Wondering what Mommy Homework is??? Each week you will have an “assignment” here to share in our comments here on this site. You will love this-both sharing AND enjoying answers by others. Some of them, I compile into an ebook (contributors can resell as a product of their own–be sure to submit your email and full name when you register so I can credit you appropriately!).
The result is AWESOME!
We get to know each other…we are encouraged in our journey…and we glean super ideas from other great moms!
Ready for this week’s MH? This is going to be a good one!
Can you believe that spring “officially” begins this Saturday??? I am SO ready for a change of seasons! I LOVE this time of year. This year has been a very damp and gloomy winter. I have been anticipating this spring so much so that I have been “Spring Cleaning” for weeks! I am spring cleaning my house, my business, even my computer! Can you tell that I am ready for spring? 🙂
Ready for spring? Let’s get ready together! Let’s “Spring Clean” together! And, let’s begin here with our Mommy Homework.
Do you spring clean? What are you doing to gear up for a super spring this year? How do you work in all of the things that you need to do? How are you balancing everything else while you clean out? Any tips for others?
I am looking forward to all of these! This is like a virtual clean-out! It will be super! Have fun! 
DIG IN!
Love ya!
Cindy
PS! Please remember to use your real name if you want credit for your Mommy Homework Credit. 
PPS! You CAN just share and not participate in Mommy Homework, BUT I would LOVE for you to get some goodies along the way!
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Deadline–Friday at midnight CST.
I am anxious to see what others suggest. I was just talking to a girlfriend about this the other day. How do you get special projects in when it seems you barely have time to get the every day stuff done?
I guess mostly that I spread it out over a longer period of time. I make a list and pick one thing at a time, like get out the children’s spring / summer clothes and go through things that are too small. (Sometimes, I have to break this task down even smaller.) Then when this is done, then I do the next project. At this rate, it takes longer than spring time to get all the cleaning and projects done!
Katrina
Well Spring cleaning this year is going to be an event. We are suppose to move in about 5 weeks. It is going to be the first time in 15 years that we have moved. I am so ready. I normally do a purge every 3 months to try and keep clutter down. Well it hasn’t worked so well the last 2 years. Loads of stuff to go through. I have a solution though.
Each room will take about a week. Each room gets 3-4 bins for items that are important and needed. Books go in crates and well we are homeschoolers so we have about 14-15 book cases of books. We will be purging those too. Each bin will have a manifest list in it to let me know what is inside and what room it goes in.
The Kitchen will of course get large bins. As will the Dining room. All bedrooms will get 4 bins per person. Clear with a colored lid to match that person. Page in Page protector for manifest goes on the inside of the lid. Taped down.
Filing cabinets are also getting a good purge. These will be gone through with a fine tooth comb. (idiom) If it is not needed it goes. Loads of Curriculum will be leaving my house. As will textbooks that are on shelves that duplicate material.
The major thing for me to remember is I only have a certain amount of time to do things and it needs to be done by April 25. In the mean time I will also be doing other things to prep for walking out of here like, Shampooing all carpets and scrubbing all floors and cabinets. This will make walking out a lot easier.
Well that ‘s what we are doing this spring to Clean out and purge.
Blessings
Lisa
Honestly, I don’t really spring clean. It’s challenging enough to keep up with my 5 kids (ages 4-11), teach them, feed them, and keep up with the laundry – spring cleaning is generally low on my priority list…With that said I AM doing some serious cleaning this week because I have guests coming in at the end of the week! Yikes!
We are doing a light homeschool schedule this week to accommodate the cleaning. Also, instead of waiting until Friday to have the kids clean up their rooms (when we usually do a once-over on the house, clean the bathrooms, sweep, vacuum, etc.), I’m having them do it every day this week so I won’t have to worry about that later on this week. I’m attacking the most cluttered spots right now – the kitchen counter is looking way better than it did a couple hours ago. I still have to declutter our “arts and crafts table” which is piled so high there’s no way we can even find anything on there, let alone do any arts and crafts there. I really am afraid that if I move one thing everything’s going to come crashing down!
I guess the best way for me to be successful with spring cleaning or any cleaning is to have a deadline – otherwise I will keep putting it off. I look for for the most obvious things like where everything is piled up because taking care of those first is going to make the whole house look better anyway and give me the motivation to keep on going. And either enlist the kids to help me clean or to entertain the younger ones while I do the jobs. It helps me too if I can listen to music or a podcast while I’m cleaning. Today the music of Fee has overtaken the house, but I also enjoy putting on headphones and listening to a podcast.
