How to keep your home clean, yes, even pregnant and with a toddler

Published on 30 June 2023 at 10:45

I have spent the last 4 and a half years trying to learn how to effectively care for a home and that only got more complicated when we moved into our old 1870's built home in November of 2021. I'm going to share how I have found to keep it clean and guest ready almost any day of the week and yes even with an active toddler and while I'm pregnant.

There are three main changes I had to make to really help me to stay on top of my home. The First one I did was I decluttered, and I got rid of a lot when we moved into this house. The second thing I had to do was change my mind set on how if viewed my home, this was a work God that really started in my heart about comparison that I was struggling with and I am so grateful for the progress He has made in me on this. The third thing I discovered earlier this year and that is the fly lady cleaning method, and I am telling you these 3 things have changed my life and my home environment immensely.

Decluttering:

When we moved into our current home, I was forced to declutter half of my kitchen because our kitchen is actually that small, and this only got me more excited to declutter more. I also got rid of close to half of my clothes, and many other things in the rest of my home too. I wouldn't call us minimalists, but we have greatly simplified our home and lives. This is what that did for me, not only do I have way less dishes and laundry to wash, because let's face if you have 7 cast iron frying pans (like I did) and 3 weeks' worth of clothes you're probably going to wait until all of those are dirty and you have nothing to eat off of and no clean underwear before you muster up the motivation to clean any of it, but I feel less stressed and exhausted all the time too. Getting rid of the access streamlined my choices and made caring for my things not only easier but also but, dare I say it, enjoyable. This was not something I did overnight though, I spent months slowly going through my things and there are still some areas of my home calling for me to give my attention to but with just a few minutes a day, five minutes matters, you can see a massive change in your home.

Overcoming Comparison:

The second change that I had to make for a clean and presentable home was my mindset. I discovered that part of the reason I didn't want to clean and care for my home was because I was too stuck on how ugly and outdated it was. Like I mentioned it was built in the 1870's but it was also last renovated in the early 1970's so you can probably imagine the design. Think turquoise cabinets and a yellow stove and paneling everywhere. It was also a tax office for many years before we moved in so there wasn't a very large priority, on having lots of cupboards, or shelves and storage. I quickly learned that although I said I was grateful for my home I didn't actually feel that way deep down in my heart. I needed to remember that God gave me this home and although right now it doesn't look the way I think it should it is still a gift from Him, and I need to respect Him and my family in caring for it and doing that well. When I began to look at my home as a gift from God rather than a disappointment my desires changed and although I don't always have a lot of energy and motivation, I am able to make caring for it a priority, and I do a better job because I am cleaning to serve the Lord not because it is just another thing I need to do.

Fly Lady Cleaning method:

So now that my home was simplified, and I had a heart and desire to care for my home well I needed a system that would work for me and my very limited time at home. So, I did what most of us do when we have a problem, I took to good old YouTube and that's when I discovered the fly lady cleaning method. This method helps you establish daily and weekly routines to help you maintain the clean and then breaks your home down into 5 different zones, usually 1-2 rooms, where you focus on one zone a week for about a month to deep clean. As someone who used to run a housekeeping department at a college a zone system helps me look at my home as something as important as a job too, so I don't ignore these tasks that are important. I go into more detail on how this method works and what it looks like in my life in my post from last week, if you're interested you can read that here. This method really has changed how productive I have been able to be in just the couple hours that my toddler is napping. Using this method, caring for my home has gone from being an overwhelming and unmanageable job to a task that actually, many days, I can look forward to doing because I know while I work on my focus area the rest of my home still looks good enough to have guests in and be a sanctuary for my family. I also love this system because it is so flexible for people with weird schedules like mine was when I started this which was essentially 4-6 hours a week because of my husband's work schedule and my toddler.

So, after getting rid of the excess, working on my sin of comparison and seeing my home as a gift, and then putting in place routines to motivate me to clean I have been able to keep my house in order most days, enjoy a sabbath rest and still care for my 16-month-old toddler all while pregnant and I believe that these tips will help you too.