A Virtuous Woman Cooks and Cleans

• Who can find a virtuous woman?  her price is far above rubies
• She looketh well to the ways of her household
• She eateth not the bread of idleness

Today's task on the 30-Day House Cleaning Challenge at Money Saving Mom was to surface or deep clean the kitchen and/or living room.

Since I've been doing the challenge, my house is staying so clean, I pretty much surface clean the kitchen, living room, bedroom, and bathroom every day.  I still have some hidden areas--closets, cabinets, etc, that need to be tackled, not to mention my biggie--the junk room spare bedroom. That's a project that's coming soon, but now is not the time in my schedule to tackle it yet. 

So today, I did my regular morning routine, (quick cleaning the bathroom, bedroom, living room, and kitchen) as well as washing and drying a load of clothes, doing some grocery shopping,and cooking a good dinner for my family. 

As this is posted, dinner is over, the kitchen is cleaned again, all but a bowl of leftovers that's cooling on the counter before I put it away--and, I had time to do a post on my food blog, Secrets of a Southern Kitchen, for roasted root vegetables.


Check it out if you have time!

Until next time...

A Virtuous Woman Plays Catch-Up--Clean in 30, Days 20-22

• Who can find a virtuous woman? her price is far above rubies
• She looketh well to the ways of her household
• She eateth not the bread of idleness

Today is Day 22 of the 30-Day House Cleaning Challenge, but because most of us take the weekend off, we have three daily tasks to choose from--surface cleaning the living and kitchen, surface cleaning a bedroom, or surface cleaning a bathroom.  Monday is usually my "catch-up" day anyway, and since it really is getting easier and easier to clean and keep things clean, I decided to tackle all three tasks, surface cleaning all four rooms. 

Kitchen before

I put away the clean dishes from the drainboard, washed up the few I had in the sink and on the counter, put the fruit in the fruit bowl, wiped down the counters and the stove, and was done in about 10 minutes.  I came back later and put away the now clean-and-dry dishes.

Kitchen after

Bathroom before

I did my regular "swish & swipe"--wipe the sink and faucets, straighten everything on the vanity and wipe it down, wipe the outside of the toilet and swish the inside, pick up the dirty towels, and put out a fresh hand towel. This took all of five minutes, if that.

Bathroom after



Bed area before

The first thing I did in the bedroom was, of course, make the bed.  That takes care of most of the mess around the bed, including the extra pillows that get piled in the chairs at night.



Bed area after



Dresser area, before

This is not as bad as it looks, I usually keep a laundry basket for dirty clothes, and it got waylaid this week!  I picked up a couple of pairs of shoes and put them away, sorted laundry and started a load in the washer, and picked the rest up and put in the now-found basket. I had already dusted the furniture Saturday--new trick I've started doing is leaving a microfiber dust cloth in one of the drawers of my dressing table, then when I'm sitting there doing hair and make-up and notice dust, I have something handy to take care of it right then.  No more "I'll get a dust cloth and do this later", only to leave the room and never remember (until the next day when I'm doing hair & make-up.)

Dresser area, after.

The whole bedroom took maybe 6-8 minute, maybe 10 minutes tops. 

This is my living room, love seat area, before  

I put away one pair of shoes, dusted, put the remotes in a little basket I now have for that purpose, and did my best to "fluff" the pillows attached to the back of the love seat, and refolded a throw we have draped across one corner.   This love seat is about 10 years old, so it doesn't "fluff" much any more!

Love seat area, after

  (I used to have lots of little decorative items sitting around, and I changed them out periodically or seasonally, but lately I've been enjoying the "less-is-more" look!)

My main "hot spot" in the living room

  

There are always books here, plus a magazine or two, a planner, a Bible, and usually my prayer journal. This is not nearly as bad as it used to be--since I've been doing the 30-Day challenge, I tend to keep it picked up a little better these days. (The green and blue things on the front corner are re-usable sticky note tabs that I use to mark something I want to come back to when I'm reading or studying.)

What I've been doing here is going through the stack to make sure it only has things I'm still reading in it, purge what needs to go back on the book shelves, pick up and little bits & pieces and straighten the stack so that it looks a little neater.

No "before" for this shot, I straighten the pillows, refold the throws, and fluff a little.

I dusted as I went around the room, then finished with dusting the tv and tv stand, and I was done--in about 5-7 minutes.

