Not According to Plan
August 1, 2025
Milking Memories
September 26, 2025The Strategy:
Maintaining an orderly home
My feet hit the stair landing, and I sag. My youngest, Alec, is down for a nap. I see my big girls playing on the lawn and they appear to be making flower crowns. I glance at my computer and the work waiting for me, but I see the crayons on the floor, the stack of papers I meant to put away and a half-eaten banana mellowing on the bench.
Unable to resist the urge, I begin in the kitchen, the place from whence all order flows. Then I move to the living room to tackle the homeschool chaos of books and blocks and then I organize my desk. Last, I move the laundry from the washer to the dryer.
At last, I feel I can breathe. Ignoring the dirty fingerprints on the window (that’s for another day), I open my computer. My space is tidy, and my mind can now focus on creativity for a bit.
I may be in the minority here and this may not be the healthiest trait, but I cannot create beautiful things if my house is a mess. I constantly have an invisible check list in my head that I need to complete, to feel at ease, which is something that is vital to my ability to write or create anything cohesive. I have found that I must maintain some semblance of order in my life and in my home in order to stay above the preverbal water of motherhood that sometimes feels to be taking me under.
While I don’t necessarily enjoy cleaning, I do enjoy the sense of control and order that flows from having a space that is decluttered and orderly. Like I said, this may be a coping mechanism that helps me maintain better mental health, but I don’t think it’s all bad. Cleaning feels a bit like a moral resolution and one I’m continually chasing. Rhythms of mess followed rhythms by orderliness tend to repeat in an endless cycle, but a cycle I feel is AT LAST manageable.
Disclaimer: in case you’re nursing a suspicion, my house IS NOT perfectly clean all the time and sometimes I deviate from the plan. I have three small children, and we are home most of the time; we live on a farm and a chicken has been brought into the house TWICE this past week.
However, I have developed a strategy for an orderly home that has given me not only freedom to create, but also a sense of rhythm:
But first, why is orderliness important?
- It gives me a sense of real, actual control amid motherhood that lacks it.
- It is a gift I can give to my family or one I can withhold from them. Cleaning & maintaining a clean house can also be a cruel task master if I let it. The choice is mine.
- It keeps me accountable: rather than letting things pile up, it helps me break cleaning up into small, manageable tasks.
- It’s an act of stewardship: this home, these people and this life is God’s, yet He’s entrusted it to me to do with what I will.
My Strategy to Order in the Home:
- Monday: RESET DAY. This is the day that I deep clean the house. I don’t make plans to do anything outside of the home (if I can help it) and we tend to pretzel our homeschooling/things that must get done around the cleaning as it is the only day in the week where it takes priority. This helps us get off on the best possible footing as everything is in its place and I feel I can think clearly for the rest of the week.
- Whole Kitchen: counters, appliances, table, highchair, etc.
- Bathrooms: sinks, toilets, scrub shower/tub.
- Dust/declutter (kids help with this)
- Vacuum whole home
- Mop
- Laundry: 3-4 loads of laundry: one dark and one light.
- Towels
- Bed linens (every other week)
- Tuesday:
- Sweep under table as needed
- Wipe counters
- Declutter
- Laundry: one load.
- Dark colored clothes
- Wednesday: Hump Day tune-up
- Quick clean of bathrooms: wipe counters, toilet.
- Clean Kitchen sink & counters
- Vacuum main living areas (kitchen, living room, etc.)
- Declutter
- Laundry: two loads
- Towels & light-colored clothes
- Whites and bed sheets
- Thursday:
- Wipe counters & stove top
- Sweep under table as needed
- Declutter
- Laundry: one load
- Dark colored clothes
- Friday:
- Wipe counters
- Sweep under table as needed
- Declutter
- Laundry: one load
- Dark colored clothes
- Saturday:
- Sabbath prep (anything that can’t wait until Monday): wipe counters, vacuum main living areas, declutter, etc. I find this works best right before everyone goes to bed so everyone can pitch in.
- Laundry: two loads
- Light colored clothes
- Dark colored clothes
- Sunday: SABBATH. That means NO CLEANING. I use paper plates this day, we eat leftovers and if the house becomes a mess (which is usually does), I do nothing to stop it. Why? Because today has one purpose (rest & connection) and I also know that Monday is coming.
In short, I set aside one day a week to “reset” the home, I do a daily load of laundry, I wash my sheets every other week, I vacuum the whole house once a week and touch up a few times a week as needed and lastly, I set aside a day for rest. You may think that “cleaning” is a strange topic to blog about, but let’s be real, this is something WE ALL deal with daily. You may be scores ahead of me in this department or you may feel like you need a little help, either way, us mothers are all in this together.
I hope you may have found a few ideas or maybe a bit of motivation to incorporate into your own beautiful homes as you serve your families well.
