Individual Zone Cleaning

After we moved to the mountains, some of our 'cleaning schedules' began to break down.

I'm not sure why.

The smaller space?

Our schedule slowly becoming busier?

The kids' school work getting more intense?

My bought of depression after the girls' diagnosis and my mom's death?

I'm sure they all contributed.

But... whatever the reason, we got into a rut.  The house would slowly deteriorate throughout the week.

Resulting in Saturday being an 'all-day-cleaning-day'.

This wasn't a HORRIBLE thing, but it did mean by mid to end of week, the house looked awful and come the weekend ALL we did was clean.

Not to mention the chaos if for some reason we were 'busy' with some other task on the weekend.  Then?  The house would become a veritable pit before the next weekend hit.  Sigh.

It also meant the house really only felt and looked tidy and peaceful for a day or two -- MAX.  At least on the days we DID get to the cleaning.

That in and of itself was deflating to me personally.

To counter this, I came up with assigning 'areas' to each child to work on daily -- 15-30 minutes a day.  (Originally I figured 15 min a day twice a day, but it's turning out to be more like 20-30 once a day due to their school work and other 'chore' schedules.)

This approach actually appears to be working quite well.  (Most of the time, anyway.)

We plan to rotate areas every several weeks.

Allowing each person to get 'good' at their particular zone, but also preventing any one person from having the 'lion's share' of the work.  I originally thought of rotating weekly, but decided this could allow one person to 'slack' on their zone resulting in the next person being responsible for 'picking up that slack' and being bogged down.

Let's face it.... cleaning the school room is no where near as demanding as cleaning the kitchen etc.
Plus, next year the older kids go off to college.  The girls need to know how to do ALL of the chores so it's not a shock to the system once they take them over in just a mere 11 months or so.

Now, this may sound 'extreme'.

ONE person is responsible for the kitchen?

It's not quite THAT bad.

The breakfast dishes and cleaning of the island/table/counters are the girls responsibility while the older two walk the dogs.  They even have a chart on the refrigerator that divides out who does what, when.  Lunch is on the big kids.  Dinner once again falls to the girls while the older two again walk the dogs for the evening.  Not to mention I do some of the dishes as I cook and meander through the kitchen throughout the day.

Then, once a day, the individual who has the 'kitchen' chore is responsible for a more thorough clean. Putting everything on the counters away; wiping down the counters; wiping off the fronts of the cabinets (although this one still gets forgotten often - maybe MOST of the time, actually); sweeping the floors; emptying trash etc.

The living room gets straightened - everything off the floor and put away; swept; dusted at least once mid-week so it doesn't build up too much - again, I'm finding this one gets 'forgotten' more often than not, but.....  (We live in a VERY dusty location so it can look not dusted mere hours after completing said dusting.)

Same with other areas of the house - the dining room gets swept, straightened, table cleaned, and the pantry 'picked up' daily.  The bathroom counters gets wiped, toilet swished, floors swept -- daily.

Each 'zone' in the house gets a little 'spruce up' throughout the day.

Since all the chores are being done regularly, the house stays looking 'presentable' and the 'all-house-clean' on Sat doesn't take near as long.  Plus, if we happen to have a week where Sat is already full, (which happens often as we get further into the school and 4H year) the house doesn't look as though a tornado went through -- or at least it looks like a category 1 or 2 rather than a 5.  :-/

I think it's been a win-win for everyone.

The kids are learning to do things bit by bit; picking up; putting away instead of simply stepping over the 'mess' on the floor; being more purposeful; etc.  Plus, their Saturdays are not completely eaten up cleaning the house.

More free time in the long run.

The house may not be perfect - my post about messes in the kitchen made that obvious - but... once a day, the house usually looks 'decent'.

(Although, busy schedules still tend to wreak havoc on the best laid plans -- when we have appointments out of the house; big projects due in school; other chore projects that eat up more time than expected; this system still 'breaks down'.  However, it's better than it was so it's a gold medal in my book.  Plus, habits are being formed that'll last a lifetime which is the greatest incentive of all -- that's the hope anyway.)

I don't twitch nearly as often.

My blood pressure doesn't rise, pounding in my veins as I walk through the house.

I've come to accept our house will always look 'lived in' because, well, that's exactly what we do.  We live and love in our little house.  That results in constant messes, constant dishes, constant books and papers on surfaces.

However, I've also come to expect that we can keep some modicum of order in our everyday chaos.

The zone daily cleaning is helping us accomplish that order.

At least on a minor scale.

It may not be 'Martha Stewart or Pinterest Worthy' but.... it's homey; it's safe; it's ours.

Our little 'controlled mess'.