Kimberly Uy's Blog: Join me for Cleaning Class!

Welcome to Cleaning Class! My hope is that this session is going to come at a time when you need a little encouragement and a simple, do-able plan for your home. Sit back and see what the Clean Mama Routine is all about, jump all in and try the routine out for the week, or do a little bit of both. The Routine is intended to be implemented in the midst of a busy and full life, if you want to clean all day, it’s not the routine for you. If you want a clean house but aren’t sure how to keep it that way all week long, it’s THE routine for you!

CLEANING CLASS is *free* and it happens here on the blog and on Instagram. I am so excited to bring this to you and to share that I also have a FREE nine-page printable Cleaning Class Guide to help take you through CLEANING CLASS. Complete with a quick start guide and darling checklists this kit is going to help you learn the 4 parts to the Clean Mama Routine AND successfully integrate it in your own home.

FREE CLEANING CLASS GUIDE

READY? HERE’S WHAT YOU NEED TO DO:

GRAB YOUR FREE PRINTABLE CLEANING CLASS GUIDE and print it out or have it ready to access – there’s a great coupon code in the packet too! This guide is ONLY available through this week, it will not come back again until I do another Cleaning Class and I will not email you the download if you miss it (sorry). When you click that link you are heading to my FREE PRINTABLES PAGE – you only need to put your email address in ONE time and the password will be sent to your email address. Check your promotions and spam folders if you don’t see it right away.
FOLLOW @CLEANMAMA ON INSTAGRAM – that’s where the majority of CLEANING CLASS will take place. Follow along and turn on your notifications so you don’t miss a thing.
Share, share, share! I’d love it if you shared CLEANING CLASS with your friends this week and asked them to join you. I’ll have images in Instagram this week for you to use – tag me!

I’ll be on Instagram quite a bit this week in Live on Monday and in Stories – make sure you’re following along over there too.

If you think you are too busy to do a cleaning routine, I will disagree and tell you that you’re too busy not to do a cleaning routine. Try it out this week with me and I think you’ll find that just starting with the daily tasks brings order and calm to your home.

There are 4 parts to the Clean Mama Routine – I always recommend that you start with the DAILY TASKS and work your way to the MONTHLY FOCUS.

What’s the secret to the routine? CONSISTENCY – doing a little bit every day is what will help you take your home to the next level of clean. The Clean Mama Routine is intended to be done in the little moments that you have during the day – you know what to do because it’s on a schedule – it takes the guesswork out of trying to figure out what to clean and when to clean it.

What are the 5 DAILY TASKS?

MAKE BEDS
CHECK FLOORS
WIPE COUNTERS
CLUTTER
LAUNDRY

Three Ways to Start the DAILY TASKS:

Start with one every day for a week and add a new task every week – make beds for a week and then the add check floors to the next week, and then the third week add wipe counters to make beds and check floors, continue until you have all five tasks incorporated.
My preferred method is to start on a Sunday and make your bed, then on Monday, make your bed and check floors. Then on Tuesday, make your bed, check floors, and wipe counters. Continue through the week until you have incorporated all five DAILY TASKS. You can do this method while adding the WEEKLY TASKS too.
If you’re used to do a cleaning routine and just want to try something different, start with all of them at once.

HERE’S A LITTLE EXPLANATION OF THE 5 DAILY TASKS:

MAKE BEDS
Set the tone by making your bed daily. It will instantly make your bedrooms look more put together and in reality it takes under a minute to complete. Teach your kids to make their beds and this job is even easier. I find that by keeping the bedding simple this makes it really easy for even the youngest family members.

CHECK FLOORS
Most days I need to at least do a quick sweep or quick vacuum of the hardwood floors on our first level. Sometimes I grab the vacuum cleaner and do a little touch up, but most of the time it’s just a quick once-over with my broom or a microfiber floor duster. My kids are in charge of crumb clean-up under the kitchen table with the broom and dustpan or the vacuum cleaner if necessary. When my kids were smaller, they loved this little broom and dustpan. You can see my favorite floor care items in my Amazon shop here.

WIPE COUNTERS
I wipe the kitchen counters after each meal and I check the bathroom counters daily and give them a quick wipe if they need it. I use this method for kitchen counter clean up and keep bar mop towels in a cute jar for easy access and great wipe-down capability.

