Let’s face it — homeschooling is a part-time job. Well, depending on the number of kids you have it could be a full-time job. Add to that many of us are working at home and there are people living in our houses all day long, and it can be tough to keep things clean.
There are a number of cleaning systems you can use to keep your house clean. Here are some to consider:
Cleaning systems for homeschoolers
The first one is to hire help. If you are overwhelmed and you can do it, this can be a great place to spend your money.
We did this when my husband was deployed and then for a while after he returned. The kids and I would go to co-op and come home to a clean house. It was worth every stinking penny.
Also, hiring help doesn’t just mean hiring a professional cleaning service who comes in weekly or every other week, get creative with your ideas. Maybe there is a homeschooled teen who would like to make a few extra dollars with some household tasks or by helping fold mountains of laundry.
You also don’t have to hire someone to clean the entire house. You can have someone just do the floors or only clean the bathrooms.
Next are some of the do-it-yourself systems.
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Do-it-yourself cleaning systems for homeschoolers
Flylady which is great for the overwhelmed mom who needs to give herself lots of grace. Except the Flylady herself can be overwhelming.
So I suggest you learn the system from The Secret Slob or That Awkward Mom.
You start with baby steps and then try to set up routines for cleaning during your day in short bursts. I will talk more about how I have adapted the Flylady system next week.
Clean Mama is another popular system. This system assigns specific days to specific tasks and includes the printable you need to get things done.
She breaks the tasks into daily, weekly, rotating, and monthly to help you get it all done. Find out more here.
I will be honest, I have looked at this routine, but never followed it. I just wanted to provide an option for you.
One of my favorite low-stress cleaning routines ever (and one I used when my kids were little) was Jamie C. Martin’s Once a Month Cleaning post from Simple Homeschool.
While I did tidy and things like dishes and laundry in between deep cleans, for a while this method was what kept us from defending into complete chaos in our home.
I highly recommend this and a large dose of grace if you have a bunch of little kids.
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What to consider before choosing a cleaning system
Before choosing a system I think it’s important to consider a few things:
I want to start this conversation by talking about the comparison trap. You might recall that I chatted about that in episode 49 of the podcast with All You See are Edited Lives.
Remember you don’t need to please anyone with the cleanliness in your home except for you and your spouse. But I do think it’s important to consider both of you and your needs.
Ask yourself in this season how much untidiness can I stand? How much can my husband tolerate?
Notice I started with the idea of a “season” just because your home might be messier now doesn’t mean it always will be.
But if you only have lots of little kids and no older helpers everything depends on you. One day all of those helpers will be older and WAY more helpful. Trust me, that day will come. So don’t despair. No season will last for ever.
So determine your tolerance level and then ask your spouse about theirs. You might be surprised that it is lower than what you expect.
It’s also good to get specific. My husband cares very little about the state of his bathroom mirror (much to my chagrin), but cares very much about the amount of dog hair on the floor.
If I can only do so many things (and honestly I can only do so many things) then I know where to focus my time — on the things that drive HIM crazy and the things that drive ME crazy. When I have to let something slide, I know where to focus my efforts.
This is also a fabulous time to ask the spouse for help. I know those floors are important to you sweetie. Can you help me clean them every Saturday morning?
I find asking for the specific things you need (as opposed to making vague comments about the state of the floors) gets the best results.
So once you’ve established what is really important you make make a prioritized list of things to clean. Since you will likely be adapting any system you use this step shows you where to concentrate your time and efforts.
To chat more about keeping your house clean while homeschooling come on over and join our free homeschool community. We’re going to be talking about that there all month long. Join us by clicking here for an off-social media, drama free place of encouragement with other homeschoolers.
I’ll be back again next week to talk about how I am keeping my house clean (or clean-ish) these days. I hope you join me then.
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