I do all the cleaning on Saturday morning, but it seems to stretch into the afternoon and I feel like I'm losing one of my precious weekend days. We just moved back home after a renovation due to a fire and everything is perfect and clean. It is my goal to keep it clean on a more regular basis - do a little each evening so less remains on Saturday. So far, so good. It's easier to maintain the clean than to have to clean up when everything is already dirty.

I love the idea of a cleaning schedule, but haven't been able to execute it in my personal life. Working at a remote backcountry lodge many years ago, I implemented this and it was wonderful (dusting was Tuesdays, vacuuming couches was Wednesdays) - why can't I get it done now? I have a linens and a garbage schedule now, but everything else is do as it needs done/whenever I notice and have time. A cleaning lady comes twice a month so that helps but I have no schedule for my own cleaning.

I wish... when I notice something is dirty I try to clean it. I think it's a never ending battle.

Wednesday is my cleaning day, and usually a bit of time on the weekend. With three cats vacuuming twice a week is mandatory!

I try to do my grocery shopping on Tuesday evening (I have a class so I have my car [which I don't use every day because it gets a measly 20 mpg] and the store is usually desserted.) but if I don't restrain myself I end up at the grocery store 3x a week.

I hate cleaning the bathroom, though, so I do that as I go... I keep a container of those lovely pre moistened wipes under the counter and give the sink / radiator / mirror etc a wipe down a few times a week while I'm brushing my teeth.

I'm very happy with my clean-as-I-go routine. I'd hate to have to say, "I would have loved to meet you for happy hour tonight, but it's toilet-cleaning day"

No, I'm the least disciplined person about cleaning. I'm an utter filth ball, it's awful. I let it get messier and messier than do one huge clean up.

I like the idea of the "old fashioned cleaning day" thing too! I'm about to move into a new house so I have high hopes for starting fresh with a new cleaning schedule I'll actually stick with. No advice here, I'm pretty messy right now...

I don't follow a rigid cleaning schedule but I do try to clean up some each night so that I don't spend all weekend cleaning.

I downloaded an app on my iPad called HomeRoutines to help keep me organized and accountable. I set up weekly cleaning tasks, biweekly tasks, and each week I focus on one zone of my house to deep clean. This ensures that my windows, baseboards, etc., get cleaned on a regular basis.

Having a business at home where I see clients once a week means I have to clean on a schedule. Laundry and cleaning get done Saturday night/Sunday mornings so that everything is fresh and tidy when people come over, at least in the publice spaces. And to the end of not having too much to do during that time, I do try to keep things tidy as I go. I wish I'd do that with a little more discipline though - I really should vacuum the furniture at least twice a week, because by Saturday night I really can't even sit on the couches or chair since they're covered in hair and dirt from the cats =/. Anyway, yeah, having a full time job and another at-home business I pretty much have to stick to a schedule or I'm sunk.

I have a loose schedule, there are certain things I do on certain days during the week days so we have our weekends free and repetition makes remembering appointments and what not easier.

Also I have a permanent list of chores that need to be done through the week and check them off as we go, so there is no set day/time, but nothing gets missed. It also provides the odd opportunity for one of the children to earn a little extra at the end of the week if something has been missed lol.

Also, each bedroom has it's own laundry basket, as does the main floor. So each day of the week I grab a basket from one room, wash, dry, fold it and return it to the same room, so that person can put it away. This saves sorting for each person and fights over socks.

Here's what my week looks like:

Mondays - Paper day! Everything to do with paper, sorting the past weeks influx, recycling, shredding, responding to correspondence, filling out forms, getting any out going mail ready, paying bills.

Tuesday - Appointment Day- doctors, dentists, banks and all others. I make any and all of our appointments on Tuesdays between 9 am and noon, except in an emergency. This way I know it won't interfere with school activities and work schedules and I never have to remember numerous random dates and times. I can also write a note for school for the children on Monday/paper day ;)

Wednesday - Errands. The post office with the mail that is already ready, groceries and what not.

Thursday - Big Jobs. I generally pick one big job to do one Thursday, something that does not need to be done every week like washing windows or laundering all the quilts and blankets or cleaning the stove.

Friday is Planning Day. As a family, we sit down on Friday evenings at the table with some snacks and plan the following week. Making sure we know what papers need to be dealt with on Mondays, which appointments may be on Tuesdays, what supplies need to be picked on on Wednesday and that leaves us free to enjoy our weekends in a fairly clean and organized home.

@msmerlin: Me, too.

