How to Keep Your House Clean: The Ultimate Guide

Are you wondering how to keep your house clean?

If so, you are in luck! I’m a neat freak and a mom of six boys – and I keep a lean, mean, clean home. 😁

I grew up cleaning my house every Saturday.  Seriously.  And when I got married and started my own family, I still cleaned my house. Every Saturday.

It was a routine I kept until the last three were born.  😆  Then it just got to be too much.  I didn’t have time for all of that.

I had to find something that worked better for me.

After a bit of trial and error, (and a couple of lost years while the twins were little) I found a weekly cleaning routine that works for me!

So, I’ll share it with you, in hopes that it will help you too, Momma.

How to keep your house clean

There are many moving parts to my weekly house cleaning routine. I can manage to keep a clean house by tidying up daily, cleaning every weekend, and implementing ‘deep cleans’ every spring and fall.

It sounds like a lot, I know. But it’s really not. The secret sauce is the daily tidying up. My daily chores allow me to skip a weekend cleaning if I have to. 😉 They also keep my house looking “clean” all of the time, even when I know otherwise! 😆

To get started, all you have to do is create a cleaning routine that works for you. I’ll walk you through it! 😉

1. Start with a basic house cleaning routine

But first, let’s not stress ourselves out with trying to keep a perfect house.  We aren’t Martha Stewart or Carol Brady, after all.  (I know, dating myself again…)

No, it’s better to be realistic about what we can accomplish in a weekend – and how much we care about a clean house to begin with!  Not everyone cares if their house is clean or dirty, you know.

So, if cleaning is not your forté, then no worries!  You get to clean your house, your way. 

Meaning, you choose how crazy you want to get.  😉

Step one to creating a cleaning routine: daily chores

I miss those days when I could clean my house on Saturday, and it’d stay clean all week.  😢

Now, I can clean one room, leave it to go grab a drink, and then pass back through to see it instantly a disaster. 

Because nothing stays clean in a house of six boys, I had to quickly adapt my cleaning routine. This meant I had to constantly be cleaning.  24/7.  Sounds horrible, I know. 

But here’s how I got it done:

⇢ Tidy up every morning

My little morning routine changed over the years, depending on how old the boys were.

When they were really small, I only got a couple of things done every morning.  I had to choose my battles and let the rest wait for another day.  (Or lifetime! Ha!)

As they got older, I could do more.

I’ll share my entire morning routine in another post, but basically, I tidied up each room, swept, and wiped down the bathrooms.

And that’s it!

⇢ Do the dishes after every meal

I am kind of a stickler on this. 

I do the dishes after every meal, no matter what.  And I know it’s tough, with little kids.  I could probably write a whole other post on how to get the dishes done with kids in the house!

I also make my kids do the dishes.  I often ask them to help, and I’ve taught them to clean up after themselves when I’m not home.

I get super angry when I leave the house with a clean kitchen, and return hours later, to a mess. 

⇢ Wash clothes every day

This might not be necessary in your house, but in mine, it is.  It doesn’t take long to build up piles of laundry in a family of eight!

I wash at least two loads of clothes every day, more on the weekend.

⇢ Perform the drive-by clean 

When the kids were little, I realized I could stay ahead of the game if I never left a room without grabbing something!

Seriously.  If I’m in the living room, and I’m heading downstairs, I’ll scan the room before I leave, and see if there is anything that either:

            A.) belongs downstairs, or

            B.) belongs in a room that is ON THE WAY to downstairs

If there is, I grab it!

Never leave a room empty-handed. 😉

⇢ Tidy up before hitting the hay

This doesn’t take much.  Just walk through each room and grab the stuff that doesn’t belong in there.  Return it to its rightful spot.

You can do this before or after you lay things out for the next morning.

If you do these five things every day, then your Saturday cleaning doesn’t have to be so hard!  Plus, if you keep the house clean on a daily basis, you can often skip your weekend cleaning.  😁

Step two to creating a cleaning routine: clean on the weekend

Like I said, I used to clean every Saturday.  Often, I’d clean before leaving for the weekend (usually on a Friday) and then clean again when we returned (usually on a Monday).  My husband still likes to make fun of me for this! 😆

I was kind of a cleaning freak.

But that all changed with boys 3 through 6!  😂 🤣

I am so much more relaxed now.

Still, I do like a clean house!  So, I usually try to ‘Saturday Clean’ it every weekend. 

How much or how little will often depend on how well I kept it clean during the week, what we have going on, and when my last ‘Saturday Clean’ was.

Step three to creating a cleaning routine: deep clean every spring and fall

Okay, I’m not going to lie. 

I gave up spring and fall cleaning when the twins were born. 

It was just too much.

This is why it’s so important to know what your values are.  If you highly value a clean home, you aren’t going to give up your spring and fall cleaning.

And I do, I really do value a clean home.

I just valued caring for my boys more.  😁

They are old enough now, though, that I could easily get back to spring and fall cleaning.  But….we moved this spring. There’s a lot of cleaning that went along with that.  😁

So, I’m calling it good.

