The Secret to a Clean House

I know, I know, I'm actually writing a post - the first one in a long time. So much has happened that I have many topics I could write about - going to the Rison Singing, Emily in school, Ethan's getting so big, etc. But today I'll write on the topic that has affected me the most in the past month.
In one sense there are two kinds of people in this world: the born organized and the rest of us. The born organized are somehow always on time, their rooms never get messy, their stuff is always put away, and their kitchen counters are always cleaned off. This has never been me. Warning: If you are a BO person, the rest of this post will seem silly to you. My room growing up was usually messy. I had piles of stuff everywhere - but I knew where everything was, of course. On the rare occasions that I cleaned it, I really cleaned and straightened and did a good job, but it never stayed that way for long. When I got married, I really tried to keep a clean house. At first we were students, and John worked on Friday nights. That's the time I spent cleaning - it took 2 hours to clean that little one bedroom apartment, including mopping and dusting - no big deal, right? Then we moved to Little Rock and both got jobs, and that's when it all fell apart. It seems the only time I could keep it together was when our parents would visit.
I consider myself a reasonably intelligent person - I majored in math, for goodness sake - and I did learn a few things through the years. I bought and read several organizing books, and observed my mother-in-law and sister-in-law, who are both born organized. The books that were most useful to me were Survival For Busy Women by Emilie Barnes (thanks, Mom!) and Confessions of an Organized Homemaker by Denise Schofield. My attitude was, if you're going to clean it, clean it right. I didn't realize it was better to do a little than nothing at all. You would think that a stay-at-home Mom could keep it together, but it's always been a struggle for me . . . until about three weeks ago.
I don't remember how I got to this website, but I was playing around on the computer when I came across www.flylady.net. Little did I know how much that would change my life! It starts at the top by asking, "Is your home in CHAOS (Can't Have Anyone Over Syndrome)?" Boy, did that sound familiar. She promised to help me overcome all the clutter and keep my home clean and neat - for FREE - by sending me emails and reminders daily of steps to take to work on the house. I thought, what have I got to lose? I started with the 31 "babysteps", where each step is a day. The first day my assignment was to clean and shine my kitchen sink. I thought I could do that, so I did, at 9:30 at night, and signed up for the emails.
Her thing is getting you to establish good habits, little by little, over time, and use a timer. Set it for 15 minutes, work like mad, and then quit when the timer goes off. Right now, I'm on day 21, I think. I have a morning routine, an evening routine, and do the weekday "assignment" they send me. I was already doing some things right, like keeping a calendar, making my bed daily, running the dishwasher every night, etc. But this has helped me understand why born organized people are the way they are - they have these good habits, but don't even think about them that way. One day last week I realized that if anyone dropped by and asked to use my bathroom, I wouldn't have to lead the way, picking up clothes as I went. It was company ready!
Here's a funny example to illustrate: At home I keep a little spoon rest by my coffeemaker, because I stir in creamer and want a place for my spoon so it won't get the counter dirty (don't ask how many years I didn't have one, but did have a dirty counter). I also drink several cups a day and don't want to mess up all those spoons just drinking coffee. When I'm at the in-laws' house, my MIL doesn't keep a spoon rest there, so I put my spoon close to the sink. Well, the last time I was there, I got my cup of coffee, left the spoon, and come back for another cup - but the spoon wasn't there. I thought maybe she didn't want the spoon messing up the counter, so this time I left the spoon resting by the sink, with the spoon part hanging over the sink. Next time, no spoon. It was getting fun at that point, trying to figure out how I could leave the spoon where she wouldn't put it in the dishwasher. It didn't happen! Now, she probably didn't even think about putting that spoon in the dishwasher every time, bring the BO person she is, but I could see why her counters stay so clean. Well, she probably wished her DIL would please put the spoon away instead of leaving it out. ;-)
So if you're like me and not BO, you ought to take a look at www.flylady.net. She's a little over-the-top at times (hug yourself, etc.), but she has some great ideas and is a lot of help. I would make that a link, but can't figure it out. Just copy-and-paste.