How I Clean My House

Since I was on the road/in the bay area all day yesterday, today became my house cleaning day. Normally Saturday is my cleaning day, a habit I’ve been trying to work on.

I recently took a “What’s Your Cleaning Personality?” quiz, and I got The Procrastinator. “Congratulations! You get that there’s more to life than cleaning. For you, cleaning is a last-minute, get-it-done-as-guests-walk-in-the-door type of affair.”

Since then I’ve been trying to be good about getting into a cleaning routine, and so far it’s been working quite well. Here’s how I do it.

1. First I go through every room and clean the surfaces. I start in the master bedroom/bathroom and work my way forward.
2. Once I finish cleaning the living room, I go back and vacuum the floors.
3. After vacuuming, I Swiffer and then steam mop the kitchen and laundry room floors.

A couple of tips I’ve learned along the way…

1. Start with the surfaces.
When I was a kid I used to put everything on my bed, dresser, etc. and clean the floors first; then I would tackle the surfaces. This continued on into my adult stage until I read an article about starting with the surfaces and finishing with the floors.

The idea behind it is that when you’re cleaning surfaces you’re knocking particles onto the ground; if you do this before the floors then you vacuum up any debris that fell on the floor.

2. Multitask.
I first start cleaning in the bathrooms. I put toilet bowl cleaner in both toilets, and I spray them down with antibacterial spray, letting that sit while I clean everything else. Once I’ve cleaned the surfaces in the bedroom and bathrooms I go back and give the toilets a final scrub.

3. Turn weekly tasks into daily tasks.
I use Method’s Daily Shower Spray after I shower everyday, so when it comes to cleaning the bathroom on the weekend, the shower is one less area I have to worry about. I do, however, give the shower a spray-down with Clorox Bleach Foamer once a month.

I also wipe down the counters in the kitchen and in the bathroom daily. I still give the bathroom counters a good wipe down at the end of the week, but the quick daily run-over makes the job a lot easier.

Products I Use

1. Method Antibacterial Bathroom Cleaner
2. Method Daily Shower Spray
3. Clorox Bleach Foamer
4. Method Antibacterial Toilet Bowl Cleaner
5. Dyson DC25 Animal Ball Vacuum Cleaner
6. Method Glass + Surface
7. Method Antibacterial Kitchen Cleaner
8. Method Wood For Good Polish
9. Method Wood For Good Daily Cleaner
10. Shark Vac-Then-Steam MV2010
11. Microfiber Cloths
12. Swiffer Dusters
13. Swiffer Sweeper