When I grow up (hahaha -- over 50 now) I am going to have a cleaning schedule and cook having done "mise en place". Meantime, I am just flying by the seat of my pants....

A perfect cleaning schedule? Don't I wish! :)

However, I've managed a few habits that help: All the toys get picked up before the kids go to bath/bed. We have guests weekly so that helps motivate me to at least vacuum and my husband gets stressed out if clutter adds up over time so I've just gotten better at managing/hiding it!

The only scheduled thing I've managed to stick close-ish to is for the tasks that don't require daily, or even weekly attendance but can add up. I write down one task a day on our calendar, things like washing windows, shredding paper, dusting, cleaning out the fridge, mirrors, etc. I don't have to do each task on the day prescribed, just try to get it all done by the month's end. I cross off the day once I'm done and hope to see a full month of x's before I turn the page.

Though I occasionally find it frustrating when a friend says she can't get together with our group because it's Laundry Night for her, I often forget she's in a situation with a shared and busy laundry room, establishing a regular schedule was very successful for me. Really the Only way to ensure my weekends weren't completely consumed by house chores. A task each day, before or after work, keeps me on track and I don't feel the temptation to hire a housecleaning service (which means even more money in my vacation fund, woohoo).

i don't have a 'schedule', but my husband works weekends when I'm off work, and we only have one car.

It normally ends up that I choose to clean on Saturdays, and go grocery shopping on Sundays with the newest coupons from the Sunday paper.

He does the laundry whenever he feels like it (usually 3am or after I've begged for clean jeans), so there's no method to that madness.

and dishes...well, I handle dishes when i get enough motivation to do them. we have a single basin porcelain sink with no disposal, so it takes FOREVER.

it's funny though, if I'm out of town for a weekend, I normally have to let everything stay dirty all week, because mid-week cleaning (aside from just picking up things here and there), throws off my whole schedule. ha!

Since I have laundry facilities down the hall (two washers, two dryers per floor in a 10-story, four-arm building), I have to time my laundry for when I think my neighbors probably won't be doing theirs -- so nix on Sunday nights, alas. I try for Friday nights or Saturday and Sunday mornings, but it's all so dependent on circumstances and whether some loon has decided to wash his 10 bathroom rugs, each in a separate machine, at an odd hour.

sorry, cremedela, that was me.

My mom used to always clean on Mondays, but worked part time so it wasn't too hard to keep that schedule. I'd love to do the same, but my work schedule changes with the week. I try to keep the same frequency for chores though, like doing laundry once every 10 days or so and cleaning the heavy traffic areas at least once every week.

If we all decide not to clean, then won't just that be the norm? Can we all get on board with this idea? I keep proposing it and no one is taking me seriously. The same went for "let's just make mint choco chip the only food in the world" and "the official wake up time for everyone should be 10 am."

But yeah, weekly cleaning schedule - not happening in my life. I barely get around to cleaning myself daily.

My daughter has a schedule. It goes something like this:

Monday: Weed garden for 15 minutes, wash kitchen floor

Tuesday: Water front yard, weed for 10 minutes, wash bathroom floor

Wednesday: Sort mail, take garbage and recycling bins to curb, wash bathroom mirror

Thursday: Weed for 15 minutes, dust living and dining rooms

Friday: Vacuum and sweep floors, change bed linen

As far as I can tell, washing dishes is nowhere on any list.

When we lived in an apt, we chose one day a week to do laundry in the evening. Now that we live in a house with our own washer and dryer and can do it anytime it seems warranted, my anti-list brain is much happier.

I do have a cleaning schedule - cleaners come on Friday every two weeks :) Best money ever spent!!! I'd rather skip dinner out than give that up. As for putting things away - I put things away after I use them. I follow a one minute rule - if it takes less than a minute to put something away I just do it. Kids toys stay in a heap on the carpet - they are toys, they are supposed to be like that!

My husband and I are both students and work part-time. Since last fall, he's been working weekend nights, and I work weekdays with Fridays off. After a few months of our different schedules, we realized we needed more of a plan in order to be good partners in caring for our space. Of the two of us, I'm typically the organizer or organized one. I like to create organizational systems and plans, so I got to work...

