One spoon... Harmless, right?
But if your spoons are anything like the ones in our house - they multiply - very quickly!!
I'm not just talking spoons either. Dirty dishes. They attract one another like magnets:
 |
| (Not my kitchen... but some days I feel like it looks this way!) |
One day, Andrew gave me some advice (in a nice way, of course!). You see, his parents' kitchen is always clean! It's like magic! And I know his mom does a lot of cooking, so it should be getting dirty, right? He said that growing up, his parents always cleaned dishes immediately and if any dish could go in the dishwasher, you put it there right away - no time hanging out in the sink!
I put that advice on the back-burner for awhile - after all, surely that would not work for me. I've never been the clean-as-I-go type.
But in the flurry of nesting mode, I decided to give it a go... By golly, it works! The kitchen has been clean for pretty much the last week and a half! Sometimes a few things pile up, especially when I am in the middle of cooking or baking, but I always make sure to clean it up as soon as I can. I don't even let one spoon hang out in the sink because that, my friends, is the beginning of the slippery slope. It's also nice not having to scrape dried food off dishes - who knew it rinses right off if you clean it immediately!
Andrew has even commented that when the kitchen is perfectly clean he feels bad leaving one dish out, so he is also motivated to clean up immediately after himself. Whereas, before if there were already dishes collecting in the sink, what's wrong with adding a few more?
I know I'll have down days, and everything won't always be perfect, but I am really hopeful right now that I'm developing good kitchen habits that are here to stay. My favorite part about having a clean kitchen is I feel like I have more time to do other things - like play with John and keep up with the rest of the house.
If this sounds appealing to you, go ahead and give it a try! =)
Great post, Linds! My nemesis is folding and putting away the laundry; I have literally gone for WEEKS without taking the time to put the clean things in my dresser!
ReplyDeleteBut just the other day I took the time to put everything away (around an hour and a half... it was that bad...), and having a clean room really motivates me to continue to keep things clean! I actually started using HabitForge again to form a habit of making all the clothes are either in the hamper, the closet, or the dresser before bed.
Keep fighting the good fight! Love to you and all your boys!
ah ha....now we know who never washed their dishes on 35th street :). Jk....it was all of us. But I live by the wash immediately rule now too and it really does work. So much better to do it after dinner then later.
ReplyDeleteI've been doing something very similar lately with my kitchen clean-up and with putting away my clothes. When I'm tempted to leave something out, I ask myself, "if not now, when?" which causes me to be conscious of the fact that there's never a better time to do something than the present. If I leave the clothes on the bed now, later when it's time to go to bed, I won't feel like putting them away any more than I do now, and will probably shove them off the bed onto the floor, which starts that slippery slope you're talking about. I may as well put one thing away now when I have the energy instead of letting it pile up. I've been doing this for the past couple of months and my kitchen and bedroom have never been cleaner.
ReplyDelete