Summer is not just for vacation but also for getting your house fresh and clean. With kids enjoying their school vacation, you definitely have some helping hands available. But getting some help is just a bonus. You did the cleaning yourself previously, so you definitely can handle it anytime. All you need is a motivation!

Cleaning your home isn’t all about strength. You just have to plan ahead to save yourself strenuous effort and time. Time matters a lot since you have other things to do for the day apart from cleaning. That’s why you have to make sure that you maximize your time in cleaning.

Image via: James Glover Residential & Interior Design

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Begin by decluttering the entire area

This is very important when you want to finish cleaning your home fast. Decluttering your area first will give you enough space to move around without something blocking your way. This will certainly increase your efficiency and effectiveness in cleaning.

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Organize your cleaning tools and equipment

This should help you clean faster and better. You can place your tools and equipment in a tote bag or plastic organizer. This way, it will be easier for you to access your tools and equipment. You can bring it over and have it placed near beside you. You can save a lot of time moving around to get what you need.

Take advantage of technology

Instead of using brooms, use a vacuum cleaner as an alternative. This should lessen your time and efforts cleaning your home especially the corners. Also, you have to acquire long extension cord for you to reach farther distance without transferring to another power outlet. There’s no question that vacuum cleaner works far better than a broom. So, take advantage of it.

These helpful ideas should give you more time to your family and have more relaxing time to yourself. So, don’t allow cleaning to burn you out and your precious time. Plan ahead and consider the above-mentioned ways to save time. Enjoy cleaning your home this summer!

For more cleaning tips on Stagetecture, click here.

Even though you’ve grown up and accepted that the only way your house is going to stay clean is if you stay on the ball, there’s no denying that it’s still a pretty big chore (or several). And while you may even learn to find some therapeutic value in cleaning, still you have to squeeze it in when you’d rather be relaxing or doing something more fun. Luckily, it doesn’t have to take you all day to clean the house. So pump up the jams, grab your cleaning cloth, and follow these shortcuts to truncate your time spent keeping up your house.

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1. Wax on, wax off.

One rag soaked in cleaning solution, one clean and dry. Grab one with each hand and get to work, Miyagi-style. Or you can follow the lead of a hotel maid and opt for the spray-and-wipe method of cleaning, by which you simply spray with one hand and wipe with the other. The only real problem with these methods is that they don’t allow for a rinsing phases, so over time your surfaces could suffer from some buildup. But if you do a deep clean, say, every third or fourth cleaning, this is a great way to shave some time off your regular routine.

2. All-in-one solvents.

If you have to switch solvents and rags for every surface in your home it’s going to take you a lot longer to get the job done. Instead, opt for a multi-purpose cleaner that works on windows, countertops, tubs, tile, appliances, and everything in between. You might still have to switch to something else for the wood in your home (so as not to dry it out with harsh chemicals), but that’s better than having five or six solvents for each room in your house.

Image via: Hugh Jefferson Randolph Architects

3. Vacuum attachments.

After you dust and sweep you’ll still have to pick up the extra, so why not get the whole job done the first time around with a vacuum setup that comes complete with multiple attachments? This way all you have to do is pop them on and off as needed and you can work your way from one end of the room to the other, sucking up every speck of dust and dander and every cobweb along your route.

4. Swiffer.

This handy tool is a godsend for homes with hard flooring. Instead of pushing an unwieldy broom that leaves particles behind, using a vacuum that can’t get into tight spaces, or crawling around on your hands and knees with a rag, pick up a lightweight, versatile Swiffer Sweeper and some dry and wet cloths to make cleaning every floor a cinch.

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5. Robots.

While it’s still a little too soon to hire your own Rosie the Robot, you can at least benefit from the current robotics revolution by using a product like the Roomba to help you clean. Simply turn it on and set it loose in your home and it will travel around the room, picking up dust bunnies from under your couch and coffee table, and anywhere else it can reach. Of course, if you’re this desperate to avoid cleaning you could simply hire a maid or engage a specialty service like EP cleaners. But you might just want to spare yourself the expense and see how the robot works out.

For more cleaning & maintenance tips on Stagetecture, click here.

Chances are that there are places inside your home you have never cleaned. No matter if you’ve lived in a home for a decade, chances are that there are nooks and crannies that haven’t been untouched in years. This is permissible only due to the fact that the area might be hard to reach. However, what if we don’t want to deal with it in the first place? Yet, there is also the chance that that we just simply forget about these nooks and crannies when we clean and then move on to other areas of the house without even thinking about it. Here are 5 of the dirtiest places in your home that you forget to clean.