Step four to creating a cleaning routine: be realistic

Okay, before we get into the nitty-gritty about weekend cleaning, let’s quickly run through how to actually set up your cleaning schedule.  I’m going to share mine with you, but that doesn’t mean it’s going to work perfectly for you.

You need to be realistic about what you can – and can’t – get done. And how clean your house is going to stay. 😉

⇢ Know your values

Just like everything else that I preach on this site, you need to understand your own values.  And dare I say, your hubby’s values as well?  Because let’s face it:  It’s very possible that he values a clean home and you do not. 

Or vice versa.

So, before you decide what your cleaning schedule will look like, you need to decide what your values are when it comes to a clean home.

Here’s mine:

• The rooms in our home need to be inviting to our children. The older ones need to feel like they can come in and take a load off.  The younger ones need to feel welcome to play.
• Our home needs to feel welcoming to guests.  They can’t feel overwhelmed when they walk through our door. They too, need to feel like they can come in and take a load off.
• We need a living space that supports our family values. We value education, quality time together, home cooked family meals, etc.  Our home needs to reflect that.
• Our house needs to feel like home to my husband and me.  It is our haven. 

Your values determine ‘how clean’ your house needs to be

Knowing my values helps me to know how clean I actually need my house to be. 

If my kids can’t find a place to sit and relax because everything is piled on the couch, that’s a problem.  Likewise, if the kitchen table is overrun by junk, we have an issue.

If my kids can’t find their toys, have too many toys, or there’s too much stuff on the floor for them to even find room to play, then we have a problem.

If people don’t want to come over because my house is gross, we have a serious issue.

If my house isn’t set up to make everyday routines run smoothly, then it’s hard to function.  If there’s junk piled on the kid’s school table, how can I go through their paperwork, find their library books, charge their Ipads, etc.?

If my kitchen is overrun with dirty dishes, how am I going to cook?

So, I clean to support my values and our daily lifestyle.

Because I want my kids to feel like they can take a load off when they come home, it’s okay for my house to look ‘lived in’.  It’s not okay for it to look filthy.

So, what do you value?  And how do your cleaning habits support or hinder your values? 

⇢ Know how much time you have

After you know your values, you need to take a look at how much time you REALLY have to dedicate to cleaning.

And not just how much time you have, but how much time you want to spend on it.

I love cleaning and wanted to spend a lot of time cleaning.  And I did.  Until the twins were born.

Then I had to reassess everything.  I obviously couldn’t spend hours cleaning every day.  Not even every weekend!

I had to get down and dirty about how much time I really had, to clean up after all of these dirty boys!

And then I had to be okay with that.  I had to figure out ways to handle not being able to clean as much as I wanted to.

I had to prioritize my cleaning, shift my mindset, and call-in help.

Maybe you don’t want to spend a lot of time cleaning. If there’s a lot of cleaning that needs to get done every week, though, then you may have to figure out how to meet that need in as little time as possible.

⇢ Prioritize

The biggest thing that saved me, when the twins were little, was prioritizing. 

I couldn’t have a spic and span home.  I had to let that dream go.

So, what I did was prioritize.

Every day I had a list of three things that needed to be cleaned. They were either big things or little things.  And I based these three items on how grossed out I was.  Literally.

So, it might be things like vacuuming, sweeping, and cleaning the toilet.

But, if I woke up and was suddenly disgusted by my dirty fridge, I might forgo the vacuuming and clean the fridge instead.  I would move vacuuming to the next day.

I never got everything clean.  I think we lived in a constant state of dirtiness.  But I did at least shoosh my mental anguish by tackling the worst. 

It was survival mode. And I got good at it.

I don’t have to do that anymore, thankfully.  But if I’m short on time, I do still have to prioritize.

Say friends are coming over, and you want to clean the house before they get here.  But you only have two hours.  You need to decide how to best spend those two hours.

Clean the rooms they’ll be in the most?

Clean the dirtiest rooms?

Clean the easiest rooms?

As far as your weekly routine goes, figure out what is most important, and tackle that first.  That way, if you run out of time, at least the most important stuff will be clean.

The rest can wait for another day.

Step five to creating a cleaning routine: divide and conquer

When you are creating your cleaning routine, divide your list out by rooms and/or levels of your house. 

For example, maybe you tackle the upstairs on Saturday and the downstairs on Sunday.  Or maybe you do all the bathrooms and kitchen in the morning and tackle the rest in the afternoon.

However it makes sense to you.  If you start in one room, or on one level, and work through to the next, you’ll have small little wins along the way. And that will feel momentous!

2. Then involve your kids

My kids clean every Saturday with me, and they often help with daily chores as well.  I’ll write a post about our cleaning process, but basically, I create a long list of chores and we all take turns initialing the ones we choose.

That way they feel a little in control of their chores, rather than just being told: “go do this”.  It gives them a little more power and ownership. And, when I initial too, they see we are a team, in this together.

Involving your kids teaches them to take pride in their home as well.  You don’t want them to go off to college or move out and not clean.  😱  You must teach them now.

