Are you ready for Mom's in home inspection?
The Holidays require hours of cooking, but oh wait, you have to clean the house for guests too! You’ll be too busy to clean every corner, closet, and bedroom. It’s best to plan ahead and tackle big projects first, then focus on cleaning the rooms that your guests are going to see and spend time in. Here is our Holiday cleaning checklist:
Two Weeks before:
Tackle the stuff first that will stay relatively clean for 2 weeks
- Clean the refrigerator: prepare to make room for all that fresh baked food. Be very relentless! You’ll need the space.
- Clean out a coat closet: you will be hanging guest’s coats there.
- Wash serving dishes: or utensils that haven’t don’t get used regularly, you may be surprised what you find and you don’t want to be embarrassed.
- Wash and polish special china or glassware. Things collect dust when they aren’t used.
- If you have any cluttered areas you don’t want guests to see, organize them now.
One-Week Ahead:
It is now time to do a really deep cleaning so that the house will be just need a quick touchup the day before your big event
- Thoroughly dust, window sills and other places guests might lean and talk
- Vacuum, and sweep: See our Floor Cleaning Guide for help
- Use a brush attachment on the sofa and other upholstered furniture.
- Clean all your windows in dinning room, kitchen, living room and any glass in the front door
- Wash and iron any tablecloths and napkins that have been stored for a while.
- Deep clean bathrooms guests will be using- sink, toilet, shower, tub, mirrors, and floors. Include the inside of medicine cabinet and drawers!
- Scrub the oven and stovetop and exhaust fan- you’ll want to have a clean range for all the cooking you’ll be doing
The Day Before the Holiday
Touchup Time
- Touch up the bathrooms- wipe mirrors, the top of the toilet, an the faucet
- Touch up dusting, vacuuming and sweeping- it go quickly since you did it a week ago
- Run and empty the dishwasher
- Set the table- if you don’t need to use the dinner table for cooking preparation, set it the day before so it will look nice for arriving guests and you’ll have one less thing to do
- Put out any candles or decorations
It's the Holiday.... Guest are on their way!
- Put out fresh towels in bathrooms
- Take out the trash before guests arrive- it will be full after all the cooking
- Wipe down the stove
- Clear away countertops- guests congregate in the kitchen
While any Holiday event or party is a lot of work, it is also very rewarding to spend time with friends and family in a festive atmosphere. Taking the time to clean ahead of time will help you enjoy the cooking and socializing, Planning ahead with this house cleaning list will help you avoid being stressed or embarrassed about your housekeeping.
