Have you ever received the dreaded phone call that you will be having guests within a few hours only to look around and see a complete disaster all over your house? Yeah, me too! You only have a few hours to clean your home. Well, I’ve got you covered {along with a cute free printable to help you out!} Forget the overwhelm and get your home in tip top shape with this speed cleaning checklist.
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My husband and I always say that the quickest way to get our house clean is to have people over! Well, sometimes we only have a short time and a lot to do! This is when speed cleaning comes into play.
If you have an entire house to clean and a short amount of time to complete the project, then this is the speed cleaning checklist for you! Whether it’s the pending arrival of company, trying to accomplish a weeks worth of cleaning during your child’s nap, or just trying to do your weekly cleaning as quickly as possible, this schedule should work for you!
This is how I speed clean my home. I don’t have a huge home, but rather a 1700 square foot ranch. If your home is larger than mine, it may take you longer. Likewise, if your home is smaller than mine, it may take you less time to complete all the tasks!
Before you start, turn on some upbeat music. Make sure it’s a playlist that will last at least 120 minutes. You don’t want to get distracted during cleaning to get the music to restart! My current favorite thing to do while cleaning is to listen to an audio book from Audible
. {You can use this link to get your first month for FREE!}
Remember, you can head to the very bottom of this post to get a printable speed cleaning checklist of the 2 hour cleaning schedule!
5 minutes - Strip the sheet on every bed. Put the dirty sheets in the washer.
5 minutes- Grab a laundry basket. Go through you entire house and grab anything that doesn’t belong in each room and put it in the basket. If toys are out in a room that just need to be put away in that room, put them away now. Don’t spend time organizing. Just get them put away as quickly as possible. This shouldn’t take you more than a few minutes to go through your entire house.
15 minutes - Clean up the kitchen. Collect all the dirty dishes, load the dishwasher, hand wash any pots & pans, put away clean dishes, wipe out sink and the countertops.
10 minutes - Quickly vacuum all of the floors in your home, including, hardwood, carpet, tile, linoleum. Everything. Get all of the crumbs, dirt, and dust bunnies cleaned up. I love my Shark Navigator
because it works on all floors! As much as I would love a Dyson, my Shark is a much more budget-friendly vacuum.
10 minutes - Quickly mop your hardwood, tile, or vinyl flooring. I like to use my Turbo Mop
to do this as it’s super quick and cleans well.
10 minutes - Grab an all purpose cleaner & wipe down the bathrooms. I love my Method all-purpose spray
. Start with mirrors, countertops, faucets, then scrub the toilets, the floor surrounding the toilet. If you have time quickly scrub the tub. Close the shower curtain and add a fresh hand towel. Make sure the toilet paper is stocked and the hand soap is refilled.
5 minutes - Gather all dirty laundry - sort into two piles (towels/sheets/rags & clothes). Switch the sheets to the dryer. Start a load of clothes.
10 minutes - Spend 10 minutes putting away the items that you placed in your laundry basket at the beginning. Make sure things are actually put away. Don’t make more piles! Put things where they belong.
15 minutes - Grab some wood dusting spray
. Start at one end of your home and quickly walk around your entire home dusting all of the wood surfaces. Don’t be super picky. Remember, this is a quick clean!
10 minutes - Grab some window cleaning spray
. Start at one end of your home and quickly walk around your home in the same manor cleaning all of the glass surfaces.
10 minutes - Grab the sheets from the dryer. Throw the clothes in the dryer. Start a load of towels & dirty cleaning rags in the washer. Go make all the beds with the clean sheets.
5 minutes - Light a candle, grab a cup of coffee, put your feet up and enjoy your clean home! 🙂 (Just don’t forget to switch out the laundry when it finishes!)
The very best way to stay on top of the cleaning is to follow through with daily routines, both morning and night. (Need help with this? Get the 1st day of Make Over Your Mornings and Make Over Your Evenings free!) If you can stay on top of the daily tasks, it makes the weekly and monthly tasks much easier to accomplish.
On the flip side, if you continue to let things pile up, you will constantly be trying to stay on top of the daily tasks and very rarely get to the weekly and monthly tasks. Trust me, I know from experience! Get those routines in place and actually complete them and your home will stay much tidier and be much easier to clean!
So I’m going to go and use this cute printable speed cleaning checklist to get my house back into shape after almost 6 weeks of remodeling projects! 🙂 If you want to print a copy to get your house in shape fast, just enter your email in the box below!
Happy cleaning!
What’s your most dreaded task on the speed cleaning checklist?
2 Hours to a Clean Home
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