15 Minutes of Clean

In my "housewife" dreams my bed is always made, I have folded the laundry as it came straight from the dryer, toilets never get a little ring around them, dishwasher is loaded and unloaded with ease, carpets vacuumed, counters wiped down, toys picked up, and everything is done quickly and often enough that I never have to do all of it at one time.  

Did I mention that this was dreaming...

Reality is so far from that. 

I have mentioned apologized to Ethan more than once, that he got the short end of the "wife stick" when it comes to cleaning.  I know how to do it, but motivation is so hard for me to find.  If I had a quarter for every time I've heard my mom say "If you'd just do it right away, it wouldn't be so hard or take you so long" I could hire a maid to clean the house.

I think my main problem is my attention span. 

Or lack thereof.

I get started on the bathroom and clean the sink, then I go unload the dishwasher, then make the bed, and start a load of laundry, then it's back to do the toilet, load the dishwasher, and so on...

It's not until I'm all done (hours later) that I finally feel like I accomplished anything.

And in comes Frugal Faye.

Frugal Fay is a friend of mine from high school.  She writes a very cool blog on being frugal, being a mom, and her everyday life as a wife and mother.  She is (in my opinion) the gold medalist of house wives. 

Today she posted a blog on the 12 ways she gets motivated to clean. 

Out of all the things I think to Google on the Internet throughout the day (baby development, dress shopping, eating healthy, making baby food, shoe shopping, etc...) "how to motivate yourself to clean" was not something I even considered.

Faye had many great ideas to motivate yourself to clean, but there was one of her methods that just seemed to make me think "hey, I can do that!"

Setting a timer for 15 minutes.  How much can I get done in 15 minutes? 

It's almost like competing with myself.  And I LOVE competition!

Then reward myself with something fun (another Frugal Faye tip). 

Now this is not a way to get the entire house clean, BUT if I can do a little each day, 15 minutes at a time, maybe I can eliminate those all-day marathons. 

Along with a few other tips from Faye! 

I might just end up a bronze medalist house-wife.