Word For Word
Ashley Brown 00:00
[Intro] Routines, my absolute favorite word, but you either love them or you hate them. And either way, I strongly believe that routines can be a springboard for improving your home, yourself and your life. I'm Ashley Brown, and this is the Routine and Things Podcast. In each episode, we'll dive into a specific routine or point of view that will move you closer to enjoying life more and more each day. Trust me, you're going to want to keep listening because you're well on your way to getting and staying happy!
Ashley Brown 00:48
Hey, welcome to the Routine and Things Podcast. So we are still in the routine series this week. We are going to be talking about cleaning today. Just soak that in. I just want to ask you a question when I say cleaning, how do you feel when I say that? Because if you're feeling a little anxious or a little like rolling your eyes, like Ashley, nobody want to talk about cleaning girl, then I am going to get you all the way together today. Because I know cleaning can be one of those things that we don't want to do sometimes, because cleaning is always on a constant basis in our homes. But the beauty of cleaning is that it frees you from a lot of mental clutter. And that's what I'm gonna talk about today. Cleaning, cleaning, cleaning, and how you can actually make it feel good for you and how you can make it fun for you. Now let's dive into the episode and talk about cleaning.
Ashley Brown 01:49
I have to tell you that this positive energy that I have about cleaning is pretty new, I would say in the past like a year and a half. That's when I'm really started to get really positive about cleaning. Now, I wouldn't say that I never liked cleaning. But of course, if I could be doing something else, I wouldn't be cleaning. And that's probably for anyone. But I just say that to let you know that it's okay if right now you feel like oh, cleaning isn't something that I find important or cleaning isn't something that I'm like jumping for joy to do. But I want to help you get to a point where when you think about cleaning, what you feel is a sense of peace and a sense of calm within yourself. And so I want to talk about that today by just starting off with what is a cleaning routine.
Ashley Brown 02:44
So essentially what it is, is a routine that's based around cleaning and caring for your home. So cleaning and caring for your home, keeping your home well kept, keeping it decluttered. So all of those things are all apart of a cleaning routine. So what does a cleaning routine look like? I want to talk to you about that? So when you think about cleaning routine, you first want to think about how often do you clean. First, we want to think about how often are we cleaning our home. And so in terms of a cleaning routine, usually within this routine, you want to have a daily routine and a weekly routine for cleaning. That's how often you are going to be cleaning on a daily basis and on a weekly basis. And of course, it's going to be things outside of daily and weekly. But I want to focus on these two routines, your daily and weekly cleaning routines, because this is what you're going to be doing most often. And when we're talking about a cleaning routine, we're talking about cleaning your entire home. Everything in your home has to be cleaned, from the ceiling to the floor, like honestly, and so that can sometimes be overwhelming to think about it especially if you have a lot of square footage in your home. Like, I'm not in a really big home but I'm not in a really small home either. I'm not like in an apartment, I am in a home that has multiple rooms. And it's a good bit of stuff I have to do around my home. And so I know for you that could be the case as well. And even if it's not, it could just be like, "I have to clean all of this?!" So yes, we have to clean our entire home. So that's why I want to make it clear that the daily and weekly routine is something to really focus on because this is what's going to help you keep your entire home cleaned.
Ashley Brown 04:36
So let's jump into the daily cleaning routine. Usually in the daily cleaning routine. You are going to be focusing on the kitchen. Right I know that you probably go into your kitchen every day in clean in some type of way. Whether that's doing the dishes, sweeping the floor, cleaning off the stove top, that is a part of your daily routine for your kitchen. Other rooms in your daily cleaning routine include your living room, right, you're going to be tidying up the living room. So yes, so definitely the living room is a part of your daily cleaning routine more than likely and it should be if it's not, and then also possibly your bedrooms. I know every morning I make my bed. So I make my bed because I'm the last one out of it in the morning and I love to make my bed in the morning because it gives it such a good vibe in my room when I make my bed it feels neat and tidy and I'm like okay, I'm good for today. I'm good. So your bedroom can also be one of the areas that is included into your daily cleaning routine as well as like decluttering and like straightening up your rooms as well. And even your children's room in the morning. I like to make my daughter's bed. I like to pick everything up off of her floor because she throws everything on the floor, you know how children can be. And so our bedrooms is a part of our daily cleaning routine including the kitchen and a living room. So those are some areas that I would suggest that you include into your daily routine, especially if you want to make sure that you are being caught up on the things that need to be decluttered and organized and just clean throughout your home in order to make that a space of peace and calm and just cleanliness.
