The Housekeeper’s Secret Weapon

By: Terri Emmett
Submitted: 2007-01-17 16:41:45
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You can eliminate housework altogether and still have the cleanest house in the neighborhood.

As anyone who manages a household can tell you, it’s often a challenge to face the mundane obligations of keeping a home in order and it’s easy to fall behind in your responsibilities. Once you find yourself falling behind, it’s a terribly short step between that point and things getting entirely out of hand, often resulting in an overwhelming disastrous aftermath.

Take heart. Everyone’s been there and experienced the snowball effect of this kind of discouragement that can leave you in a serious state of depression unless remedied as quickly as possible. The farther behind you fall in your housework, the more discouraged you become. The more discouraged you become, the farther behind you fall. It’s the proverbial “vicious circle.” that can lead to common household depression. Before things get too far out of hand, you know for your own emotional comfort, you have to find inspiration from somewhere and do something to correct the situation before it gets any worse, if, by this point, it possibly could.

There is one secret weapon that can help guard against such contingencies that life so often throws your way. All it takes is a slight attitude adjustment and a simple kitchen timer.

If there ever were a “miracle product” for maintaining a home, the kitchen timer would be it.

The attitude adjustment is easy. Just tell yourself you’re done with housework and you refuse to deal with it. Instead, tell yourself that you are simply going to play games.

The kitchen is usually the best place to start because a clean kitchen generally gives you enough encouragement to tackle the rest of the house. Set your kitchen timer for 15 minutes and tell yourself you are only planning to work on one certain project for that amount of time. Start with the dishes on the sink, counter and table. Wash up enough dishes to fill a draining rack and while the remaining dishes soak, dry what you’ve already washed and put them away. Simply see how far you can get in 15 minutes before the alarm sounds.

Chances are, by the time your 15-minute game is over, you’ll be finished with the dishes and the sink will be cleared – now THAT’S inspirational! If you don’t get completely finished before the alarm goes off, admire what progress you have made and set the timer for another round and play again.

Here are the rules to play the game in other rooms:

1. Give yourself 10 minutes on the timer. Take an empty trash bag and go from room to room picking up trash, soda cans, emptying ashtrays, and collecting dirty dishes that may have strayed from the kitchen (not that it would ever happen). See if you can remove all the clutter from the room before the alarm goes off.

2. Put another 10 minutes on the timer and go from room to room picking up everything off the floor that shouldn’t be there. Stack each item on the sofa, beds, chairs, or wherever you can find to stack them. Don’t worry about putting these things away yet - just make sure the entire floor area is visible. You should get pretty far along before the alarm sounds.

3. With another 20 minutes on the timer, go through each room collecting all accumulated dirty laundry. Take it to the laundry room and sort through it. Start a load in the washing machine and replenish the bathrooms with fresh linens before the alarm goes off.

4. Lastly, give yourself only 5 minutes on the timer for each room (again, the kitchen is best place to start) and spend the entire 5 minutes in this single room simply putting things away, straightening, tidying, wiping off counters, straightening pictures on the wall or other little odd-jobs that need to be done. Once you have spent a simple 5 minutes in each room, looking for ways to improve the area, you will have the entire house thoroughly straightened in, what will seem like, no time at all.

Need to clean the refrigerator, tub or shower? Set the timer for 15 minutes and tell yourself that’s all the time you’re planning to invest in it. Does a closet need a serious cleaning? Give yourself 20 minutes. This is one game you will never lose. There will always be improvement – and that should be the main focus.

Using this method of racing against time by playing the “Housekeeping” game with yourself, you will realize there is no hideous chore that will ever get the best of you again.

The beauty of this method of housekeeping is that you can play as often as you want, as long as you want and you will always end up the winner!

Article source: Expert Articles