After I get things decluttered, I need to do a massive bathroom cleaning. I don’t even want to tell you what’s on the floor in there – I’ll just say there’s evidence that my 3 youngest still have their share of “accidents,” and I haven’t been enforcing the Friday afternoon bathroom cleaning as I ought to – I would be very embarrassed for a guest to use that bathroom in its current state.
The day our guests arrive I’ll probably do the vacuuming, sweeping, mopping. Not sure when I’ll get to the dusting but hopefully I’ll be able to see the wood on our shelves and other flat surfaces (instead of the gray haze of dust) before the guests arrive. So this week I focus on our downstairs.
Next week I’ll be heading upstairs to clear off tops of dressers, switch out winter clothes for spring, discard things the kids have all outgrown, and get my twins ready to move in with their older sister as my son moves into his own room. I’m sure that as I move dressers, there will be a good bit of vacuuming and dusting going on up there as well. If I have any energy left after that I may do some decluttering and cleaning in the master bedroom. Then the next major cleaning will be in July just before my parents come to visit.
Jenn Pearson
We don’t really spring clean here either. Some jobs do need a massive clean every once in a while and I tend to just do it when I see it needs done or when it starts to bug me 😉 Not the best method and I know I need to change that. I would prefer to change it to a method so that we do the cleaning all year long and not just a BIG deep clean in once or twice a year.
Also, Cindy, I tried checking the MH credits but the pdf is coming up as 18 pages for me. The names are on the first 9 then the last 9 are the amounts. I tried counting up on the names and then doing the same on the amounts but I don’t think I did too well 😉 LOL Anyway, just wondering if it was just me.
I have never really done a “spring cleaning”. I tend to get a little over zealous about cleaning, when I do it. I either keep driving at it, never finding a stopping point, until I’m completely exhausted, or I don’t do it at all. I have been trying to adopt my mother’s theory. She tries to do a small job every day. I’ve been doing better since I’ve tried that. This is an area that I am lacking. Must need prayer. 🙂
Linda Sprague
Well, thankfully, I’ve already gotten a head start on spring cleaning with a lot of help. I don’t normally have a regular, scheduled spring cleaning, but there are always a few things I like to “spruce” up for Spring and get organized after winter. I fell and sprained my ankle/injured a tendon a few weeks ago and have had to keep my feet up for awhile, and both my mom and my mom-in-law have been in and out of my house helping me tackle things I’ve needed to get started on.
My in-laws helped arrange for someone to come haul off many things that were put in the garage through the winter that were broken or needed to go to the dump. That has been HUGE. My MIL also helped get some curtains hung in my girls’ room, clean out some toys and clothes for Good Will, and hauled off all of the recycling that accumulated in February with the almost 3 feet of snow we got. She also wallpapered our bedroom to replace
My mom got started on my girls’ room and was able to fill 2 rubbermaid tubs with clothes they’d grown out of through the winter, as well as organize my pantry which helped a lot.
So my next steps, now that I’m able to move around, is to get my basement cleaned out – more clothes for Good Will, things to haul off in trash, and just reorganize into a nice storage area. Then we’ll get the garage cleaned out with the last load of old furniture to be hauled off. I’ve slowly been getting back into a rhythm of dusting and vacuuming regularly – and can’t wait to get my windows open!
Other than cleaning ceiling fans, blinds, and outside windows, I don’t do much other spring cleaning inside, per se. My Mom and MIL did a lot of the things I wanted to do! But we do get outside and get our landscaping and garden ready for planting over a couple of weekends and that is really fun. My hubby takes care of the landscaping out front while I work on the garden area. It’s so nice to finally be outside in sunshine!
Spring House Cleaning ? No I do not do spring house cleaning like Grandma did. She would take all the mattress out the upstairs window onto the porch roof to air out. Than all the rugs went out on the clothes line to get a beating. Than you can only imagine what went on inside that house. I clean when I have to and that is more often than I care to. I do like to have a clean house but who has time to do spring cleaning all the way through?
