Secrets on Keeping a Clean House From a Disorganized Person

Okaaaay....so this is my in ingenious plan that has worked for me but for some of you it's quite obvious.  In fact, you are a perfectionist this doesn't apply to you.  You are welcome to look at my pictures though.  So, enjoy my pictures, Chris H.  :D


For the rest of a few disorganized, scatterbrains who have a hard time with this, here is my secret.

Invite someone over at least twice a week

Ashley watching granddad install our new
dishwasher....gasp...I am so grateful!

It works for me every time, no joke.  Even if it's just your neighbor, go for it.  Okay, when I was single keeping a clean house was easy breezy.  The key was being poor.  I couldn't afford to buy anything off my $600 a month budget.  My apartment was $275 a month.  The rest of that check went to tithe I gave my church.  I was happy to give that too.  The other check paid for my monthly bus pass, food for work, food at home, and my bills. Needless to say I only could budget in around $30 a month for groceries.  I pretty much ate ramen and potatoes. It's a wonder I'm still alive.  Well, the only reason I had any furniture at all was because someone abandoned their apartment (I actually knew this person) and so the manager gave me her love seat, tiny table with 2 chairs, and a single bed that I brought from home.  I had one pot for cooking.  2 forks, 2 spoons, 2 cups, 2 plates.  Dishes took me all of 2 minutes.  I washed clothes maybe once a month because I had so many clothes it took me a month to go through all of them.  Still, my little apartment was spotless.  Not because I was organized but because I had almost nothing to clean!  I worked all day for pennies and came home.  I was too tired to make a mess and it seemed to take me only 5 minutes to clean if I did.  

My First Apartment.  Top floor, 6th door from the right.  :D

So that's the other key:

Own very little

It worked for me.  When I got married, it got a little tougher for me.  I had more money, we went shopping.  Brought home more STUFF.  I had to cook for two, so more dishes.  We met GREAT friends and had get togethers. Needed more dishes.  I had friends and family donate lots of stuff they thought we needed.  Actually, they've blessed us many times over throughout the years.  I just needed to figure out when to say yes or no to things being passed along.  One day it hit me, "My gosh, it's getting harder to keep up.  Who's gonna clean all this?"  I was making the messes because I couldn't keep up with all the crap I thought we needed.

Then I had a kid.  Then another and another and another and another and another.... you get the idea!  Okay, so take a very disorganized person who can barely keep up with cleaning up after someone else and then times that by say.....1,000. Okay, for a person who thinks cleaning is a breeze, you can only times it by 10.  Seriously, that's so unfair.  I HAVE to have list for PURE survival.  I don't have those awesome organizing lists because I'm such supermom. For me it's a matter of sinking or swimming.  A better picture would be swim or getting swallowed by the whale.

Ashley is happy to see her grandma

My sisters got the organizing gene so by the time my mom got to me, the 3rd kid, the good gene ran out.  Do they have a pill for that?  I don't know.  Just seems really unfair. I'm a good person.  I deserve that incredibly awesome supergene.  (Just because someone has a lot of kids, people assume they must be some sort of supermom and super organizer.)  

Oh well, I got the patience gene.  So ha.  Or maybe that's acquired.  Maybe I at least got the I-can-handle-a-lot-of-kids-because-I-don't-have-to-have-a-perfect-house gene.  Heh heh.






A friend in my comments pointed out that I was a typical baby of the family they talk about in a book called Birth Order.  I can't believe I forgot to mention this before.  I've read this book and it's incredibly accurate with only a few exceptions.  I passed it along to another friend to read because she was interested but I want to get another for myself.  I even see this with my own kids.