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1. Trash Cans

Have you looked inside your trashcan lately? Most of us take out the trash one a week. If we have a large family this can be a bi-weekly chore. However, most of us don’t even think twice about cleaning out the actual trashcan. All those germs and food particles from the things we throw out have probably found their way to the bottom or side of our trashcans. It is important to clean out our waste bins at least twice a month to eliminate odors and germs.

2. Light Switches

When was the last time you wiped down and de-sanitized the light switches in your home? Here’s a better question: if you have a lot of people in your household, how many people are switching on and off the light switches during the course of a day? Our light switches become like safe harbors for germs that are literally carried around the house. It is important to clean your light switches at least once a week.

Image via: Exquisite Kitchen Design

3. Behind Artwork & Picture Frames

We don’t often think about what could be lurking behind our picture and art frames. Perhaps this is why when we move out of our homes there is a very clear demarcation as to where our picture frames were. Whether you are looking for Ottawa house cleaning or Vancouver house cleaning, always make sure that the people cleaning your home do a quick clean or dusting behind the picture frames.

4. Doorknobs

Just like your light switches, our doorknobs can also be covered in germs from daily use. It is funny that the things in our homes that we operate the most are the things that most often get left unclean. Our doorknobs are an obvious place that we should clean, but we often forget to. If you have sanitizer wipes you could go around to all the doorknobs in the house for a quick wipe down.

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5. Houseplants

Lastly, if we have houseplants and you find yourself sneezing it might be because you’ve never cleaned the dust off of them. Just like anything that is still or stationary in the house, your houseplants can accumulate dust. So when you go to water them every week, just make sure to do a light dusting. Your plants will be happier and your home will be that much cleaner.

For more cleaning & maintenance tips on Stagetecture, click here.

When the birds return to sing their morning songs and the tulips start breaking free from their winter rest, thoughts turn to spring cleaning. Now is the best time to open the windows, knock the winter dust out of rugs and make your home as clean as possible. Spring cleaning once entailed spending weeks scrubbing every corner of the house, but you can make it fast and easy with these clever tips.

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Work from the Top Down

It’s important to vacuum the floors, but you don’t want to dirty them after you vacuum. When dusting and polishing, always start at the top and work your way down. That way, the dust you knock off the ceiling and the small spider webs you evict from upper corners will be cleaned up when you vacuum.

Decide on a System

You have two basic cleaning systems to follow when you’re trying to work through the whole house. You can go one room at a time and complete all tasks in that room, or you can work through the entire house focusing on one task at a time. With this method, you would get your window cleaning supplies and scrub all the windows the same day. The next day, you might dust all the rooms. The following day may be when you move methodically through the home to sweep and mop the hard floors.

Think of the Little Things

You clean the big things throughout the year, but spring is the time to focus on the little areas. This is when you will clean the tracks of your sliding patio door, polish wood trim and even check the walls to see if they need scrubbing. These surfaces are overlooked throughout the year, so pay a little extra attention to them now to make the entire house sparkle and shine.

Image via: Kelly Baron

Fresh Carpet and Upholstery

Your carpets take a beating throughout the year, and this is the perfect time to give them a good cleaning. Start by picking up large items, then vacuum the rug thoroughly to remove dust, dirt and pet hair. Finally, have the carpet steam cleaned to ensure that it is truly clean.

Move Items

When you are cleaning the home, remember to move items. Slide the couch over to vacuum under it. Pull the refrigerator out to clean behind it and vacuum off the coils. Take area rugs out to mop and polish the floor below them. When you move items, you can rest assured that dirt hiding in a corner will be found and eliminated.

The warmer weather brings the chance to spend more time outside, and it’s also the time to open the windows and give the house a good cleaning. These tips will make the chore a little more organised, and the reminders will help you clean even the areas that are normally neglected. Use this guide to make your spring cleaning more effective and faster.

Kelly Barnes is a busy mother of three who enjoys how fresh the home is after a good cleaning. She relies heavily on her Robomaid to help her with the vacuuming and make her cleaning chores easier.

For more home cleaning tips on Stagetecture, click here.

When you have a house, it probably never feels like the housework is never done. Oh, but when you have a big house, the feeling starts to turn into a very real and potentially overwhelming situation. Seemingly, once you get one room the way that you want it then it’s time to work on another one. This can lead to a never ending cycle. Luckily, there are some tips that you can apply that will make cleaning and maintaining your house a lot easier.

