Three simple ways to live a tidier life | …even with kids in the house!
Anyone that reads my blog regularly or follows me on any of the socials will know, that I am not the tidier or cleaner in our house, that title goes to LagerDad. I’m the one that moves things from one place to another and has a quick hoover around.
However, I am quite house proud and when we have guests over, it’s always a bonus if they’re not tripping over dirty nappies or sitting on clammy old rice cakes. It’s not just for the guests benefit….
Tidy house, tidy mind.
Here are three of my home hacks to keep it a bit tidier on a daily basis so that you have more time to sit around and enjoy it. After all, there’s nothing better than sitting on the sofa in a spotless lounge and enjoying a hot cuppa and a biscuit. OK, that last bit may be a bit far fetched, but you know where I’m going with this…
Have designated spots
You know how people tend to claim that everything in their home has its place? Although it sounds a bit Kim & Aggie, when everything has its place, it is so much easier to keep it tidier.
If you do the same with everything in your house, and put away whatever you don’t want to have on display – you know, those things that you need ‘someday’ but only on that rainy day?! Hide it away but just remember its safe place! You may end up with a drawer or two of stuff you can’t find a place for – but at least you’ll only have to focus on tidying up that one drawer later.
If you find that you have quite a lot of larger items to get rid of, you could always sell it rather than letting it hang around the house with nowhere to go. I’m a big fan of nearly new baby sales and putting big items on Facebay or Ebay. If its large and worth quite a bit in value, then keeping it in domestic self storage is a good way of getting it out of your four walls until you need it.
Keep a cleaning basket in set rooms
Some rooms in the house tend to get messier faster than others. For us, it’s all rooms. I joke, the main two are definitely the kitchen and the bathroom – and they are the ones that you want to keep squeaky clean and hygienic. For the kitchen I have a whole under counter full of my favourite cleaning products (cupboard locks essential!) and for the bathroom, I keep a small basket filled with everything I need to give it a quick clean every time I’m in there. Again make sure that this is up high out of reach of the kids – safer and also tidier!
I find Zoflora in a spray bottle is ideal to have to spray and wipe down after every use, or even the Flash wipes for kitchen/bathroom.
Invest in easy-to-clean fabrics
If you want to take the hassle out of cleaning and tidying the major items around the home, I highly recommend investing in sofas that come in a range of fabrics that are easy to keep clean. We recently got new sofas for our lounge from John Lewis and we decided to go for the Aquaclean range of fabric. There is literally no difference to the feel or look of it, but it does wipe clean from yogurts, bogeys and a variety of sticky hand substances. And of course, we road tested it with a red wine spillage!
We also opted to have wipe clean flooring in the main rooms of the house, with carpets reserved for bedrooms and the playroom. Not only can we spruce the floor up with rugs, but we are able to whizz the mop around easily to clean up muddy footprints!