The first day I did "surface clean the living room and kitchen, it took me a couple of hours just to do those two; today I did all four rooms in less than an hour, and that was with going back and forth putting things away. 

All of you ladies participating--are you noticing a big difference in over-all cleanliness and neatness?  I'm not sure if which system I'm going to use after this, but I definitely love having something concrete in place. 

What did you clean today?

Until next time...

A Virtuous Woman (Now) Has A Morning Routine

• Who can find a virtuous woman? her price is far above rubies
• She looketh well to the ways of her household
• She eateth not the bread of idleness

I know I was really hit or miss the first week of the 30-Day House Cleaning Challenge, but it's hard to believe it's already Day 17.  

Today's task is to clean frequently touched items, like door knobs and light switches.  This would be a really good thing to do around my house, especially since I'm just getting over the worst head cold I've had in years. Unfortunately, this is one of the days I spend outside the house in my office at church. It's such an easy thing I thought I'd have time to do it before I left for the day, but alas, it's not done, although I hope to add it to tomorrow's schedule.

However--ya'll remember, right, when I was working on Making New Habits at the first of the year? I did well some of the time, not-so-great some of the time, and down right terrible some of the time.  After I fell and hurt myself physically, that gave me a good excuse to wallow in the already-deep pool of poor-pitiful-me that I was wallowing in emotionally and even spiritually.  And my physical environment reflected it, too--remember the "before" pictures of the bedroom?? (Did I tell ya'll that when my mother read that post, she asked me if I had messed it up worse than it really was for the pictures?  And I had to tell her, "no, mom, that was really what it looked like."  And she was aghast, as I knew she would be.)

What I'm getting to with this long, long, explanation, is that the focus on habits, even though I'd had less than stellar results with some of them, combined with these 30-Day House Cleaning Challenge tasks that are manageable, yet show an immediate, visual result, have somehow meshed in my brain, and I have to say, ladies, that my house looks better than it has in a very, very long time. 

So---even though I didn't get to the doorknobs and switchplates, I did do these things:

• Made the bed, including the "frou-frou" pillows
• Did my daily "swish & swipe" in the bathroom
• Put up last nights clean dishes, washed the few from this morning, wiped the stove and countertops
• Picked up a couple of things in the living room that didn't belong and put them away
• And of course, dressed "to shoes" in appropriate clothing, including hair and make-up ("of course" since I had to go someplace today!)

Overall, just left the house, not in perfect condition, but generally in good shape for my family when they come home tonight. 

Did you "look well to the ways" of your household today?

Until next time...

This post is linked to:

Making My Home Sing Monday at Mom's the Word

To see other posts in this series, click on Clean in 30

30 Day Cleaning Challenge-Deep Cleaning the Bathroom

• Who can find a virtuous woman? her price is far above rubies
• She looketh well to the ways of her household
• She eateth not the bread of idleness

It's Day 16 of the 30-Day House Cleaning Challenge, and today's task is to deep clean the bathroom. 

Here is my "before"...

...not too bad since I've been back to doing my daily "swish & swipe".

After--swished and swipe the toilet, straightened the vanity and wipe it down, emptied the trash, picked up the towels and put them in the dirty clothes basket, put out a fresh hand towel...

...grabbed the washcloths and put them in the dirty clothes basket...

peeked in the shower/tub to make sure everything was good there...

And then--

--tackled my worst spot, the drawer in the vanity.

Yuck.  The brown in front is just where paint has skinned off, showing the original brown, but the back--

that's just dirt and fuzz!

And after!

I still have way too much stuff in there--and I'd prefer smaller organizers and more of them, but this is what I

had available, and at least it's all clean, and semi-organized.  I'd still need to tweak this, but at least it's clean and semi-organized.  When I was purging, I wasn't really surprised that I had some things that were expired, since it's been a while since I cleaned out this drawer, but I was a little surprised at how far out of date some of the little tubes were!  

And my final "after", much better lit than last week's pictures.

This post is linked to:

30-Day House Cleaning Challenge at Money Saving Mom

Tackle It Tuesday at 5 Minutes for Mom

Titus Tuesday at the Time Warp Wife

Until next time...