Ashley Brown 06:34
Now we also want to think about the weekly cleaning routine, because I definitely have a weekly cleaning routine as well. And some of the things in my weekly cleaning routine, include cleaning our bathrooms, cleaning our floors, and then also doing the laundry. These are the things I focused on in our weekly cleaning routine. So I clean our bathrooms every single week. Especially the ones that are used the most. I may push it off to two weeks depending on how often we use certain bathrooms because we have multiple bathrooms in our home. But for the most part I clean our bathrooms every single week because it gets messy especially with a toddler who's potty training. So that's what I will do in our weekly cleaning routine. And then also clean our floors. And that means vacuuming the carpets. This also means mopping the floor. Even if I don't mop all of the floor I at least mop the areas where my oldest daughter will drop crumbs on the floor, in the bathrooms, and I like to think about cleaning our floors, just all the floors. I don't like to break it up in terms of rooms. I just like to say today is a floor today. And so that helps me to keep in my head. Okay, I need to just make sure that I tackle all of the floors and not just the bedrooms or living room today and it just makes it easier for me to remember and to think about. So that's a tip for you, maybe you can start thinking about just cleaning your floors in general, especially if you've had a hard time keeping up with things. Just say "today is a floor day" and I'm just going to do all the floors. If you can bunch like things together, that is really a great way for you to keep it top of mind and to remember it.
Ashley Brown 08:21
And then let's talk a little bit about laundry. The good old laundry that we do every single week and I know some people that do laundry every single day. I'm not one of those people. But if you are great, great, great. Do what works for you and your family. We will wash clothes weekly, and I usually have two specific days throughout the week that I wash clothes that's usually on Tuesdays and Thursdays because those are my heavy home days. And so that's when I wash clothes, Tuesdays and Thursdays. Just want to make sure that you know when you're washing laundry and when this is getting done. Because laundry is one of those things that will pile up you know how it gets, it will pile up and then you're stress washing all the clothes, folding all the clothes and now it takes you two weeks to put away clothes. I'm silent because I've done this, like legit like two weeks, I'm like Ashley, put the freaking clothes girl! So that's why it's so important for you to have set days because when I didn't have set days, it would take me forever to put away clothes because I will wait till it got like filled to the brim it was just exploding over the laundry basket. And so that just really caused so much anxiety for me and overwhelm that I was like, I have to get this together. And so now that I've been doing this on a consistent basis of having days that I do laundry, it has gotten so much easier for me. And I also have a suggestion if you feel like you're washing clothes now on specific days, let's say you have two days out the week that you're washing clothes, and you still feel like it's a hassle for you to fold. And to put away your clothes. And it just kind of gets missed or just overlooked. What you can try to do if it works for you is to do small batches. And so to put a load in the washer every day, so that you have a very small load so that it doesn't feel like you have so much to do. If you throw some clothes in the washer in the morning, or after you get off of work, and then you dry them, you would probably more than likely be able to put them away because it's a really small amount. And so that could really help you keep up with your laundry. So I just wanted to throw that out to you. Just in case that might be helpful for you.
Ashley Brown 10:50
And then also when it comes to laundry, in terms of folding. I know that folding used to be for me like one of those things like I hate folding. I'll love washing because it's not that big of a deal, you just throw the stuff in the washer and the dryer. But when it came to folding, I was like, I don't really want to do this. So I used to put it off of my husband all the time to fold clothes. But a while ago, I started actually doing really fun things when I did the laundry, like just watching TV, and using some sort of distractions. Two ways that you can help make your routines feel good is by distracting yourself or indulging in something that you like. So when I'm folding clothes, I love to either have me a cup of coffee when I'm folding clothes, and or watch TV. Like a good movie a good show that I haven't watched in a while. While my daughter is napping, that's what I like to do. And so it makes the time go by and I don't think about it as much and so that's something that you could do as well. Just try to distract yourself in a way. turn on some music. Talk to someone like your bestie on the phone. Talk to your family. Have them help like, you know, maybe drink you some coffee, get you a glass of wine, whatever that looks like for you. Do whatever feels good for you while you're folding. And that can really help you feel good about folding, and not feel like it's a burden or something you don't want to do.
Ashley Brown 12:16
Alright, so we talked about some things that could fit into your daily cleaning routine and your weekly cleaning routine. But I don't want you to think that it's nothing else that you need to do. Like I said, we have to clean our entire home. But these things are going to fit outside of that. So it's going to be things that you do bi-weekly, monthly, it's things that you're going to do yearly even bi-annually. It's going to be things that you do that fit outside of these two routines daily and weekly, and with the things that fit outside of the daily and weekly routines, because you're not so much in a rhythm with these things. You're gonna have to really make sure that you remind yourself when to clean these things through planning. That's why planning is so so vital. Because you have to remind yourself to make sure that you do the things that are outside of your rhythm and the things you do on a weekly and daily basis.