First, I created a weekly chores list and a monthly chores list based on our cleaning/up-keep needs and goals, and consulted with my Husb. Second, we divvied up the tasks from the weekly and monthly chore lists. We have those lists on our refrigerator (typed & in magnetic photo sleeves), and our chores are color-coded so we remember who signed up for what. Then we cross off chores as we complete them. At the start of a new week or month, we erase our marks of completion, and start the cycle again. These solutions have been great for accommodating our different cleaning styles, working as a team, and giving ourselves "gold stars" (or at least front-of-the-refrigerator props). :)

After awhile, I realized I needed a routine, because I couldn't always pull off the occasional all-day extravaganza of cleaning. (That is often my preference.) Thus, I've generally been following a household maintenance schedule I made for myself. (It's listed below.) My husband has his own rhythm for completing his chores.

~My Weekly Chore Schedule~

Mondays: Change Linens; Water Plants

Tuesdays - Thursdays: Laundry

Fridays: Weekly Bathroom Chores; One Set of Monthly Chores (I complete ONE of the following sets of monthly chores each week so that by the month's end, all my monthly chores are done: Monthly Kitchen & Bathroom Chores; Monthly Living & Dining Room Chores; Monthly Outside Chores; or Monthly Bedroom & Basement Chores)

Saturdays: Weekly Kitchen Chores; Plan Meals; Shop for Groceries

Sundays: Weekly Home Office Chores; Prepare a Few Meals & Snacks for Upcoming Week

I added this schedule to my Google Calendar, and set up reminders for myself that are automatically texted to my phone. If friends or family are visiting, or I'm out of the house, I have flexibility to ignore my self-imposed plan. If not, I try to stick to my plan. When I stick to my plan, my home is so much more pleasant to be in and I have space (mentally and physically) to relax and live.

So much time/money is wasted if you don't at least adhere to a loose schedule! We only have laundry and grocery shopping on specific days- the weekend. The rest is when it bothers us.

I've sort of adopted the Flylady system and made it my own. Dividing things up makes them seem much more manageable. I'd rather clean every day for 15 minutes then spend two or three hours doing it one day a week. (Note: the Flylady system is basically the Pomodoro technique applied to house cleaning).

I have everything scheduled on Google Calendar as repeating tasks. For instance, I vacuum and mop every Wednesday, and clean bathrooms every Thursday (though I follow Flylady's swish and swipe method every day though, so the weekly bathroom cleaning only takes a moment). I have other household chores set up to repeat every two weeks, some every month, some every quarter...

A while ago I tried to implement the "little bit every night" system. Dusting one night, vaccumming another, bathroom another, etc.

I HATED it! In addition to working, commuting, laundry, preparing food, finding free machines to do my laundry -- all the daily stuff we all have to do -- adding even 20 minutes of actual housework/cleaning almost EVERY night of the week made me feel like a total drudge!

So now I clean my entire apartment top to bottom on Thursday nights, which takes about 2 hours. Yes it's tiring but that way my place is clean for the weekend and I'm not using precious weekend time to do it! If something comes up on a Thursday evening, I can move it a Friday easily enough and still be ready for the weekend.

Oh, crap. I just realized it's Thursday TODAY.

I have a list of household chores that need to be done regularly.. I try to spend 15-20 mins a day doing a chore, tick it off the list, and move on to the next one the next day, start over when I come to the end of the list. I don't sweat it if I miss a day or two because we're away, or we're busy.. Works out really good, never feels like I have much to do but everything's always pretty clean.

A schedule would drive me nuts, but so does the house when it gets too messy. When that mood hits every few days I clean everything that I can in a given hour or two. Some days it's the living room, some days the bathroom, etc. I time it so laundry is happening at the same time so I know exactly when to move things to the dryer! I did skip morning yoga earlier this week to clean wash the dishes that were piling up. It's an imperfect system.

In our house, where we both work part at home and part on campus, the schedule is something like this:

Everyday: bed gets made, things are tidied, kitchen is cleaned as we go (there are NEVER any dirty dishes in the sink at the end of the day--a pet peeve of mine); scooping the cat litter.

During the week: laundry (who does it and when depends on who is home, but we do several loads over the course of the week and they all get dealt they get cleaned; ironing (hubster does this about once a week while watching movies).

Once a week (when depends in part on schedules, though if not done during the week, these are done on weekends): bed is changed; deep kitchen clean and bathrooms (we each do one); changing the cat litter and scrubbing out boxes; sweeping hard floors and vacuuming rugs throughout house and carpet in bedroom; thorough tidying of all rooms and surfaces (me).

Every other week: one floor of the house is completely dusted and swept (two floors overall so every other week; this doesn't count the basement, which gets a twice a year deep clean and decluttering).

