishwasher gets emptied quickly and it's ready for more dirty dishes, then run it as soon as it's full... which does not take long at all. it's unreal. There was a time before we had a dishwasher, that I got rid of all dishes except one per person and everything was color coded. This was great until each kid had a friend over for dinner every other night and we'd have family drop in etc. I should have had special "company" dishes, but I wasn't thinking clearly... I had 4 little kids at home. Some day I was lucky to think at all.
So, I know less dishes doesn't really lessen the issue, it just makes more complications. Thank GOD for my dishwasher! Having a place for everything definitely helps too. The Hoosier cabinet has been another Godsend. It holds all the baking dishes, the crock pot, the waffle maker, basket of dish cloths and dish towels, stand and hand mixer, all the thermoses, the lunch boxes, all the lunch snacks and plastic silverware and lunch bags, all my cook books and all the huge stock pots. I've seen some Hoosiers on blogs that are like just for show and they have vintage collectables and stuff in them, but I USE mine. Serious workhorse.
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| That's the empty hamper that needs to go back to the hallways in front of the bathroom. |
The living room is usually not TOO bad, especially now that winter is over and there's not a dozen blankets all over it every night. The biggest issue is the dogs and their "accidents". The elderly dog is the biggest issue, and bless his heart, I know he can't help it, but man is it annoying. I am SO glad we have vinyl flooring in the living room though. The mopping just never really ends. I've really got to get the dusting done in there. Oh! That reminds me! Flylady has the original style feather duster back in stock with the purple feathers and it has an expandable handle! It's 30 bucks, but I want it so bad. Maybe I'll finagle some room in the budget and have the family get it for me for Mothers' Day :) Then once the room is dusted well, I can maintain that with the feather duster.
So, yeah that's it for maintaining right now. I'm actually *really* proud of my master bedroom, but I never seem to get pics of it. I'll do a separate post on it, and my office are and the master closet.