To see other posts in this series, click on Clean in 30

A Virtuous Woman Cleans the Kitchen

• Who can find a virtuous woman?  her price is far above rubies
• She looketh well to the ways of her household
• She eateth not the bread of idleness

Today is Day 15 of the 30-Day House Cleaning Challenge at Money Saving Mom, and I have to say, with one major (my "spare bedroom"/library/office/junk room) exception and a few minor ones, my house is looking better than it has in a long time.  

Today's task is to surface clean the living room and kitchen.  In the living room, all I really needed to do is pick up one pair of shoes (mine!) and put them away, and clean up the end table next to my recliner.  I always have a little pile there--books I'm reading, a Bible, my prayer journal, my daily planner, a calendar--but since I've been sick I had other things laying there--tissues and vitamin C and mentholatum and lip balm--so I picked up and put away what didn't belong, and straightened the rest.  My sweet husband swept pretty much the whole house last night (we have carpet only in two bedrooms), so other than doing some dusting, I'm done with the living room.

Monday tends to be my worse kitchen morning.  We tend to eat a lot of leftovers and snacky-type meals on the weekends, and since it's always "just a few things", the tendency is to just stack everything in the sink and leave them.  These pictures are from last Monday, I just didn't have a chance to post them then, and it was no exception.   

Apologies for the dark photo again, I didn't realize how dark it was until it was too late for another "before".  Even with the poor quality, you can see the general disarray.

Three closer views...left....

...center...

..right..

...and the yucky, up close and personal

Step 1--put away the clean dishes, and pick up and put away items that don't belong in the kitchen--or at least on the countertop.

Step 2--rinse, sort, and stack the dirty dishes ready to be washed.

Step 3--clean the sink.  I squirt a dab of dishwashing liquid on my dishcloth and rub all over the sink, then rinse. How can I get the dishes clean in a dirty sink?

Step 4--put the first batch of dishes to soak in hot, soapy water. 

Step 5--tackle the stove, putting things away, wiping it down if needed

Step 6--start working on the other counter top--putting away, wiping, straightening. 

Wash the first sinkful of dishes, and put the next batch to soak.

After--right hand counter--I know it's still clutter-y for some, but this is my 'normal'

Step 7--Wipe out the sink, rinse the dishcloth and hang it to dry, so that it doesn't sour. Every few days I throw it in the laundry and get out a clean one.  Dry the sink and surrounding area--if you don't let water spots form, you don't have to try to clean them later. 

Dishes clean and drying

Bigger picture--after. 

Today I followed the same basic steps, only the kitchen wasn't in quite so much disarray today. Not because of me, but my sweet husband came in after working all day yesterday and cleaned the kitchen for his poor, sick wife (that's me!)

It's so easy to let "just a few things" pile up until it becomes oh-my-goodness-how-will-I-ever-get-this-mess-cleaned-up, but most of the time, breaking it down into simple steps and doing each thing, one at a time, followed by the next, makes it take much less time than we originally think it will at that first, overwhelming glance.

This post is linked to Money Saving Mom's 30-Day House Cleaning Challenge, Day 15

Until next time...

To see other posts in this series, click on Clean in 30

Sometimes, A Virtuous Woman Doesn't Clean

• Who is like the virtuous woman? her price is far above rubies
• She looketh well to the ways of her household, and eateth not the bread of idleness.

One of the things that I really like about the way Crystal from Money Cleaning Mom is organizing the 30-Day House Cleaning Challenge, is the way she takes the tasks that would  normally fall on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, and combines them into one challenge for Friday, so that you can choose to do one or all three of the challenges on Friday, leaving your weekend free.  This Friday the choices were to clean out a closet, surface clean an extra room, and deep clean a bedroom. 

I had looked ahead on the cleaning list, and had decided since I'd made such tremendous strides on my bedroom already this week, work on deep cleaning my bedroom with my husband's help to move the mattress and box springs and clean under and around the bed, the windows and blinds, etc, and to work on my closet a little more. 

Fast forward to Friday, which unexpectedly turned into my husband's only day off, not only for this, week, but for the next two weeks.  So, I did what any virtuous woman would do.   You know the verses from Proverbs 31, don't you?  "The heart of her husband doth safely trust in her, so that he shall have no need of spoil. She will do him good and not evil all the days of her life."  So I spent the day with him. Or actually, he spent the day with me.  He gave up his plans, too, and went grocery shopping with me, carried everything inside, and helped put it all away, too.  We visited my parents for awhile, and just had a nice, quiet day together. 

