STOP CLEANING YOUR HOUSE...Yes, Really!!
Episode Stats
Words per Minute
211.72263
Summary
In this episode, I talk about the one time you should stop cleaning on the weekends and why it s so important that you don t have to do it. I share some tips on how to keep your home clutter free and organized during the weekends.
Transcript
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Hello Classic Crew and welcome to today's video where I'm going to be sharing the one time you
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should stop cleaning. If you are new to my channel, here we talk about classic living
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and traditional values and I would love if you would consider subscribing and hitting that
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notification bell. If you would like access to a ton of exclusive content including my book club,
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my av club, my podcast, as well as monthly zoom girl chats, make sure to head over to
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classicallyabby.substack.com to get access to my newsletter where you will only pay seven dollars
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a month for all of this content. It's great but today I want to talk about the one time you should
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stop cleaning. Now if you've been following me for a while you know that I think that cleaning your
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house, keeping things organized, decluttered is a really wonderful way to respect the things that
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you own, to respect the people around you, to respect yourself. I really think that cleaning is a beautiful
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way to express gratitude for the objects that you have and the home that you live in but there is
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one time I think that it is really important to stop cleaning and that is on the weekends. I have
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one rule as a wife and as a mama and that is there is no cleaning on the weekends. So I want to explain
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this concept to you so let's get into it. So I have this rule right? I have this rule that I will not
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clean on the weekends. Now there's like a little bit of wiggle room here but the reason I say that
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is because the weekends are a time for family and for community and I think a lot of the time we as
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mothers can want to keep our homes clean for all the reasons I mentioned at the beginning of this video
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but it will interfere with the time that we can spend with our children, our husbands, and our
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communities and we'll choose to wash the dishes instead of doing a picnic with the kids or we'll
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choose to mop the floors instead of enjoying a lunch with friends and that is a really big mistake in my
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opinion. There's only one time of the week that we get to spend with our family and with our friends
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when no one has to worry about working and it's really important that we as homemakers, as wives,
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as mothers, that we encourage our family to spend time together and participate in it and enjoy it.
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I recently wrote a post on my Instagram and I'm going to share it here but I'm also going to read
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it to you guys. I want to read you what I wrote because I said it a little bit more concisely
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One of my favorite rules as a wife and a mama, no cleaning the house on weekends. I don't want to
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take away from the time we get to spend as a family by worrying about the mess we make. We have
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as much fun together as we can in every way and if there's a big mess I'll get to it on Monday when
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we are all back to work. This philosophy has made our weekends so much more enjoyable and made me more
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present and intentional. I think another big part of this is that I don't worry about the mess that we
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make and I think that allows us to do more fun things. So as even our son gets older if we want
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to paint in the house or if we want to put on a play and the clothes get strewn everywhere I don't
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want to make that an impossibility because I'm worried about the mess. I want the mess to be a
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part of the fun. So I feel really strongly that the weekend should not be a time for chores in that
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way. We can relegate that to the week. That is going to be something we do on the weekdays
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but during the weekend we focus in on each other and we don't worry about that. So I got an Instagram
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DM asking me how do I accomplish this? What do I do on the days where I need to clean up after a long
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weekend or something like that? And I wanted to break it down a little bit. So I have my notes here.
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So the first tip that I have for this is to eat off of paper plates, use plastic cutlery, or just have
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things that you can easily put in the dishwasher. So I'm somebody that I don't wash my dishes before I
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put them in the dishwasher. I just give them a quick rinse and pop them in and that keeps things
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really quick. But if you are somebody who doesn't do that, who rinses your dishes and cleans them
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before putting them in the dishwasher, eat off paper. It makes a really big difference because
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dishes are really like the biggest project I find when you're trying to keep the house clean
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and it's something that you're constantly having to do. So if you can either eat off of paper or just
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rinse your dishes and pop them in the dishwasher, that'll be the best solution. And you don't have
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to worry so much about doing the dishes. But my other tip, if you are going to do the dishes on
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weekends, is just do them first thing in the morning when you get up, which is really my practice
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throughout the whole week. It's like the first thing I do every morning. Or if you're somebody
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who likes to do their dishes in the evening, do it the last thing before you go to bed. But do it
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when it's not interfering with another fun thing that the family is doing as a group and isn't getting
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in the way. So if you want to do the dishes, do them either in the morning or in the evening,
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but not at a time when the family's getting together and doing something fun. So for example,
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if the whole family's going to watch a movie, but you want to do the dishes, wait to do the dishes
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until after everyone goes to bed or just wait until the morning when you wake up. Because
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generally we wake up early as parents, early with the baby or earlier than the younger kids,
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and we can take care of it before it even gets in the way of getting to spend time and enjoy time
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with your family. My next piece of advice is have everybody put their clothes in the hamper.
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I find that the other problem that I have keeping track of is just clothes ending up everywhere,
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including my own. So if you have messy clothes, you don't have to do laundry on the weekend.
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I would specifically say do not do laundry on the weekend, but just have things get thrown in the
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hamper so that on Monday when you do do the laundry, everything is in one place and you don't have
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to run around the whole house collecting things. But that is my last piece of advice, which is to
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leave the mess for Monday. I work from home. I can take Monday off really and spend it cleaning,
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but not everybody has that luxury. And that is my choice. I know a lot of people like to use Monday
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as a way to jump and start the week. I have chosen that because I don't clean on the weekends.
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Usually I take most of Monday or at least half of Monday to really focus on getting the house clean.
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And I am totally fine with that. It's a decision I've made and I'm really happy with,
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but not everyone has that luxury. So if you also want to clean on Monday, maybe you can talk to
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your husband about dividing and conquering the duties if you both work. So if you guys are both
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outside of the home, then on Monday night, one of the adults is on kid duty and one of the adults
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is on house duty. And maybe you guys split the responsibilities or you guys switch from Monday
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to Monday, but just dedicating Monday night then for that big family cleanup. And maybe it becomes a
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family project. The whole family gets together and keeps the house clean Monday night so that
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everyone knows the weekend is not going to be a time where we worry about this. But Monday night
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is family chores night. I love that idea. I might do that with my kids as they get older.
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But I really wanted to share this thought because I think it's so important as moms, we set the tone
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for the household. And if we're always putting chores ahead of family fun, then we're not giving our full
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attention and quality time to our kids. We're doing acts of service in place of quality time. And for
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kiddos, they don't necessarily view keeping the house clean as an act of service for them. They
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don't really notice it yet. And for a lot of husbands, that's true too. They want you. They want your time.
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And so keeping the house clean, that can be something you guys do as a team, as a family. But what you
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really want to do is devote your time and love and energy to the family, to the community over the
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weekend. So for us, Friday night and Saturday are Sabbath. So we really spend that time totally in
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our community. It's the best. And then Sunday is really for family. So that is one of my most
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important household rules. Let me know if you guys would like to see another video where I share
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another household rule that I have. And I can maybe make this into a series like my rules for life as a
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wife and a mom. I'd love to hear your thoughts down below. Make sure to leave a comment. If you
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haven't already subscribed, make sure to hit that notification bell and subscribe. And if you haven't
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subscribed to my Substack newsletter, make sure to head over to classicallyabbey.substack.com. I would
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love if you would consider following me on all my social media, which is classicallyabbey
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absolutely everywhere. Thank you so much for watching and I'll see you guys in my next one. Bye!