Do you feel like it’s a constant battle to keep your house clean?
You just cleaned the house … again. Everything was so nice and tidy and put-together when you went to bed last night. You must have spent an hour putting away the toys that were strewn around the house. So how can it be that before lunch the house is trashed again?
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Or, maybe it’s more like this:
You’ve been hustling all day, trying to keep up with the kids, but they just make mess after mess. While you’re making everyone a PB&J for lunch, your friend calls, or your mother-in-law calls and she’s coming over for a quick visit.
Uh-Oh! The house is a mess.
When you look around, you see toys, blankies, socks, a random t-shirt, shoes, granola bar wrappers, and a myriad of other things scattered about the house.
Shoot! I’ve gotta get the house clean fast … again.
These are perfect times for the 10-Minute Tidy to help you keep your house clean.
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Do A 10-Minute Tidy To Keep Your House Clean
Can you relate to this? When you live with kids, your house frequently gets trashed! You stay very busy throughout the day moving from one activity to another. After breakfast, and some free-play it’s time to start pulling out all the schoolwork (if you do schooling), or games, crafts, and toys. Typically one activity doesn’t get fully picked up and put away before moving to the next activity. Then it’s time to leave it all and run to swim lessons, preschool, the grocery store, a play date, or whatever. We end up just walking away from all the books, games, toys and supplies that are left out.
This is how people in a house all day long can create a pretty big disaster. This is exactly what happens in my home every … single … day.
But, by learning to do a 10-Minute Tidy, you can keep your house clean and recover quickly from these moments.
What Is A 10-Minute Tidy?
A 10-Minute Tidy is really just 10 minutes that you take at strategic times of the day in order to pick things up. When you hustle for those 10 minutes you can get a crazy amount of cleaning done. This is a surface-cleaning routine, not a deep-cleaning routine.
It’s also something the kids pitch in on, so they’re learning important skills about keeping the house clean, taking responsibility for their own messes and helping others.
When To Do A 10-Minute Tidy
With a little bit of planning, you CAN keep your house clean. It’s important to do a 10-Minute Tidy at strategic times throughout the day. Pick however many times you need in order to maintain the level of tidiness that you want. We all have a different amount of chaos that we can live with, so this is your choice here. It will be most effective if you make it something you do every single day at the same times. Some ideas:
- Right Before snack
- Before each meal
- Before watching tv or tablets
- After a big activity
- At every transition
- Before getting out a fun activity
- At specific hours of the day
- Before going on a play date
How To Do A 10-Minute Tidy
- Gather the troops – There is no reason that this needs to be a Mom-heavy job. It’s pretty clear that the smaller people in the house made most of the messes, so they definitely need to be a big part of the cleaning up.
- Identify the goals – Sometimes the focus needs to be on just one or two rooms, and sometimes it needs to be on the whole house – you decide. Part of this is determined by just how much mess has accumulated.
- Pass out jobs – Assign everyone a specific area, or items to clean up, if necessary.
- Clean for 10 Minutes – Set an alarm, and hustle, hustle, hustle. Start by putting away everything that has been left out. Make sure it gets fully put away, not just moved somewhere else. This is a great timer to help give the kids a visual way to track the time.
- Turn on some music – Pick something rowdy and upbeat, to keep everyone positive.
- Give lots of encouragement – Especially when you’re first starting out, praise everyone as you go.
- Go, Go, Go – Work hard and fast, teach the littles to work fast too.
- Praise, Praise Praise – When the 10 minutes is up, give everyone a high-5 and a thank you.
Progress, Not Perfection
You can accomplish a lot in 10 minutes of hustle and will love to see your progress. But, sometimes after the 10 minutes, you look around and think, “It’s not quite done.” Keep in mind, that’s OK. Just do another one in an hour or two. You may find that you need to do these sessions several times per day. No problem, just repeat the steps each time and be happy with the results. Appreciate what you accomplished and let go of the things you didn’t get to.
When you’ve got messy people living with you, it is so hard to keep everything tidy and cleaned up, but by instituting the 10-Minute Tidy throughout the day you can keep your house clean. You will feel so much better about your home and your family will be learning along the way about keeping things clean.
More resources to help with keeping your house clean
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