Sure, it’ll slow you down.  But trust me, when they are 16, and you can tell them to go clean the bathroom because their girlfriend is coming over, you’ll thank me.  😉

3. Next, be as consistent as possible

It does no good to clean your house this weekend, and then go months without cleaning it again. By the time you get back to cleaning, it’ll be a war zone!

You’ll feel like you are spring cleaning, rather than doing a light Saturday clean!

It is so much easier to stay on top of your weekly schedule if you clean every week.  Things don’t get as dirty then, and it doesn’t take as long to clean up.

So, get into the habit of tidying up every day, and cleaning on the weekends.  Even if it’s just a little bit.

4. And finally, use the weekend to “Saturday clean”

Wow! That was a lot, just to get us to the point where we can clean!  😆  You know your values, you know your priorities, and you have an idea of what you want your weekend cleaning schedule to look like.

So, let’s clean your house! Here’s how I get it done, room by room.

💥 Bathrooms

I like to start with either the kitchen or the bathrooms.  It’s the worst job, so you might as well get it over with, right? 

Here’s what I clean every weekend in the bathrooms:

• Shower/tub
• Mirrors
• Sink
• Counter
• Toilet
• Dust any shelves or nic nacks
• Wipe down any lotions, soap bottles, shampoos, and toothpastes – pretty much anything that is sitting out or looks dirty
• Wipe down the bathroom scale
• Wipe down the towel racks, light switches, and door handles
• Wash the towels and any other dirty clothes
• Take out the garbage
• Replace any items that are out
• Finish by sweeping and washing the floor

💥 Living Room(s)

For some weird reason, the living room is always the most fulfilling for me.  If my living room is clean, the rest of the house feels clean.

Here’s how I clean mine:

• Dust all furniture
• Dust all shelves & nic nacs
• Put away anything that does not belong in there
• Wash the windows
• Wipe down any door handles or light switches
• Vacuum the couches and chairs
• Vacuum the carpet (or sweep and wash the floor)
• Wash any rugs if you have them

💥 Kitchen

The kitchen usually takes me the longest.  So, I like to tackle it first, or after the bathrooms.

Here’s how I clean my kitchen:

• Sanitize the counters
• Sanitize the cutting boards
• Wipe down all items on the counters (Kureig, toaster, mixer, recipe box, TV, etc.)
• Clean out the kitchen sink
• Wipe down the doors to every cupboard (they get grimy)
• Wipe down the table legs and the chairs (they also get grimy)
• Clean out the fridge
• Clean out underneath the sink (I have a garbage under there…it gets grimy as well)
• Wipe down all big appliances (dishwasher, stove, oven)
• Wipe down the door handles and light switches
• Wash the windows
• Take out the garbages
• Sweep and wash the floor

💥 Bedrooms

Have your kids either clean their bedroom or help you clean their bedroom, depending on how old they are.

Here’s what we do:

• Pick up all of the toys
• Wash the clothes
• Dust the furniture
• Dust the shelves
• Dust any nic nacs
• Wash the bedding, if it hasn’t been washed yet this month
• Wipe down the door handles and the light switches
• Take out the garbage
• Dust the TV and gaming systems
• Wash the windows
• Vacuum

💥 Laundry

I wash laundry every day, but on the weekend, I also clean the laundry room.  Here’s how:

• Wash, fold, and put away all the clothes
• Wipe down the washing machine and the dryer
• Wipe down any other appliances in the laundry room (such as an extra fridge)
• Clean out the fridge if it is dirty
• Dust any shelving and nic nacs
• Wash the windows
• Wipe down the door handles and the light switches
• Sweep and wash the floor (or vacuum)

💥 Playroom(s)

Treat your playrooms just like a living room or a bedroom and follow that same routine.  The only difference is there will be TONS of toys.  😆  So, often a little toy organization is required.

Also, from time to time, I’ll wash toys. Throw the stuffed animals into the washing machine.  Wipe down the toy kitchen with Clorox Clean-Up Wipes. Clean out the toy box, etc.

This is because kids are all boogery and gross.  It’s good to sanitize their playthings periodically. 😉

💥 Doors and Entries

With so many kids running in and out of the house, our doors get nasty.  Every weekend I wipe them down.

This includes the screen doors and the windowpanes.  I also wipe down the doorknobs and any light switches near the door.

Then, I clean the rest of the entry if there is one.  Dust anything that needs dusting, put away anything that doesn’t belong there, wash the rugs, and sweep and wash the floor.

And that’s it!  That’s how I clean my house.

At the end of the day….

At the end of the day, momma, we keep our house clean because it makes a house a home. ☺️ A home to raise our babies in. To love our husband in. And to welcome friends and family to.

A clean house makes disciplining kids easier. A clean house makes playing together easier. And a clean house makes creating memories so much better.

Keeping your house clean is more than just daily chores – it’s one way we love our families.

Btw – I’m kind of an odd duck.  I like to reward myself after cleaning each room by lighting a candle or spraying Febreeze.  😁  It kind of makes the room feel ‘complete’.

Happy Cleaning!!