This year has been different ! We are having some company coming for a few days. Our guest bath that I have been going to redecorate for 3 to 5 years has not yet got done. My husband was in there and said “this door on the sink should be painted” SO was my thought. I do have to admit that it was getting kind of in need of help. So Monday evening I got out the paint and brush and give the front of the cupboard a paint job. Than I woke in the night a began to think since I still have everything out I might just as well go ahead and paint at least the one wall.
Tuesday, this will not take long. Ok two days later and its not back to gather yet. So here goes the spring cleaning. You just couldn’t leave well enough alone. Ended up with every thing moveable out of there, all the walls painted, tub, tile, toilet, sink scrubbed and the floor scrubbed and waxed. In the middle of it all I painted an ocean scene on the wall with palm trees, sand, rocks, wild grasses, even clouds. This had been my plan for years but had never got it done. Ok that’s enough spring cleaning for this year. I am getting to old for this and have decided it’s time to move into a travel trailer, that’s not so big.
In the mist of all this cleaning I was thinking. We spend hours and days spring house cleaning just so our homes will shine for how long before the spiders and dust move back in again. Don’t get me wrong I am for a clean house but to spend 2 – 3 days on one room, that doesn’t even count the rest of the house.
In the mist of this I begin to think I spend all this time on my house here on earth that is not going to last but what have I done with my spiritual house that is going to last for eternity. Have I spent 2-3 days reading Gods word, praying, having devotions. I don’t mean just our daily time but as much time as I spent redoing one room. No way. This morning as I was reading John 9 about the blind man I begin to think if I was blind would I care what this house looked like and there may never be any spring cleaning. After a good spring cleaning our home shines and smells fresh but it is more important that our spiritual home should honor God with a good spring cleaning, so we will shine forth His radiance and smell of His sweet fragrance.
Our earthly home is here for only a time but our spiritual homes are going to last forever into eternity.
Nancy Lewis
This is a tough one. With a large household and some special needs kids…I once was determined I would not start school after Christmas until the offic was in order. Six weeks later I gave up in defeat.
Yes, I’d really tried.
I nearly had a nervous breakdown just thinking about it, but I couldn’t stand the “stuff not in it’s place” and the deeper cleaning that needed to be done. I had the older kids make lists of what THEY thought needed to be done in a particular area. I think it might have helped them take ownership of it. I had previously reserved the right to add things,a nd I did but just a few.
We will ahve to wait and do someoutside work til it’s warm,b ut I’m thrilled w/ what we accomplished in two days…and I’m looking forward to pushing past that last hump and finishing!
We have sorted things, cds, toys, (books are on hold til dh gets a new bookshelf in and I can SEE what I have!). We have moved things, cleaned walls….
and now have lots of stuff for a garage sale
BUT I MISSED THE AUDIO on having a killer garage sale. sigh.
hth
Monique
mom to 10
Spring cleaning???? I have always tried to wash the windows, kitchen cabinets and few other minor things around the house. I am currently working through the Make Today Matter group but it is going slow. I love the help I have gained but it seems like with having a handicapped child I always seem to need to be with him or my daughter instead of working on the stacks of things in the different rooms. I do have a goal this year to get at least my upstairs completely clean – big goal with lots of bumps in the road.
We used to do a big garage sale every year and I was able to clean a lot of junk out at that point but since we had a person try to sue for $1 million for falling at one 4 years ago my husband wont allow us to have another one. So the stuff seems to sit. sigh.
Having a family that seem to think you should be the one to dump everything that own (junk) into my house has made it where it is so hard to move around. And having one that checks up to make sure you haven’t tossed it makes it even harder.
Yes, I do a little spring cleaning but not a lot.
Orilla Crider
I don’t think I necessarily do “spring cleaning”. I can’t stand a messy/dirty house so I have systems and routines that help keep things under control. I try to keep the house in a constant state of “not too bad”.
Instead of having too many massive clean outs I try to do it bit by bit as needed. I leave a little margin in my day so that when I see a kitchen drawer or something that needs attention I can just take care of it relatively soon. I try to do little jobs along the way like cleaning the area of the doors where little fingerprints seem to pile up, washing the oven and dishwasher fronts, and finding homes for homeless stuff that always shows up on the kitchen counter. (why does everything live on my kitchen counter?)