This is only inside the house; the outside is my territory during the growing season and I tend to do a bit every day (watering and weeding) and do the mowing (small yard and a push mower) and trimming and any other bigger jobs once a week or so. During winter (we're in WI), the hubster is in charge of shoveling and de-icing.

I really like the rhythm of doing things regularly; especially if you have a good system for putting things where they belong (which we do), things are never really out of control and someone could come by at anytime and I can have them in without worry. It is just one less thing to worry about.

I don't see my husband 4 out of the 7 days in the week, due to our work schedule, so I try to leave our apartment as clean as I care before going to bed - depending on how exhausted I am. My top priority is the kitchen, every day - all dishes washed, counters wiped down, and the oven & floor spot cleaned. Everything else can wait until I'm off, which is when laundry, groceries, and errands get done!

I follow a set of unorganized cleaning system but should start with a set planned just to keep me on schedule

I make my own cleaning products, and I make a batch whenever I'm ready to clean. Because of this I tend to do certain chores in their entirety rather than room by room.

Example, when I whip up a batch of glass cleaner, the windows and mirrors throughout the house gets cleaned.

Dusting solution gets made and all of the fans, dressers, tv's, vents, wooden furniture and other dust-prone items get wiped.

Mopping solution = all floors cleaned

Murphy's Oil soap on baseboards, moldings, light-switches.

Sunday late afternoon (right before sunset, my favorite time of day) I sweep the driveway.

All the above gets cleaned on a weekly basis. Luckily I have a tiny house so it's not overwhelming. I watch tv while I clean and clean in between commercials lol.

I make up a batch of antibacterial spray weekly and keep a bottle in the bathroom and kitchen, so those areas get wiped daily (mostly just the counters). I'll actually use bleach about once/month. Can't bring myself to give it up completely.

Dishes are either on the drying rack, in the dishwasher, put away, or in the sink but rinsed off.

Food trash gets put outside nightly.

I need a schedule because it's easy to forget to clean certain places. Like walls, switch plates and outlets, vacuuming furniture, BEHIND furniture. Even if you can't easily see it, dirt and dust and grime contributes to odors in a house and can really prevent your home from smelling and feeling fresh. Every little bit helps.

I used to hate cleaning and was the messiest little teenager ever, but since getting my own place I have pride in keeping it nice and I am actually able to zen out while cleaning.

I definitely need to work on making the bed daily. I really hate making the bed.

I have 1 hour for lunch and after eating lunch in the lunchroom, I got sick of it so I started coming home. It's really nice. I get home and put on some music, throw something in the toaster oven for lunch, turn on the kettle for a tea, run upstairs and make the bed, back downstairs to unload and reload the dishwasher, wipe the counters/stove/sinks , eat lunch while I check facebook/AT and if I still have time I will fold laundry or maybe sweep the kitchen floor. I love coming home to a tidy kitchen/bedroom. As for the rest of the household chores I usually get them done in 2 or 3 hours on a saturday or sunday which I don'y mind at all. I get in a groove and check things off of my list, it's almost fun!!

Oh and I am very thankful that my boyfriend takes out the garbage/picks up after himself most of the time, does most of his laundry and we share the cooking and grocery shop together. Our place isn't spotless but I'm fine with people dropping in. OH...I do hate vacuuming though.

@ A from IsItAHouseYet

-If we all decide not to clean, then won't just that be the norm
-let's just make mint choco chip the only food in the world
-the official wake up time for everyone should be 10 am.

I second all three of those motions!!!

As a student, I'm so unbelievably busy that cleaning sort of happens when it happens. Usually when I finish a project or paper I sort of realize what a mess everything is, and cleaning up is sort of cathartic.

On the idea of cleaning schedules, it may work for certain modern adults, but the concept of a Wash Day, Market Day, etc. is absurdly archaic. That system is the product of a period when men left the house to work and women stayed home and "kept house" all day long. The other factor here is that before the computer and the car and the washing machine, these tasks took a really long time! When you have to walk 5 miles to get to market, of course it's going to take all day.

@ A from IsItAHouseYet

-If we all decide not to clean, then won't just that be the norm
-let's just make mint choco chip the only food in the world
-the official wake up time for everyone should be 10 am.

Am already there except that food is 2%Organic Yogurt with fruit and heavy whipping cream, with pumpkin seeds some days! And, there's always dark chocolate covered almonds available to have with milk:}

Also ditto on getting around to cleaning myself: shower when I am exhausted or smelly or the clothes I'm wearing are dirty... the body needs to time to recover and regroup after being stripped of its working armor.

