Quick fix for a clean home

Christmas, New Year, holiday season, friends on a visit, calendar full of parties, eating out and having fun – what happens to the house. Cleaning up is an ugly business, anyway and with so much else to do, cleaning the house is the last thing on my mind.

Here’s a quick fix guide – never mind the short cuts, after all - you need to come back to comfort to a clean house after a busy day.

No perfection business:

One is usually stressed out thinking of a perfect home - shining floor, spic and span furniture, newspapers in the rack, playthings in a bucket , etc that would speak out for the abilities of the home maker. No way. Even if it is a very difficult thing to let go off, one must not harp too much for perfection, which is not possible, all the more so

if you are going to be busy enjoying yourself and running around. Sometimes you might just have push in all the papers into the cupboard and close the door on the entire lot, or just look away from that one bedroom, which always doubles up as your store room, especially at such hurried times.

Do not hoard, DISCARD:

If you are an obsessive hoarder, then what you need is therapy. Start with consciously deciding to discard 10 things that you do not need, every day, for a week. Another self-check is to reflect – ‘Did I ever use that old bag ever in the last one year or even 2, 3 or 5 years’. If you didn’t, then obviously, you will never ever do so.

The same goes with things that need repair and so you put them away, hoping to mend them. Get a bag ready and keep adding to it all the things that are contributing to clutter as you move around the house getting it into shape. When you have some time at hand, sit, contemplate, consider and come to a decision. Better discard than hoard.

How organised can you get:

I read somewhere – like you have an address, each thing in your home needs to have an address and should be returned to its place after it has been used. But, alas, half the clean up involves returning things to their assigned places. It cannot be done in a day.

When will your chest of drawers come to help? Stock a couple of drawers with things you know are important and will be missed if you can’t find them that are currently away from their designated places. As and when you get time, you quickly get them back to their addresses.

What is the immediate task at hand?

So you have the dishes and laundry, cleaning and mopping, cleaning the toilets, dusting and cleaning up the mess on the kitchen platform, clearing the newspapers and the dining table. Remember majority of clutter is superficial and once the strewn around newspapers and magazines are in place and the dried laundry that needs to be ironed and folded lying on the bed is put away from sight – half the cleaning up is done.

If the time is less, then choose to do the dishes - as a sink full of dirty vessels is not a pleasant sight after all, laundry can wait. Cleaning can be done and mopping can be restricted to the living room that is more in use. The secret lies in prioritising.