Ashley Brown 13:09
And I want to go back to when I was talking about how to make your laundry easier for you or just feel better for you. But I want to give us some really good tips about how to make cleaning, feel so so good to you. Because like I say, I was at the point in my life at one point where cleaning was not where it was at. And so with that being the case, I've totally transitioned the way that I think about cleaning, because I've started to do things that I actually enjoy when I clean. But then I've also changed up and switched up my perspective about cleaning. So I want to give you some things that can help you as some tips for enjoying cleaning things that can help you enjoy it. So those are things like when you're cleaning, listen to music. I love listening to things in the 90s and 2000s. So anybody rocking with me, let's just lean back, lean back lol! That's what I love. I love me some 90's in 2000s, but whatever the music that you love, crank it up, crank it up or put your headphones in and vibe out. It's all about creating the experience. Music can be really, really helpful when you clean because it really distracts you and you get into a groove. Also listen to podcasts of course like this one, it can help to motivate you so turn on a podcast talking about cleaning while you clean and go girl. So definitely podcasts can help. And audiobooks as well.Turning on a good book that you're reading or that you want to listen to, that can be really helpful. Like I said, indulging in something that you like. so having your cup of coffee to give you a boost of energy, some tea, maybe a glass of wine, if it's late at night. You can have a glass of wine while you're cleaning. Do what you do. Whatever feels good for you in terms of what you want to indulge in.
Ashley Brown 15:07
Also, you can use really good smelling products like a good smelling product will do you so much good and give you so much energy. I love Mrs. Meyers Clean Day. I love those products especially my favorite. I'm gonna tell you right now, make sure you listen. Are you listening? My favorite scent of Mrs. Meyers clean day is Compassion Flower. Oh my gosh girl is smells so so good! You should definitely go check that out Compassion Flower scent. I usually get my cleaning products from Grove Collaborative. It is a company that will ship you cleaning products and their cleaning products are no harsh chemicals and they smell so bomb. Like I said they do carry the Compassion Flowers ccent of the Mrs. Meyers Clean Day. And they also have this really, really great wood floor cleaner that smells so good. So I love using Grove Collaborative, because when I just get that box to the door, I'm like, Yes, I don't have to go to the store, I have my cleaning stuff, I don't have to get behind. And so that's why I love using Grove.
Ashley Brown 16:23
Also having just an attitude of gratitude, let me speak on this really quick. An attitude of gratitude can do you a world of good when it comes to cleaning. Because like I said, you want to make sure that you are instilling good vibes in your home. So walking around or cleaning the toilet while you're rolling your eyes or popping your lips and smacking your teeth. It ain't doing you no good, it's not doing you no type of good sis at all. And so with that being the case, try not to do that. Instead, think about what you're grateful for when you're scrubbing the toilet. When you're on your knees scrubbing the bathtub and you like my back hurting me, look into that bathtub and say, but you know what? I got running water though. Thank you God! That's the type of things I'm talking about. Because it's important that we keep a positive perspective because sometimes we can get into these first world problems. I don't want to go there with you today, though. I'm not gonna go there today about the first world problems, but sometimes we can get into first world problems and thinking that we have so many problems. When we look around and if you look around right now, I don't care where you are. You might be on your job listening to me, you might be riding in your car, make sure you being safe. Make sure you have your seatbelt on. You might be in the house with your kids, wherever you are, look around because there's so much to be thankful for. So keeping a positive perspective can really help your cleaning routine you feel better for you.
Ashley Brown 18:06
Also focusing on the result. I sometimes we get so caught up on oh my gosh, I don't want to mop this floor. But what is the result of you mopping the floor? You get some shiny good smelling floors, right? They don't got no streaks, no shoe stains, nothing, no food crumbs. That's the result. And so we focus on the result instead of the action that just makes us more likely to want to stick to cleaning. I always say, loving the result does not require you to like the action. Period. Loving the result of something does not require you to like the action. Now I want to enjoy the action. Right? So just focus on the result. Don't worry about what you're doing. That's why I say use the distractions, use the things that you can indulge in. Because if you focus on the result that's just going to help you to actually enjoy cleaning and to actually see it as being really really beneficial.
Ashley Brown 19:07
And then the last thing I want to say is after I clean, I want to give you this tip. After I clean I love to either light a candle, burn an incense, or spray some type of room spray. I like to just create a vibe. I love to create a vibe so that's through lighting a candle. Light like a good smelling candle and then just set the mood, turn off all the lights. I turn off all the lights and set the candle I know my children be like, "what is mama doing?" But that's what I do. Then I burn an incense. Right some good smelling incense man, like oh, that can just do a world of good for you after you clean. But then I also love to use room spray too. If you've never checked out room spray go Google it. I love we use Sydney Hale. It's a company in Virginia, but you can buy their products online, so you can go check them out about the room spray. But yeah, that's what I love to do. I think that's really, really good because it helps you to reward yourself like you just cleaned up. And it looks nice. So go ahead and lay down, relax, do whatever you need to do, but light your candle, put you on something that smells good. And you're gonna see. you're gonna be like, Oh, I feel so good. So those are my tips for you.