Saturday, I did something with my son.  He has an event coming up, and because he's lost a tremendous amount of weight, none of his dressy clothes fit anymore.  We made a trip to the "big city" (not that big, as cities go, but much bigger than our small town) with his sports jacket and a couple of really nice pairs of pants to see if they could be altered to fit. And when the tailor told us there was no way they could be downsized that much, this mama proudly bought him a new jacket and pants. I don't care how grown they are, even sons need mama's input and guidance sometimes.  He buys his own clothes most of the time, but mama is still allowed to do something special every now and then. "Her children arise up, and call her blessed".  He may not use those words, but I see it in his eyes, and in his smile.   

And today, Sunday, I usually reserve for church and church- or family-related activities.  But I've been nursing a head cold for several days, and it decided to jump up and down on me and pound me to oblivion.  I cut my trip to the city short yesterday after taking care of what needed doing, skipping any extra fun stops, and came home and tried to nurse myself back to health.  Alas, no church for me today, and I assure you, I never miss church.  "She girdeth her loins with strength, and strengtheneth her arms".  I may not be strengthening my arms, but I hope I'm strengthening my immune system. 

Since I've been participating in the 30-Day Cleaning Challenge at Money Saving Mom, I've seen a tremendous difference in the state of my house, and that has contributed to an improvement in the state of my family, as well.  The first couple of days, I was probably the only one who noticed what I was doing, especially since the first week was a bit sporadic for me.  But working on it consistently, day after day, has inspired all of us to pick up after ourselves a little more.  I've gotten back into the habit of making my bed every day, and giving the bathroom it's daily "swish and swipe", of picking up the living room every couple of days or so, partly because I don't want to un-do what I've worked so hard to get done, but also just to keep things looking good.  "She looketh well to the ways of her household, and eateth not the bread of idleness"  And because of that, "Her children arise up, and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praiseth her." My family is really glad at the state of the house these days. 

But the best part is "Give her of the fruit of her hands; and let her own works praise her in the gates." I'm hoping to feel well enough tomorrw to complete the challenge task, but even if I don't, just seeing the improvement so far, and how much if's effected my mood and that of my family, I'll be happy at the time and effort I've put in, and will continue to put in. 

If you want to see the results that some of the other participating bloggers have had, be sure to click over to Money Saving Mom and click on some of the linkies there. 

This post is also linked to:

Make My Home Sing Monday at Moms the Word

Monday Meet Up at Covered In Grace

Matrimonial Monday at Exceptionalistic

Until next time...

To see other posts in this series, click on Clean in 30

A Virtuous Woman Cleans the Bathroom

• Who can find a virtuous woman? her price is far above rubies
• She looketh well to the ways of her household
• She eateth not the bread of idleness

Hey, ladies, it's day 11 of the 30-Day House Cleaning Challenge at Money Saving Mom, and my house is looking better and better!

Today's task is to clean the bathroom, and these are Crystal's suggestions:

• Set the timer for 20 minutes and put toilet cleaner in each of the toilet bowls and let it soak.
• Remove any items that don’t belong in the bathroom, put away items that need to be put away in the bathroom, empty the trash.
• Spray and wipe down the sink and tub.
• Finish swishing and cleaning the toilet.
• Shake the rugs outside (or throw them in the laundry) and mop or vacuum the floors.
• Wipe down the outside of the cupboards and clean the mirror.
• You’re done!

We already had a bathroom cleaning day one day last week, so I pretty much did most of these things last week, and if that was the last time I cleaned the bathroom, I'm sure I would need to do them all again today. 

However, as a person who has struggled with messiness/disorganization off and on for years, I've done lots of reading and research on cleaning and organizing, and tried lots of different housekeeping systems.  Some of them work for a while, some not--and most of the time the success or failure is due to the operator (moi) rather than the system itself. 

When I'm not off my game (as I have been lately), I have a routine that I've culled from several different sources and perfected over the years that makes the bathroom seem practically self cleaning. Almost.

The first time I read about doing this was in the book Sidetracked Home Executives, by Pam Young and Peggy Jones, who billed themselves as "the slob sisters".  In their original system (pre electronics days) you made a 3 x 5 card for every chore that needed to be done to keep your house clean, and sorted them by daily/weekly/monthly/ and seasonal chores.  And bathrooms was a daily. 

