Establishing a Cleaning Schedule for Your Home
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A cleaning schedule may sound like drudgery, but it can be a fantastic strategy to help you keep up on the housework and enjoy a clean house.
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While I’m not naturally someone to embrace schedules and spreadsheets, I’ve found that they come in really handy when managing a home. After all, there is no chef or maid at this here establishment. I am the main person to establish order here on the Ponderosa.
What I’ve found is that if I don’t give myself deadlines or “homework” as it were, I find all kinds of excuses NOT to do the work. Then it just hangs over my head, making me feel guilty about being a lousy housekeeper.
One of the things that can really help you and me manage ours home is to have a regular cleaning schedule. It’s not all fun and games, but you’ll soon see that if you put your household tasks on a schedule — and actually do them — you’ll be amazed at your productivity as well as how clean your house is.
While I sometimes fall off schedule and have to hit the reset button, I also know the bliss that comes from regular home maintenance.
As the school year gets into gear, now is an ideal time to do some deep cleaning and decluttering and get back on a cleaning schedule or start one if you never have before. The holidays are just a few months off, so what better time to get a good habit going?
Establishing a Cleaning Schedule for Your Home
There are at least two ways you can go about establishing a cleaning schedule.
1. Create your own cleaning schedule.
Print out this blank Weekly Cleaning Worksheet and then plot out the chores that you’ll do on the days that you plan to do them. The top row is for morning chores, the middle for afternoon, and the bottom row covers evening tasks.
This is just a sample. You’ll need to set up your cleaning schedule to suit the rhythm of your home.
(If you need inspiration for what jobs there are to do, consult this Cleaning Checklist to see what you want to do in your home.)
2. Use an app.
Using an app, like the Motivated Moms app, gives you structure without recreating the wheel. (You can also purchase the Motivated Moms planner which is a paper version of the app.)
I’ve been using the app off and on for a few years now and really appreciate that it sets up a cleaning schedule for me. I don’t have to think. I just have to clean. Plus, I can have the app sync to several devices so the kids can access the tasks and do them as part of their chores.
What fits at my house may not fit at yours. You’ll want to test and tweak until you find a rhythm that fits your family, your home, and you. Regardless, a cleaning schedule is essential to helping you feel good about the place you call home.
Do you have a cleaning schedule?
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Originally published September 25, 2010. Updated September 10, 2016.
I’ve been thinking about cleaning schedules lots lately. I’m struggling to get anything more than the basics (dishes, laundry) done on a regular basis. I always wind up spending lots of time frantically cleaning before we entertain (as we did today). It looks like you’ve got a great (and realistic system)! I’m slowly incorporating some FLYLady routines, but I feel like I struggle even with those!
I struggle with scheduling as well. It makes me feel so good when my house is clean. When I neglect it I dont’ know where to begin and put it off for another day. It only gets worse after that. I’ve started trying to schedule things recently. This is wonderful. Thanks for sharing it.
We moved almost 2 months ago. About a month in, I realized I hadn’t been following my cleaning schedule (or any schedule!) and was feeling behind on everything. Now that I’ve got my schedule going again, I feel so much better knowing that I’m at least doing something!
I was just thinking about getting on track with my cleaning. I am going to give this a try instead of taking a whole day to get it done. Thanks for the great post.
great tips! thanks 🙂
okay, totally surprised to see you have a gardener – don’t know why, just thought you did it yourself! 🙂 it leaves more time for the rest of life, so I totally understand!!
@angie, we don’t PAY for a gardening service. LOL. Since we rent, the gardeners are included in our lease agreement. It’s fairly standard here since owners/management companies want to make sure lawns and yards are well-maintained. It’s one of the hidden perks of renting.
We’ve always done it ourselves in every other place we’ve ever lived. Sorry for the confusion!
“Devise a cleaning schedule” as been on my to do list for three weeks now. As if putting it on the list is actaully getting it done! I am somewhat of a pro at adding things to the to do list. Thanks for the post, for some reason creating ths schedule has felt overwelming to me. You made it seem pretty easy and doable! I am going to get mine completed tonight.
When we moved into our home about a month and a half ago and I became full time at home I started out with your daily chore chart and a weekly calendar like you have shared above.
As I got more comfortable with my workload I tweaked both lists into one using a template I found from MS Office online. In order to focus on my productivity and to track efficiency I made the chart have a space for notes and time completed. {I don’t have kids yet, but want to get the house on lock down before I try to balance my next role!} That way if I notice something is taking too long or one day is long or short I can adjust.
I just changed laundry day from Monday to Friday because I noticed that my weekly workout clothes & my husband’s work pants were needing to be done before Monday morning.
I use Motivated Mom’s cleaning schedule. Have for the last five years. I began using this when my daughter, who is 5.5. yrs old, was just a few months old. Being in the brunt of post-partum pit, I had to find something that helped me to know that I was accomplishing something during the day, but wasn’t overwhelming. It works for our family. My hubby even looks at it to see what I haven’t marked off, in order to help me. It’s been easy to assign the kids chores, too, specific to the day, which are age-appropriate for them. It’s nice, too, b/c I like seeing the tasks marked off the list. Or, if we have a busier-than-usual week, most often, I can get all things done in a day, or so.
How do you know what to post exactly when I need it? My 4yo had his allergy skin test yesterday and is allergic to dust mites and mold spores. Can I tell you how bad of a housekeeper I feel? So I NEED to ramp up my cleaning skills. And since I’m a total chart person, this is right up my alley. Thanks for the reminder and wish me luck that I get my act together!
@Jen, Check out http://www.flylady.net (great site!)