Keeping the House Tidy

Among the several positions the domestic artist holds, housekeeper is certainly a big one. Having things neat, dinner cooking, with dessert in the oven- and don't forget about kids being happy- helps every evening to go well.

One of my tidying tricks is to always grab something as I'm walking through a room. Going from the kitchen to our bedroom, I'll check on the laundry and see if anything needs to be transferred or put away. If I'm going upstairs, I'll grab anything kid related, since that's where their bedroom and playroom are.

Picking up little things all day makes the great pick up at the end of the day much more bearable. Some chores are considerably less daunting if you can do them bit by bit throughout the day.

Every day (sometimes twice) when the Roomba's charged, I run around the house (downstairs one day, upstairs the next), and get everything off the floor so Ruthie (that's our Roomba) can vacuum while I'm making lunch and getting the kids settled for naps and quiet time. I have the kids get the toys (we have a no [more like very few] toys outside of the playroom rule, so there's mostly just baby toys strewn about) and I do mostly everything else.

If there's kids clothes or shoes, I set them on the stairs to take up once I have a nice pile.

Before: Super messy kids area!!

After: Here's the stairs (with my 2 year old) and the playroom, after every container in the playroom had been emptied! It took us about thirty minutes to get everything completely picked up.

Right now, the only thing on the floor is the pile of laundry in my bedroom that I'm about to tackle... Which Ruthie just tried to eat. :)

Once you're able to find your cleaning groove, you'll be super pleased with the results!

-Melanie