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It’s basically all about developing a “house cleaning system” and we have five ways to help you do just that below:

Schedule it out.

Time goes by really fast, so when it comes to cleaning a big house, you don’t really want to “wing it”. It’s best if you have a schedule set up somewhere with designated days for each room. For instance, if Sunday is the day that you plan to vacuum, then perhaps make Wednesday the day that you clean your bathrooms and so on. Also, make sure that there is one more than one person doing the house chores; that way, no one will feel overcome by all that needs to be done.

Put everything in its proper place.

When you get home from a long day at work and the kids get home from sometimes an equally as long day at school, there can be a real temptation to leave shoes, coats and bags (and sometimes even mail) at the front door while telling yourself “I’ll get to it later.” Before you realize it, “later” is not a few minutes but a couple of days and now you have piles of things in the hallway or on the kitchen counter. To avoid this, make sure that everyone in the house knows to put those things up as soon as they get home. It makes keep the house in order much easier in the long run.

Do a few things daily.

It’s best if people make up their bed as soon as they get out of it in the morning. It’s a good idea to wash dishes (or put them into the dishwasher) daily; that way, there won’t be a pile up of them in the sink. It’s also smart to wipe down bathroom mirrors and the sink and to make sure that people clean out the bathtub right after the shower on a daily basis as well. Oh, and when it comes to pulling out things like toys, video games and magazines, you might want to have a couple of ottomans around the house so that those items can go into their “hidden storage compartments” once people are done using them.

Clean up the mess right after you make it.

The kitchen is probably the one room in the house where spills happen the most consistently; but if you have kids, things dropping, breaking and dripping are pretty much par for the course. You might have days when you’ll want to look to see just how much the maid service cost would run you, but you would save yourself the extra expense by simply making sure to clean up messes immediately after they happen.

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Play “look and toss” with your refrigerator.

There’s a pretty good chance that every time that you go into your fridge, there is something that has expired or spoiled. Make it a point to look for those kinds of items each time that you open the door and also make sure to designate “official throw out day” for the evening before the trash man comes. That will keep you from having to spend an entire Saturday or Sunday (or two) cleaning out your refrigerator. Happy cleaning!

For more home ideas on Stagetecture, click here.

Not many people like the daunting task of tackling what seems to be the endless cleaning of our homes. Between laundry, dishes, and dusting it seems impossible to ever catch up! However, there are some ways to organize your home and lifestyle which can help you get the cleaning done much faster – giving you more time to enjoy the fun things in life. Cleaning is a fact of life for every home and spending all day to tackle your houselhold chores shouldn’t be a dreaded part of your day. Here are cleaning tips that you can use from www.hygienedepot.co.uk and will help make your home an enjoyable place to live again.

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Tackle one room per day:

One of the biggest pitfalls that trip us up when cleaning our homes is overwhelming ourselves by trying to get it all done at once. When we feel overwhelmed, we are more likely to toss up our hands in failure and give up.  The best way to beat this scenario is to write a chore chart. Yes, it may sound silly for an adult to have their own chore chart, but it will work! By allotting a half an hour or hour each day to a single room in your home, you will end the week with a home that has been cleaned top to bottom.  Make Monday your kitchen day where you tackle the stove, countertops, and grimy sink; make Tuesday your TV room day where you tackle the dusting, vacuuming, and storage of toys.  By the end of the week the kitchen may start looking grimy again, but don’t worry Monday’s chores will only be a couple days away, so take a break and enjoy the weekend.

Baskets:

Baskets can go a long way in helping to organize your home and speed up cleaning time. Start with a pretty wicker basket in each room of your home. At the end of every day, toss the clutter of each room into its allotted basket, making for a quick clean up. Then try to take one or two baskets per week and sort them, putting away each item in its proper place. By doing this, you are clearing your rooms of the clutter in a quick manner every day, and then doing a more in depth organizing on a weekly basis.

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Involve everyone:

Forget about doing your kids bedrooms or your husband’s office.  Why should one family member have to tackle it all? Giving up control can sometimes be difficult, but allowing your children the responsibility of cleaning their own rooms, and putting away their own laundry and toys, gives you more time and gives them a feeling of responsibly and autonomy .

When all else fails and you find yourself overwhelmed by all those incessant chores, consider hiring a local student. There are plenty of young teenagers who would love to come and vacuum your house while giving you a much-needed break and allowing them to earn some pocket money.

For more home cleaning tips on Stagetecture, click here.