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Today, I’m going to tell you five things I do first thing in the morning to get a clean house. Once I stayed consistent with these five things, I noticed that my house was getting cleaner and staying that way for longer.
Table of Contents
Here are the 5 cleaning habits I do every morning:
- Make the bed
- The Swish and Swipe
- Start a load of laundry
- Unload the dishwasher
- The Power Pick Up
We all want to make big changes that get us big results, and if you want to spend six hours today decluttering and deep cleaning your house, go for it! That’s awesome, and at the end of your cleaning session, you will be rewarded with a home that feels like a brand new space. But speaking in all honesty with you, it isn’t the big changes that are going to get you a clean house. It’s the small changes.
Let me tell you why you need to be making small changes to your cleaning habits instead of big ones.
Big changes require big momentum and big energy. Big changes are exciting at first, but they take so much work to maintain that eventually, we all get tired and can’t keep up with our big change. Small changes might seem boring or insignificant, but let me tell you – they work! If you make a promise to work on small cleaning habits done every day, those small habits are easier to keep doing over and over again, and little by little, they will transform your home from a mess to a clean house.
Every one of the things I do first thing in the morning are easy and quick to do. Maybe you are rushed to get out the door for work, or you’re tasked with getting kids fed, clothed, and to school on time. Either way, none of us have a ton of time in the mornings to clean. With these five things, we are going to move fast. We aren’t looking for perfection. Just do the task quickly and move to the next one.
Let’s get started.
Morning Clean House Task #1: Make the bed
Come on now, do I really need to make my bed?? Yes! I used to be a bed-making skeptic, but whenever I read any advice from productivity experts, they all had one thing to say – making your bed will make you more productive and help you get more stuff done every day. I begrudgingly tried it, and do you know what? Those dang experts were right.
I started making my bed every day, and I was surprised at how completing that one small cleaning task gave me the boost I needed to get other stuff done that day.
I timed how long it took to make my bed one day. It took me only one minute and thirty seconds to make my bed! That’s very little time to devote to making my whole bedroom seem neater and more peaceful.
Want to learn the best way to make a bed? Check out this blog post about making the bed.
Morning Clean House Task #2: The Swish and Swipe
This tip comes from my favorite cleaning guru, The Flylady. The Swish and Swipe will keep your bathroom clean and fresh all of the time, and it only takes about thirty seconds to do.
First thing in the morning, you are getting ready for your day and standing in your bathroom. Just before you leave, grab a spray bottle of cleaner (I keep an all-purpose cleaner stored under the bathroom sink for this) and spray down your sink and toilet.
Grab a little toilet paper and quickly wipe down your sink and your toilet. Flush the paper, and admire your fresh bathroom! Doing the Swish and Swipe every morning ensures that your bathroom is always clean for you and any unexpected guests that pop by for a visit.
One time, I was in a hurry and forgot to Swish and Swipe my bathroom, and the laws of the universe ensured that this was of course the day a friend stopped by to visit unannounced. My bathroom wasn’t exactly company-ready, to say the least. Ugh! My friend didn’t care, but I sure was embarrassed and vowed to Swish and Swipe every morning from then on!
Morning Clean House Task #3: Start a load of laundry
Oh, laundry. Do you ever end? Are you ever fully done? The answers are no and no. Washing clothes and towels and sheets is a job that seems to pile up and get out of control in the blink of an eye. This is definitely one of those tasks that is better to do a little bit every day. After you make your bed and do your Swish and Swipe, gather up any dirty clothes and head to the laundry room to get a load started.
Here’s what my laundry schedule looks like:
In the morning, I start my load of laundry in my washer.
In the evening, when we get home from work and school, I pop those clothes in the dryer.
Before bed, I sort and put the laundry away.
If you’ve got a mountain of laundry to work through, don’t panic! Just do one load a day. It might take some time, but you will see the bottom of that laundry mountain. Being consistent with a daily laundry cycle will keep that mountain from forming again. Want more help getting your laundry under control? Check out our super simple laundry system.
Morning Clean House Task #4: Unload the dishwasher
If you are cooking for a full house on a regular basis, then you know how quickly the dirty dishes can stack up in the kitchen sink! If I could choose one super power, it wouldn’t be to fly or x-ray vision, I would ask for the power to snap my fingers and have my dishes go from dirty to clean.
Do you enjoy washing dishes? Some people find it to be a peaceful activity, but if I’m being real, I dread doing the dishes! One thing that helps me get the dishes washed quickly is starting the day with an empty dishwasher. First thing in the morning, while I’m waiting for my coffee to brew, I unload the dishes that I washed the night before from the dishwasher.
This means that throughout the day when the dirty dishes start coming in, they don’t pile up in the kitchen sink. I can put them straight into the dishwasher. When the washer is full, I can start the next wash cycle. Easy peasy! Need more help with dirty dishes? Check out our post on managing dirty dishes.
Morning Clean House Task #5: The Power Pick Up
The Power Pick Up is one of the single most helpful things I learned to do when it comes to keeping a clean house. The two most important things to remember – set a timer and move as quickly as you can!
We are going to move through the house and tidy up as much as we can in a set amount of time. This isn’t a whole house deep clean, and this isn’t going to make your house look perfectly tidy. The goal here is to make things better, not perfect.
Set a timer for ten or fifteen minutes – whatever your schedule allows for that morning. Quickly move around your house picking up and putting away as much stuff as you can. Start with the main living areas where a tidy up will make the most impact. You can definitely use the timer app on your smart phone, but we prefer a simple, old fashioned kitchen timer.
Conclusion
First thing in the morning, I make the bed, do the Swish and Swipe, do a load of laundry, unload the dishwasher, and do a power pick up. It only takes about twenty minutes, and it gets my day off to a great start.
If you find adding all five tasks to your morning to be too much at first, that’s okay! Add one task this week, practice staying consistent with it, and add another one next week. Focus on small steps for success.
What do you do first thing in the morning to get a clean house? Let us know in the comments or come share it on our Facebook page!