I have a little Nightly Sink Scrub ritual that entails making sure that the counters and sink are clear and then I finish it all off with a little DIY sink scrub. People always ask why I don’t clean the kitchen in my cleaning routine and I have to chuckle because I clean it every day after each meal and then do a little sink scrub at night too. Daily kitchen cleaning falls under WIPE COUNTERS. You can see how I deep clean and clean the kitchen with the Clean Mama Routine here.

CLUTTER
Clutter can be toys on the floor, stacks of mail or papers to file, or just stuff that should be put away or tossed. Some things that work for us: toss any flyers or unnecessary mail at the door, open and file any bills that need to be paid, and bins and file folders in a filing cabinet for kid papers. In our house we toss (recycle) most worksheets and keep the special artwork and papers. Clutter is different for every person and family. Every day we take care of the daily clutter by doing a quick clean up before bed and by making an effort to put things away as we are done with them. If you have a big clutter problem you could use this item on your list to get some decluttering done every day. Make a list of all your little clutter areas and then every day spend 10-15 minutes checking them off your list. For me, I use this time to sort through daily mail and papers. I need to deal with paper clutter every day to keep up with it and not let it get out of control. I added a One Bag Declutter this year to help me keep up with decluttering all year long – check it out here.

LAUNDRY
I do at least one load of laundry every.single.day. I know it sounds annoying and monotonous, but for me it’s the only way to stay on top of the potential piles and piles of laundry. What’s the key to making one load a day work? Actually starting AND finishing a load of laundry every day. Don’t let it pile up in a corner or on a table or couch or bed or outside the laundry room. Start and finish it. It’s a great process to master because you will have clean clothes at the ready at any time and you shouldn’t have to iron as often or at all if the clothes are put away right away. If you have kids, check out my post on teaching them to do laundry. I am super passionate about SAFE cleaning and have found that laundry is one of the worst offenders – you can find safe and natural laundry essentials in my shop.

Are you already doing some or all of the DAILY TASKS? I bet you are! Once you’ve learned the DAILY TASKS it’s time to move on to the WEEKLY TASKS. These 6 tasks REPEAT weekly – if you don’t get to one, use Friday – Catch-All Day as your day to catch up OR just wait until the task comes around the next week. The Clean Mama Routine has grace built in!

Here are all the ways you can follow along:

Just getting started and want to try it out?

The Start Here Page – this page details the Clean Mama Routine and has all sorts of links and tips for you to get started.
Free Printable Homekeeping Calendar – Every month I share the a free calendar for the month with the Daily + Weekly Tasks. You can always find it on the free printables page or here.
Instagram – I share the Clean Mama Routine DAILY here – it’s free and is a great way to get motivated to do the Routine and hop off social media. Turn on notifications so you don’t miss a reminder.
Cozi + Clean Mama App – prefer an app format? I have a collab with Cozi – it’s free!

Once you have the DAILY TASKS and WEEKLY TASKS down, you might want to add in the ROTATING TASKS. These tasks change MONTHLY and ensure that your home is clean all year long on a rotating schedule – some tasks repeat monthly, others are bi-monthly, quarterly, or bi-annually. I have figured out how to keep everything clean all year long and this is how I do that. Here are SOME of the ROTATING TASKS. I add the ROTATING TASKS to weekly tasks that make sense for our schedule. If Vacuum Baseboards is on the list, I attach those to Wednesday, Vacuuming Day.

Once the Daily Tasks and Weekly Tasks are working for you and you want to go to the next level and start the Rotating Tasks and the Monthly Focus:

Printable Kits – Guide to a Clean Home and Guide to a Flexible Routine both DETAIL the Clean Mama Routine. They’re full of checklists and tips and tricks to get started. The Guide to a Flexible Routine also has a checklist for each day of the week too!
Homekeeping Society – This is my monthly (or annual subscription) that provides the full Clean Mama Routine plus community, accountability, and support.
Homekeeping Planner – The Homekeeping Planner incorporates the Clean Mama Routine in a beautiful, professionally printed and spiral bound planner designed to simplify your life and be your ONLY planner.

The 4th component to the Clean Mama Routine is the MONTHLY FOCUS – this is organizational and a way to work on deep cleaning and organizing your home slowly and consistently all year long. December is OFFICE/PAPERWORK, January is DECLUTTER, February is the KITCHEN, March is SPRING CLEANING, April is BATHROOMS, etc.

Now that you know what the four components are to the CLEAN MAMA ROUTINE, let’s get started! Make sure you have downloaded your FREE Cleaning Class Guide and that you’re following along on Instagram.