Clean the Dishes
Maybe you’ve never seen what happens to a sink full of dishes left to sit, but it isn’t pretty. Smells, stains, and odd fungal growth usually go with forgotten dirty dishes. Cleaning dishes daily is the best choice all around. If you can’t manage to actually wash the dishes, at least make a rule that dishes will be scraped, rinsed, and stacked on a daily basis. This will prevent mold and insects from invading your home. If you have a dishwasher, use it regularly.
Do the Laundry
Not every family needs to wash laundry daily, but many of us find that at least a daily load of laundry is necessary. With work clothes, school uniforms, soccer practice clothes, and sports uniforms, families can generate a lot of dirty clothes. A daily load can help prevent a mad dash to find a baseball jersey in the bottom of a hamper or an overwhelming pile at the end of the week. If you have a really large family you may need to up your number of loads a day. Luckily, laundry is something that even school-aged kids can do with minimal supervision once they are trained.
Tidy Up
Doing a little clutter control on a daily basis keeps your home ready for company at a moment’s notice. A few minutes of picking up each day also prevent your home from turning into a disaster zone that will take hours to plow through. A tidy room makes a big difference in our motivation to tackle bigger projects. Use the 15 Minute Cleanups as a daily help to keep your main rooms ready for visitors. Try instituting a quick-pick-up session before bed. Make it more fun by trying to beat your best times or racing against other family members.
File Papers
If you don’t file daily, you risk piles of papers on every surface in your home. Between junk mail, letter offers, school papers, and receipts, paper can overtake our homes very quickly. It only takes a few minutes each day to prevent a major pileup. If possible set up a mail center with a shredder, trash can, and mailing supplies. Check the mail once a day and deal with each item as you open it. Shred it, trash it, respond, or file depending on where the paper needs to go. With these few chores completed on a daily basis, your home will look neat and be ready for company at any time. You’ll also limit your need to deep clean and keep your home clutter free and sanitary. While it might not seem that you’ve done much each day, you’ll have accomplished the necessary chores to keep your home running more smoothly. Once you’ve tackled your daily chores, brush up on what to do weekly, monthly, and seasonally.
