The Best Ways to Clean Your Home

Hello World!  Welcome Friends!  Let’s face it — few of us look forward to laundry day. While there might be psychological perks to tidying your pad, the process isn’t much fun. You need the best ways to clean your home so you can bid farewell to the mess with less stress.

Fortunately, streamlining your routine isn’t difficult. It requires a bit of mindfulness to determine the best practices at first, making it sustainable in the long term. What tips should you keep in mind? Here are five of the best ways to clean your home.

1. Go Chemical-Free

Many people mistakenly believe they need an arsenal of commercial products to clean their homes. However, many contain VOCs that can cause adverse health effects like headaches and upper respiratory distress. There’s a better way — you can make most of what you need from common, inexpensive and non-toxic materials.

You don’t need a specialty product for each surface. For example, many countertops wipe clean with a little soap and water, and bleach-based cleansers may damage them. Here are some recipes to cover many of your common cleaning tasks:

• All-purpose cleaner: Disinfect countertops, clean some floor surfaces like tile and sheet vinyl and wipe slightly sticky objects clean. Mix one-half double-strength cleaning vinegar with water. Add a few drops of clear dish soap and citrus peels or a few drops of bergamot essential oil for fragrance.

• Furniture polish: Mix a teaspoon of Castile soap and one cup of olive oil. Spray onto a cloth, wipe on your tables and chairs and wipe off with a clean rag.

• Rug and furniture refresher: Mix a few drops of your favorite essential oil with a cup of baking soda in a mason jar, shake and leave overnight. Sprinkle on rugs and soft couches and vacuum.

• Tub and oven cleanser: Mix baking soda with water to make a paste. You can add a dash of salt to your oven cleanser for baked-on messes if it won’t scratch the surface.

• Mold cleaner: Hydrogen peroxide kills mold and is non-toxic. Spray on affected areas thoroughly. Peroxide also laps up some of the germs vinegar misses, so consider giving your countertops a one-two punch for ultimate disinfection.

2. Get on a Schedule

Here’s the problem with waiting to clean until you “feel like it” — dust and debris are impatient. They build up while you binge Netflix, and by the time you go to tackle the mess, it’s gotten so out-of-hand that it overwhelms you.

Your ultimate cleaning hack might be establishing a fixed schedule for certain tasks. It’s easy to leave the sheets unwashed for a month unless you get into the habit of doing so each week.

Hang a weekly to-do list on the refrigerator and add your share to your planner. Make it sustainable — instead of tackling everything in one day, perhaps clean the kitchen on Wednesday and the bathrooms on Thursday.

3. Use Shortcuts

Getting on your hands and knees to scrub grout is a spring cleaning task. There’s no need to get down and dirty every week as long as you cover the basics with a few shortcuts.

For example, you can wash your air fryer basket and other small appliance components like your microwave’s plate in your dishwasher. You don’t even have to feel guilty, as today’s dishwashers are so efficient they use less water than hand washing, making it more eco-friendly.

Likewise, you might scrub the hidden corners of your tile only once a month or so. The same goes for ripping apart furniture and vacuuming every crevice. A quick once-over with a Swiffer and the lint roller might be all you need for a weekly cleanup, saving more vigorous scrubbing for a few times a year.

4. Rally the Troops

It’s disheartening that women still do two hours more housework each day than their male counterparts. It’s time for a healthy discussion of expectations in your partnership — after all, the split should be closer to 50/50 if you both work full-time.

Remember that weekly chore chart? It doesn’t only contain your share. You can use it to assign tasks to each family member, although you’ll get more cooperation if you discuss the division of labor first. Each individual can put a checkmark next to their tasks as they complete them, saving you the mental work of managing when and how everything gets finished.

5. Decrease Your Workload

There’s a reason that “minimalism” is a trending buzzword, and it isn’t because people have stopped craving stuff. However, more people now realize that their possessions also own them — in terms of the time and labor they take to maintain. Is it really worth having all those knick-knacks if it takes you three hours every week to dust them?

Reduce your cleaning workload by practicing one-in, one-out living. What’s that? It’s the concept of recycling, donating or repurposing an old item each time you bring something new home. Getting everyone in your household on board can be rough, but it helps if you set boundaries. Explain to your family members that they’re responsible for anything they purchase, including the cleaning and maintenance, to help get them on board.

Best Ways to Clean Your Home

Cleaning your home isn’t anyone’s idea of fun. What are some of the best ways to do so with the least fuss and stress?

These five tips help you keep your home clean the best way — with minimal effort. Once you streamline your routine, you’ll be amazed at how little effort it takes to tidy your castle.

Click the links below for any posts you have missed:

11 Ways to Upcycle Your Office Furniture

A Step-by-Step Guide to Designing a Dreamy Bedroom

6 Space-Saving Solutions For Your Living Room

Beyond the Obvious: Unexpected Factors Affecting Indoor Air Quality

The Ultimate Guide to HVAC Maintenance: Tips for Keeping Your System Running Smoothly

How to Help Your Kids Make the Most Out of the Garden

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Thanks for stopping by!  Have a wonderful day/night depending on where you are in the world!  Go with God and remember to be kind to one another!

Toodles,

Between Naps on the Porch