Don't bail on me here. 

That's the same thing I thought.  "Who has the time (or inclination) to clean the bathroom every single day?" 

But the flaw in that logic is that most of us clean our bathrooms, at most, once a week (sometimes less for some of us) and what we picture is the major clean and spray and scrub and oh-my-goodness-somebody-please-save-me-from-this-Cinderella-life kind of cleaning. 

Fast forward a few (!) years to Flylady and her book Sink Reflections. Her explanation made sense to me. 

If we do certain small tasks every single day, we will never have to deep clean scrub our bathrooms again.

Here's what works for me. 

Every day, after my family is done in the bathroom for the morning, (we only have one) I go in and brush my teeth and wash my face; as soon as I'm done,while I'm standing there, I wipe out the sink, then I take the hand towel and wipe down the vanity, and faucets, and the mirror, putting anything away that was left out. Once a week or so I wipe out the soap dish.  This takes about a minute.

 (Sorry for the darkness of the pictures, I was trying to use "natural light" on a cloudy, rainy day.  Should have just turned on the lights.)

Then I take a small wad of toilet tissue, dampen slightly, and wipe the outside of the toilet, starting with the tank and moving down to the bowl, finishing at the rim. I throw the paper into the toilet and flush, then while the bowl is still wet, I swish out the bowl and under the rim with the toilet brush, using only water from the bowl. About once a week I splash in a little liquid disinfectant and swish it around, then leave it in the bowl until the next time it's used and flushed. This takes about a minute, too.

Moving on to the tub--we have a habit of hanging our washcloths and towels and letting them dry before we throw them into the dirty clothes basket in the bottom of the linen closet, from early years of apartment living and going to the laundromat only once a week.  We continue that because here in the south, if you leave a basketful of wet or damp things for very long, you'll have a mildewed, stinky mess on your hands.  So I pick up the dry washcloths, etc, and put into the dirty clothes.  This takes seconds.  (Towels are left, we let them dry then re-use.  We each have a separate place we hang our towel.  We can do that because we're a small family.  I like the idea for larger families of using color-coordinated towels and washcloths, one color for each family member.  Don't know if it really works, seeing as I have never tried it, but it sounds good, anyway.)

Back to the tub. Once or twice a week, while I'm in the shower, leaving the conditioner on my hair for the two minutes the manufacturer recommends, I take a washcloth and wipe down the tub surround, including the ledges with all of the shampoo, body wash, soap, etc, on it, that seem to get so grimy.  You know that most grime in the tub is just soap scum, right?  If you wipe it before it gets built up, it doesn't get grimy.  This takes less than two minutes.

Since we all mostly take showers, I clean the tub itself sporadically.  Today I took the non-slip mat out the bottom and washed it, and used a Mr Clean magic eraser on the tub (and it worked like magic, too!) which took around a minute, maybe a minute-and-a-half. 

Last but not least, I throw the hand towel in the dirty clothes basket, and put out a fresh one.  Then as I leave the room,  I turn and admire my clean, uncluttered bathroom, including my favorite and almost only "frou-frou" element, my battenberg lace valance on the window. (I'm the only female in my household.  "Frou-frou is few and far between for me.)

 Clean and sparkly--and taken with flash, finally!

I admit that I've been falling down on the job for awhile, so last week I did the full spray-and-scrub cleaning, but since then, I've been back on my game and have done this daily routine, keeping the bathroom clean every day. I always forget if Flylady calls this "Swish & Wipe" or "Wipe and Swish", so I've taken to calling it my daily "Swish and Swipe"!

Depending on your family, you may want to add a pass through at night to pick up after bathtime, especially if you have younger kids. 

One reader on facebook mentioned that she'd like to have a self-locking door that closed behind each family member and wouldn't unlock until all of the clothes were picked up and put in the hamper! What has worked for me since I've reinstituted the daily clean, is just to pick up and put things away behind them consistently, and honestly, after a couple of days, my family is so glad at the state of cleanliness that's pervading the atmosphere, they've been good about picking up behind themselves. 

Or you could try locking the door behind them, he he.

Next time we clean bathrooms for the 30-Day Cleaning Challenge, it'll be time to tackle the drawer on the vanity and the linen closet. 

Until next time...

To see other posts in this series, click on Clean in 30