I have learned the hard way that it's easier to clean as I go during the week, and then just do a little extra cleaning on the weekends. With a toddler, two dogs, a cat, and a messy husband, not to mention I (and I mean JUST me) am STILL unpacking/organizing after moving last fall, any sort of schedule gets tossed out the window pretty quickly. I did recently plan to clean out our shed, but it had to be done on one of the coolest days this week (and it was still hot and stuffy in there while I worked). Doing a little every day helps keep everything from falling apart pretty quickly.

I do as many others do: wipe down surfaces in the bathroom while I'm in there, clean up clutter at night before going to bed (food/drinks left out, etc.), empty garbage cans and dust when needed, etc. I even clean up and put away my toddler's basket of toys every night that has taken up residence in our living room, and line up his bigger toys in a neat row next to the entertainment center. My husband asked me why I bother doing this, since our toddler will be getting up early the next day and will take everything out again. I told him I like to enjoy a somewhat "grown up" living room for even a few hours a night, and if I didn't do my nightly sweep under the sectional for all those little toys that get thrown around, it would be that much harder to keep things clean (and there'd be no toys left after a while too).

The only time I really stick to scheduled cleaning is when the laundry gets too full and I plan to do it all on one day to get it done, or if we're having a party and it's gotta be REALLY clean (funny how you notice cobwebs or pet hair tumbleweeds only when people come over).

But bottom line? It's our first home that isn't a rental, so I adore it that much more, and I would like it to look clean and pretty :)

I try to do a little each day. Making the bed, running the vac, and a clean bathroom is a must since unexpected guests always seem to happen. One tip I picked up that I love is to always have something working for you. That means dishes are always either ready to be put in the dishwasher or ready to be put away. Same goes for laundry (once theres enough of something) If I had a Roomba I'd turn that thing on too. That seems to help me keep everything pretty tidy and always having an empty sink motivates me to have a clean kitchen. On the weekends I like to start in one room by taking everything that doesnt belong in there out and putting it where it goes, then once I am done there I move to the next room. That one is the toughest since I am easily distracted :P Also, I clean the shower when I am in it! As for groceries I only restock when we are totally out of food and begin to have weird dinners.

I do something every day. Yes, there's a schedule, but I am not married to it as long as everything has been cleaned by the weekend. Since I'm doing something on a daily basis, the house is cleaner than it's ever been!

Do I cancel dates, avoid going out with friend or change schedules so I can clean? Absolutely not. However, if I don't clean one day, I do extra the next day. I really love having a clean house.

When 'Hoarders' comes on, I start cleaning.

No schedule, but I feel as if I clean constantly as we are extremely messy. Most people I know have extremely tidy, clean houses - how do they do it?

I work from home so I'm pretty flexible. But my favorite cleaning impetus is to take my dog to daycare. She is always underfoot and thinks the dust mop is an invitation to play. And so is the vacuum. And if I'm on my hands and knees...well, forget it.

Yes, I do. Groceries are on Tuesday, Wednesday is laundry day, and Thursday is cleaning stuff like toilets, stuff that doesn't need to be done on a weekly basis. We swap it around only when we have an activity that conflicts with one of those set days. And when we've just come back from camping, I do a load of laundry that day and on Wednesday.

We set those because of necessity. Each of us only have eight sets of underwear, one for each day and the day we do laundry. We do groceries one day a week, in the evening, because only one of us can drive, and he's not the person who's got the more flexible schedule. And groceries are a pain to carry home by foot, even without a toddler.

Also, I don't know where to post this, but I found something specific to Chicago-ans I'd like to share from Chicago Home and Garden. I have no idea whether these sources have already been picked apart, and I also have no idea where to post this appropriately. So I'm just going to throw it into the mix and hope it gets filed into the new organization that is AT recently. Here:

http://www.chicagohomemag.com/Chicago-Home/Design-Sources/

I never used to have any kind of cleaning schedule. I just kept things clean. Then...the boyfriend moved in. I love him, but he's a slob! After months of trying to make him understand that if he just puts his dishes in the dishwasher when he's done, it's less work, I've given up. I put together a spreadsheet with daily, weekly and monthly chores. We don't have set days or times that things have to get done, but at a glance we can see the last time something was done and know whether it's time to do it again. So far, it's been working out great. He still doesn't clean everyday, but on his days off he makes an effort to at least do a few things from our chore list.

It also gives me ammunition if he tries to convince me he did a bunch of cleaning, because the spreadsheet doesn't lie ;-)