Spring Cleaning

Spring is my favorite season! I love to throw open the windows and smell the three varieties of daffodils and hyacinths blooming outside near our front walk. God’s variety makes me smile. Seeing all the fresh new shoots of green reminds me of God’s promise of new life for us. But smelling those flowers also gets me in the mood for spring cleaning.

Yup, I'm old fashioned. I love getting fresh air in the house and having sunshine in the morning when I get up. Although I try to deep clean a little all year, spring stimulates my cleaning hormones. There’s nothing like having everything clean at once, especially when the sun shines. If you haven’t done spring cleaning in awhile, I have a few ideas to get you started.

1.) Pray & Plan. Good spring cleaning doesn’t happen by accident. Sometimes prayer is more important in getting everything done quickly and without problems, than the elbow grease you’ll have to put into it. Even though I like to jump in and ‘just do it’, I have a check list and a time schedule.

Grab some paper, a pen and your calendar then think about what you want to accomplish. Ask God for the wisdom to know what should be done and what you should leave alone. How much work is there to be done? Do you want to get back to spotless or is everything pretty clean already and you just need a buff and polish? How much time do you have? How many helpers can you enlist? How much are you physically able to do? The more you need to do, the more time you’ll have to schedule and the more grace you’ll need.

If you have clutter build up to tackle as well as cleaning to do, there is no way it will be all done in a 40 hour week without a bunch of adult helpers. With our 3800sqft house and 2 young helpers (11 & 9), I take my time and spend an hour a day over a couple weeks. Nobody gets burned out and I get a sparkling house with enough time to smell the daffodils. A smaller house with less people who are gone 40+ hours a week, will require much less work than families like ours that have 5 people home all the time. Be reasonable and honest with your time table and about what needs to be done. And, be honest if you feel God is pulling you in one directions or another in your planning.

2.) Where to Begin. If you’ve got clutter, you can’t clean effectively until you get rid of it. Make it your first priority. Getting rid of unwanted clutter is just as good as cleaning! With the Lord’s direction, pick one room and start putting the excess in 3 categories: give away, put away and trash. When the give away pile is a decent size, box or bag it and then donate it to a local thrift shop charity. Know you are blessing someone else and don’t look back! For the put away pile, loosely sort them by where things belong. While the pile is still manageable, take your loosely sorted items and either put them away or place them in the general areas where they should be stored or used. When your trash bag is full, take it out, get another and praise God for your progress!

If your whole plan was simply to dust the curtains and vacuum under all the furniture, do it and be satisfied. If you haven’t deep cleaned in awhile, almost anything will give you that spring boost. Instead of spending a bunch of time making a cleaning list (which can take quite awhile to assemble), jump online and Google for “spring cleaning checklist.” OrganizedHome.com has a basic list. About.com has multiple extensive ones. If those don’t meet your needs, look a little deeper, but don’t obsess about all the possibilities. Pray for guidance and listen. Weed out those things that aren’t going to be beneficial for you or your family. After you choose a list, evaluate what you do want or need to do. Take less than 20 minutes then use your enthusiasm a head to the next step!

3.) Gather Your Tools. There is nothing more inconvenient then being up on a ladder and realizing the tool you needed is half way across the house, and of course, nobody’s in sight to grab it for you! I generally assemble smaller items in a bucket for easy toting. Here are my essentials: Wet mop Vacuum cleaner Stepladder/stool Trash bags Paper towels Sponges/scrubbing pads Microfiber-type “Miracle” Clothes All-purpose cleaner Abrasive cleanser Chlorine bleach White vinegar A second small bucket or my 5 gallon scrub bucket on wheels

4.) Enlist the Troops & Go! If you need no troops to help, then grab your bucket and go! Otherwise, Mom, you are not the only one who lives in your house. God has given you the responsibility to see homekeeping gets done, (Titus 2:5 - KJV says “keepers at home”) but that doesn’t mean he expects you to do all of it by yourself!

With 5 of us home all day, I generally don’t enlist my husband to help clean up for two reasons. First, it’s generally not his mess. Secondly, we like to get everything done during the day so we can spend time together doing fun stuff as a family when Dad is home. That doesn’t always happen, but it’s our desire. Take your situation into consideration and prayerfully choose your troops.

Give each person on your team the choice of several jobs. My children are always more willing to help if they have a choice. If they are doing what they have chosen and start whining, I gently remind them I get all the nasty leftover jobs and cheerfully ask them if they want to swap. The thought of cleaning a toilet or another gross job is generally enough to make them stop grumbling and finish their chosen job.

My children balk about work occasionally. They have bad attitudes sometimes just like other kids. I try to model a good attitude about work, lead by example and verbally remind the children that God wants us to be good stewards of what he has given us. Nobody is perfect and we all have bad days. That’s why there is grace.

Ultimately helping Mom is the right thing to do because… A.) It glorifies God by honoring their parents’ wishes and pleases God. B.) Many hands make light work. The quicker we get it done, the sooner we’re done! I try to give them frequent breaks because they are just children. We also do something fun after we accomplish an unpleasant task. C.) They realize at 4 kids to 2 adults and one of those 2 being gone most of the time, it’s mostly their mess and dirt. If you dirty it, you clean it!

I remind my children of the above principles and leave them with a question: Do you think your attitude is glorifying to God? After that, I walk away and know that the Holy Spirit will convict them. They are generally back at their task within a couple minutes.

Husbands are out of my scope of expertise. You’re on your own there. But I encourage you to approach him with prayerful wisdom.

5.) Maintain It. It does no good to tackle spring cleaning and then not have a system to keep it clean. The kids and I make a quick pass through the house each night to collect and put stray things away. I make sure the kitchen floor is scrubbed once a week, counters cleaned off nightly, all bathrooms wiped down weekly and the fridge purged and wiped down weekly as well.

6.) Tips. First and foremost: Go easy. If you exhaust yourself, A. you won’t be able to finish, or B. you won’t be able to enjoy the progress you’ve made. As someone who has battled a long term illness, believe me, it’s better to humbly acknowledge your limits and slow down. I strongly encourage you to stop and finish another day. Re-evaluate the schedule you made or take some things off your list. Second, take breaks and drink plenty of water. Contrary to popular belief, housework is work – more people would have spotless houses if it wasn’t. Finally, enjoy your progress and don’t forget to praise God for your accomplishments. Balance the Martha with the Mary. (Luke 10:38-42)

Happy Spring Cleaning!

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