After writing a post a couple of weeks ago about my Friday morning cleaning routine I had a request to tell in more detail how I do my cleaning and how I'm able to do it fairly quickly. I'm happy to oblige but I would never have guessed it would be that interesting :)
Because my Fridays are meant to be workdays where I work on my projects I want the weekly cleaning to be done quickly so I have the rest of the day for better things.
Actually if I have the energy I start the evening before so last night during commercial breaks watching Criminal Minds I decluttered by picking up stuff that was laying about and putting it where it belongs, cleaned the upstairs bathroom (wiped the surfaces, cleaned the wash basin and toilet, mopped the floor and changed towels and bath mat) and cleaned all metal surfaces (toaster, kettle, tea pot cozy, cabinet hardware and refrigerator door handles) in the kitchen with a damp micro fiber cloth and watered the few house plants we have.
This morning I got a late start because Wille wasn't leaving until 8.45 but while making breakfast for Wille and waiting for toast to get toasted and water to boil and all that I wiped the kitchen surfaces, did my ow breakfast dishes and scrubbed the kitchen sink.
After Wille left I tore off all the small soft furnishings, like pillows and throws and the towels Mini and Bonus use. Made a pile on the floor of what would go into the laundry and took the rest outside to shake and air. Today is gorgeous weather so I could leave everything out there until I was all done.
Part of my cleaning routine is to clean the votive candle holders and add new candles and either make sure the cut flowers are still nice and change the water or in today's case, toss them, clean the vase and put out fresh flowers. My mother in law swears by these two little tasks for freshening a room and I totally agree.
After wiping all horizontal surfaces everywhere (living room, Wille's room, bedroom, hallway, bathroom downstairs etc) I vacuumed downstairs and upstairs including the sofa and the armchairs. After that was done I put all the pillows and throws back, placed the fresh flowers and candles on the sofa table and was done at 10 am.
I skipped on a few things today though: I didn't do any wet mopping of any floors )except for the bathrooms) because it wasn't necessary (will do the kitchen floor after dinner tonight instead), I didn't scrub the shower area (I'm saving that for sometime this weekend) and I didn't change the sheets (will do that tomorrow morning). Also when I'm saying I wipe all horizontal surfaces I mean the obvious ones like window sills, tables, work tops,mantelpiece etc. I don't weekly dust or wipe all the books in the bookcase or even the tops of tall bookcases. I leave those tasks to when I take on a room to "deep" clean it. I don't have a particular routine for when that happens it just does once in a while.
There you have it, today's cleaning!
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The rest of today will be spent at the computer with an exciting upcoming project and this weekend I'm hoping to bring out the patio furniture, get some yard work done and maybe repaint the blue bedroom wall and sew some new pillow covers.
I'm also hoping to get a minute to read some of the magazines in the pile above. I got some German ones in Berlin that seem nice, like Living at Home and Living & More special editions. There's also a Pottery Barn catalog in there that I will lust over wishing I could get my hands on the goods.
I also have some gifts to wrap and some other birthday preparations to do because Wille will be fifteen on Monday! My big boy :)
