Wednesday, September 6, 2017

Speed Clean With Me!

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I had a nice long Labor Day weekend with lots of plans. But, I didn't want to spend a lot of time doing house cleaning.  So I decided to clean for one hour, loosely based on the Flylady's Home Blessing Hour.  For my own home blessing I decided to spend 15 minutes on 4 different chores.  Here's what I did.

It was a gloomy, rainy Saturday morning.  Perfect for staying inside!



 The laundry was already in progress.



At 8:00 A.M., I set the timer on my stove for 15 minutes.  I was still drinking coffee and constantly losing my mug.  Do you do that?  I have to look all over the house to find it.


My first chore was dusting.  I didn't do a detail dusting, just a light dusting.  I cruised around the house with my fluffy pink duster thingie and dusted hither and yon.   This is a static duster and does a pretty good job.   I started at the back door and worked my way around the house.   I spent a little more time in the living room and master bedroom, since those two rooms were the dustiest of the house.  I went outside a couple of times to shake and tap the duster on the back steps.  Detail dusting is reserved for the time when I am working in a particular zone.



After the 15 minutes was up, I stopped and proceeded to the next chore:  Dust Mopping.  We have hard floors in every room, no carpet at all.  I dust mopped a lot like I dusted.  I started at the back door and dust mopped around the edges of each room.  The purpose of this was to prepare the floors for vacuuming.  The dust mop pulls crumbs from under the bottom edge of the kitchen cabinets.  It gets the dust from under the edges of furniture.  I had to go outside and shake and tap the dust mop just like I did with the pink fluffy duster thingie.



The third 15  minutes was a  speed vacuuming of the floors. I didn't move any large pieces of furniture and I made sure I got up everything the dust mop pulled out.  I vacuumed small rugs, quickly pulled the chairs from the dining room table and vacuumed under there.  

I love this battery operated vacuum.  No wires to plug in.  Just grab and vacuum.  Its a Shark Navigator.  I bought mine a couple of years ago on Black Friday.  Click HERE to check it out!



Finally, the last 15 minutes of the hour, I did some quick mopping.  I started at the back door, mopped the mud room, laundry room, kitchen, dining room and living room.   During my next home blessing hour,  I plan to mop some other rooms in the house.  Of course the kitchen and mud room will need mopping again.  This mop is nice because the cover is machine washable.  I just spray the cleaner on the floor in sections and move fast.
 

Here's a picture showing the mop without the cover.  I've had that bottle of concentrated cleaner forever.  It lasts a long time and I don't remember where I got it.  I checked Amazon and they sell it HERE.


After only an hour, I was really pleased with the results!  You'd be amazed at the progress you can make in an hour.  Not included in this hour was cleaning the toilets and the tub/shower, but that didn't take too long. 

I love using this speedy method in doing other work around the house also.  For example, I had some yard work that needed doing.  This included trimming some scraggly summer plants and bushes.  Every now and then, over the weekend, I would run outside and trim just one potted plant, or one bush.  Or I would run out and spend 5, 10, or 15 minutes at a time, depending on what was going on.  I got it all done without  doing a marathon of yard work.

Getting some things accomplished like this is very motivating to me.  I'm ready to take on the next home blessing!

6 comments:

Mary Ann said...

Thank you for sharing this! I've tried to speed up my cleaning process but it still seems to take so long.

Little Penpen said...

Ok, I love this idea. And I love the idea of vacuuming all the floors. We are going all tile (slowly) in our house and I have been sweeping, but vacuuming the debris, versus using a dust pan. I'm going to try your method today. I like that little wireless vacuum too. I'm going to check it out!

Terri said...

I used to follow flylady all the time. I still do the 15 minute, speed cleaning thing. It surprising how much you can get done in a short time.

Wendi said...

I'm going to try to implement this! We started homeschooling this year and I find that I don't have alot of time to invest in cleaning.

Emma said...

I love this! I did something similar the other day when I realized that the carpet cleaners were coming and the rest of my home was filthy. (Yes I know that they come to clean your home but only the carpets! I don't want them to know I'm a slob!) So I set my timer for 10 minutes and tried to accomplish every task in less time than the timer! It's amazing how motivating that is. It totally worked for me!

Billie Jo said...

Great tips here!
Thank you for sharing this!
Have a cozy evening. : )

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