Ashley Brown 20:32
So another thing I want you to think about when it comes to cleaning is I want you to use your burst of energy. You know what I'm talking about? Sometimes we can just get burst of energy out of nowhere. I just be like, why am I talking more than unusual like, like legit because I'm an introvert at heart, even though I love talking to people, but I love my me time too. So when I start being talkative or just feel like I have a lot of energy, I'm like, I need to use this energy. So that's why I'm gonna tell you to do when you get energy around your home. Instead of just sitting down talking, chatting it up, start cleaning. When you have that energy boost, do something with it, use it girl. Because before you know it, your home will be clean, you're gonna be down there scrubbing the baseboards, and those baseboards gonna be looking pearly white lol! Use the energy that you have when you have it. It doesn't even matter if it's outside of your routine, use it. So that's just my tip for you. Because I know that's what I love to do. So I wanted to share that with you. Hopefully, it's helpful for you. So use your energy, use your burst of energy to get some cleaning done.
Ashley Brown 21:44
So I'm giving you all of these tips. And I'm telling you what's included in your cleaning routine. And you might just have the question of, but actually why is it so important? Or you may even know and if you know, I'm just going to verify whatever it is that you're thinking. The importance of a cleaning routine is I feel like it's two things. And this is from my perspective. I feel like one. It gives you some headspace and clarity. That's one. The other thing is that it helps you with your mood. I will always say there is clarity in the cleanup. You will hear me say that over and over because that is truly a belief of mine. There is clarity in the cleanup! It is headspace that you can gain. You can lessen your anxiety, you can lessen your overwhelm by cleaning. And I know that you've probably experienced that when you have cleaned up in a way that you felt like was a good cleaning for you. That you probably were like, Oh, you feel like a sigh of relief. When you clean because it eases you. It calms you. A clean space is everything, a decluttered space is everything for you. It calms us and our inner spirit, and our being and everything. So that's one part of why a cleaning routine is so important. But like I said, when you have a clean space and a clear space with not a whole bunch of papers around and toys on the floor you're stepping over and dirt somewhere in the corner. This actually will help improve your mood. If I wake up and I see a whole bunch of clutter, now I can handle it a little bit better because I'm like you can just pick it up Ashley. But before, I would instantly get an attitude, like, why is this on the floor? Why? But yes, so definitely it can improve your mood to have a clean and clear space. It can really help you and people even will tell you, if you're feeling off a balance, if you're feeling out of rhythm, out of sync, is do some decluttering. Organize something because what that will do is that will help you gain headspace, it will help you gain mental clarity. And so cleaning girl, you see the importance is so vital that we keep a clean home.
Ashley Brown 24:23
And it doesn't have to take much to keep a clean home. So if you're not the only one that creates the clutter or the mess or just things laying around, then you don't have to be the only one to clean up all the time. Now if you assume that role, and that's okay with you and your partner, whoever is in your home, do you. But if it wasn't explicitly said or you not feeling good, no more you can enlist help. Even outside of help. It doesn't have to take much all that time. Like I said, it's those tips, doing things that you enjoy while you're cleaning, having a positive attitude. Because you know, for yourself, you want a clean home. So if you want a clean home, you got to clean. So that is why cleaning is so, so vital. It's really going to help you to just ease the anxiety and overwhelm and help you gain some headspace. And that's what's important. We're talking about instilling and maintaining peace in our homes. We need to have headspace to do that.
Ashley Brown 25:31
And I'm talking about how it really doesn't take much for you to stick to your cleaning routine or to clean, but I want to give you one sure way of how you can stay on top of your cleaning routine. And that's through planning. That is through planning. And you know, I am a huge proponent of planning right? And when you continuously do your routine and your cleaning routine, your daily one, your weekly one, you're just going to get into a flow and you are going to be vibing and have your rhythm. And then from this, you're going to just start moving without even thinking about it. I'm telling you, it becomes that way when you continuously do your routine day in and day out.
Ashley Brown 26:14
Alright girl. So that's it for this episode. I'm so happy that you joined me today. Next week, we're going to be diving into self care. I am so excited to talk about self care because it's one of the things that we need more of. And so because of this, I want to dive into this routine. And I'm really excited to discuss this with you and to give you some really good ways that you can incorporate self care into your day and into your weeks. And so make sure that you rate review and then also share this with a friend today. If you know a mom, reach out to her let her know this podcast exists and is here for her. But I hope that this was helpful for you. I hope that you learned a lot. Until next time, I hope that you're enjoying wherever you are and whatever you're doing. Talk to you soon.!
Ashley Brown 27:01
[Outro] Thanks for listening! If you enjoy today's episode, could you do me a huge favor and take a screenshot and share it on social? And for more routine goodness, be sure to visit routineandthings.com, here's to staying happy!
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