How to Clean When you Don’t Have Time: Shortcut Cleaning, a Home Management Hack

Sometimes busy days can get the best of us, the mess and the dirt creeping up on us. Today I’m going to teach you shortcut cleaning techniques to help you manage the mess and keep your sanity.

The key to remember right now is that the mess and dirt is temporary, we’ll get ahead of the game someday. For the meantime though, here’s a short guide for you.

This is your guide for getting ahead here and there, little bits at a time. We’re taking steps, not leaps here (if this isn’t what you’re looking for and you’re ready for a challenge, head over to The Whole House Overhaul in 6 Weeks!).

These are manageable tips for when you find yourself behind and overwhelmed. You can do this, and it will lift your spirits!

Sometimes it’s these small steps that get the ball rolling and may spur you on to do more. And sometimes, the reality is that the cleaning happens in the five minutes here or ten minutes there.

Shortcut Cleaning Home Management Hacks

• Wash only the dirtiest windows, often the one above the kitchen sink.
• Wash only the dirtiest parts of the windows, leave the parts that are covered by blinds or drapes.
• Use a hair blow dryer to dust books, knick-knacks, chandeliers, and wall art.
• Vacuum only in high traffic areas, or the room that gets used most frequently.
• Spot mop the floor with a spray bottle of cleaner and a paper towel.

Shortcut Cleaning is still cleaning your house, just maybe not the same way that your grandma did things… or is it?

• In the refrigerator, lay a paper towel in the bottom of the crisper drawer and/or the shelves in the door to catch drips.
• For a load of cold and wrinkled laundry still in the dryer, throw a clean damp towel in and tumble dry on medium heat for several minutes.
• For a load left in the washer too long, add a cup of vinegar and rerun the rinse cycle.
• Keep a stain stick in the bathrooms to use on clothes immediately after removal. Keep one in the kitchen for use on children’s clothes that got messy at mealtime.
• Put dishwashing liquid on grease stains. I personally think Dawn dish soap is the most effective.

Don’t fall prey to TV commercials and magazine ads, who made them the boss of how to do things right? Clean your house your way.

• Keep mail in a pretty basket or drawer rather than a pile so it’s not a kitchen eyesore. (This is temporary! Deal with mail quickly or you may miss out on income or have late payments!)
• Collect cobwebs and sweep dust bunnies only in the room that you expect to entertain.
• While cooking dinner, fill the sink with hot water and soak the dishes as soon as you’re done using them. This will make them easier to wash later.
• Keep up with dishes by unloading and loading the dishwasher after every meal.
• Wash dishes quickly for a set amount of time or for a set number of dishes. Even if you only get ten done before you must quit and run, it’s better than doing nothing.
• Empty trash cans with a quick race between each one and call it exercise.
• Spray everything in the bathroom with glass cleaner. Start with the mirror and end with the toilet wiping with paper towels.
• Buy towels and bath mats in a dark color, the bathroom will appear nice for a longer period of time than with white towels that quickly appear dingy.

This isn’t an exhaustive list of cleaning shortcuts, but hopefully this helps you if you’re in a busy time in life. Sometimes we just need a reminder to see that something is better than nothing. Even the simplest 5 minute cleaning shortcut may give you the boost you need, even in a season of life where you feel that there isn’t time to clean.

You can make your best days even better! Get some tools here to help you do your best.

Learn more home management hacks in my book Home Management, Plain and Simple.  You can also access resources to learn how to make home management fit your specific life in the Free Resource Library.