A job that used to be horrible was going through the kids clothes at the end of the season. Trying on everything to see what still fits from last year, making 10 different piles of the stuff we were done with. What a mess! I don’t do that anymore. Now, each closet has a small bin for “too small clothes”. This can also include anything they know they just don’t wear. All through the year, we just put our clothes in the bin as we notice that something is too small. At the start of a new season we just go through the drawers and take out anything that won’t fit when the season comes around again and put it in the bin. The rest put in another bin for next year. We take the old clothes to Once Upon a Child, and sell what they will take. From there the rest is given to a friend at church who is told to pass along whatever they don’t want. Done. No more piles for GoodWill, sell, this friend would like this, that friend would like that, this may fit next year, I want to keep this for my own kids someday, etc, etc, etc.
We used to have a garage sale in the spring but since I can’t stand clutter, I now sell stuff on Craig’s list as we go along. My daughter does love having sales though, so we do let her try to sell the pile of stuff that would have been too insignificant to sell on Craig’s list. I’m not sure where all this “stuff” comes from since I also don’t like to shop.
I guess there is the issue of school books. Again, my inability to function in the midst of clutter (I call it visual noise) comes into play. I actually keep a box in the garage for books I want to sell in the spring. All through the year whenever I come across a book I don’t want anymore, it goes in the box. (instead of starting yet another pile in my house)When it’s time for curriculum sales we take a quick look on the shelves in the house. Anything we don’t think we want to keep, in the box it goes. Again, since my daughter loves to sell stuff we go ahead and take it to the sale. Otherwise I’d give it away. But she loves it and we get enough to make a start on next year’s supplies. (that’s another thing,I’m learning not to buy so much stuff at the sale!)
Wow, I sound pretty rigid! I’m really not. I’ve had to set up systems because I know it actually buys me a lot of free time. Right now I’m sitting outside with the kids feeling pretty good that I don’t have two weeks worth of spring cleaning to do!
I do have one big project. I’m having surgery in April so I want to get my freezer stocked with meals that my family can prepare. Once that is done I’ll be all set. I’ll let hubby worry about the garden.
Enjoy your spring!
My spring cleaning usually happens at different times during the year. This year is different. I am spring cleaning in the spring.
My spring cleaning includes not only house cleaning, but life cleaning. The most important cleaning has been in my life. Over time we tend to collect extras and stuff that is not enriching our lives, it’s just time consuming clutter. We need to spend time with God seeing what is important and cleaning out the rest. I have been taking Cindy’s spring cleaning coaching coarse. She has done a super job of helping me weed out the clutter, get organized, and stay focused in my life and ministry.
My motivation for getting the house spring cleaned is that company is coming. Over the winter the house has accumulated clutter and needed to be reorganized. We have been working at pulling out the extra and unnecessary stuff and finding new homes for it. I can’t say this is one of my favorite things to do, but it is encouraging to have an uncluttered home and inspiring to have accomplished something useful.
To get all this accomplished I have to schedule, use list, and box out time for task. It’s not easy and sometimes exhausting. Prayer is a vital part in helping me to keep going. As you clean pray for others and ask God for strength. When you are weary read and pray Isaiah 40:28-31(NIV).
Do you not know?
Have you not heard?
The LORD is the everlasting God,
the Creator of the ends of the earth.
He will not grow tired or weary,
and his understanding no one can fathom.
He gives strength to the weary
and increases the power of the weak.
Even youths grow tired and weary,
and young men stumble and fall;
but those who hope in the LORD
will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
they will run and not grow weary,
they will walk and not be faint.
Lois Graham
HI there, We’re heading into WInter here in New Zealand so Spring Cleaning isn’t on my mind at the moment but I have to say I’m not really a “Spring Cleaner”. I don’t follow the system legalistically but I do love many of the ideas from the FLY lady system. I find that I can clean out clothes drawers, wash down cabinets and do all those other “Spring Clean” jobs, in small portions (15 to 20 minutes at a time). I can think, right the little guys are in bed and I have a small space of time before I start…. I’ll grab a cloth and wash the bottom windows in a couple of bedrooms…or whatever. This way, things stay reasonably good most of the time. I do do some of the bigger jobs over January usually, which is our Summer holiodays and also the space between school years. I can get things like the school cupboard cleaned out and organised when I’m not so on board for teaching. I LOVE organising so it is a case of finding time for something I really enjoy doing. Inner Spring cleaning is an interesting idea…Hmm, gives me something to think about. thanks everyone.