written by American HouseCleaning
One of the reasons why we love working with our clients is fact that they take great pride in the appearance of their home. A home can reveal many things about its owner, and nothing sends a more positive first impression than a perfectly clean house. Given the fact that house maintenance can be both time consuming and strenuous at times, our house cleaning specialists are often entrusted with this task. After all, they have the training, the skills and the tools needed to restore the impeccable appearance of our clients’ homes in the least amount of time.
We have been often asked for tips and tricks to help our clients organize and de-clutter their homes. Unfortunately, this is an activity which does take quite a bit of time, and cutting corners may not be the best idea if you care about the quality of the end results.
However, de-cluttering does not have to start and finish in the same day. Keeping your home in a good shape is a matter of regular maintenance. And while you can always count on the services of our house cleaning company, de-cluttering is something which you can and should do on your own, as this task involves not just cleaning a space, but also looking through all of your things there, reorganizing them efficiently, and most importantly getting rid of those items which are no longer of any use to you. The secrets to efficiently de-cluttering your home are motivation and perseverance. This is recommend you try our 25 spaces in 25 days challenge. By completing this challenge you will not only gain knowledge of an interesting strategy which can prove useful to you in the future. More importantly, by being able to set your own pace, you will be more motivated to keep up with a daily routine which will help you reach your objectives.
The challenge which we have for you might sound very simple at a first glance. First, you need to make a list of 25 spaces in your home that you feel are cluttered and could use your attention. The spaces you select do not have to be big. Start small, especially if time is an issue for you, as it is for many of the clients of our clients. Any place, even as small as a drawer or a shelf can be put on the list. However, don’t be afraid to take on larger projects as well, such as a closet or even the attic or basement. After all, this needs to be a challenging activity.
After you have completed the list, you should create a table with 25 cells, one for each of the next 25 days. Either print it, or just draw a table by hand. The important thing is that you have the table in a physical format somewhere that it is visible, so you can constantly check and look at your progress. Next, write in each of the cells one of the activities on your list. Take into account how much time it would take to complete that particular task, and how much time you will have available for de-cluttering that day. A small drawer or a shelf might only take 10 minutes of your time to clean and reorganize, but a closet would take an hour, or even two, depending on its size. If you feel that a certain space would take too long to reorganize, feel free to split it into smaller tasks spread over a few days. Avoid setting tasks which are too difficult for you to complete. Try to be realistic in your estimates regarding how much time you have available on a certain day. That way you will be more motivated to achieve your daily objectives.
This challenge has a number of benefits. The first is that it will help you to better organize your time in the future – by spending just a few minutes a day you will make a significant contribution to the overall appearance of your home, in less than a month. Imagine what could happen if you did that over an entire year!
Another, very important benefit is the fact that you have the opportunity to clear a lot of space. Over the years we tend to gather many items which we keep in storage thinking we might use them at some point – but we never actually do. This is your chance to get rid of those items once and for all. It is even possible to make some money off them by holding a garage sale or by placing them on websites such as eBay or Craigslist.
This challenge can easily be turned into a family activity, by assigning every member of the family the same number of tasks. While it is likely they will not be extremely enthusiastic about it at first, you can easily change that by adding some small rewards for a number of well accomplished tasks, for keeping to the schedule, and so on.
You can take before and after photos of all the spaces you’ve cleaned in order to show others – and remind yourself – what a great job you have done. The important thing is to focus on the results of your labor, but having a little bit of fun on the way helps too.
As a house cleaning Palo Alto company, we realize that this challenge will not necessarily make your house clutter-free. It depends on various factors, not all of which are under your control. However, trying this challenge is a good start. After less than a month you will get to see the palpable results of your as little as ten minutes of work per day. Space by space, you will slowly notice how much better things look, and you will be able to realize how much space you have managed to clear with so little effort. We believe that this might just inspire you to invest more time in similar tasks in the future.
