Melissa Michaels
About the Author

Melissa Michaels is the NY Times Bestselling author of Love The Home You Have and The Inspired Room book. Her blog, The Inspired Room, was voted Better Homes & Gardens Readers' Favorite decorating blog in 2014 and 2015. Melissa is a church planter's wife and a mom to three human kids and...

(in)side DaySpring: things we love
& you will too!
Find more at DaySpring.com
(in)side DaySpring:
things we love
& you will too!
Find more at
DaySpring.com
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  1. Confession: I get to cheat a little in this phase of life… I’m a mom of two young kiddos (4 & 2) and the Director of a missions organization in South Africa. It’s culturally appropriate for us to have domestic help… so I do, and she’s a godsend!!

  2. I am right there with ya- and I don’t mind admitting that when we get to Uganda as missionaries I will have domestic help too! God knows just what we can handle!

  3. Yes! With these systems you’ve mentioned, chaos is kept at bay. People think my house is clean. It isn’t. It just has an overall appearance of cleanliness…because of these few systems you mentioned.
    PERFECTIONISM MUST GO! No beating oneself up for now having things 100%. Shoot for a shiny sink and a few evening tidying up routines and keep moving.

  4. My running thought through the day is: “if someone showed up unexpectedly, would I be totally mortified?” That’s not to say my house is model home perfect…oh NO…just that it doesn’t look like a bomb went off in it. It helps me keep up throuhout the day. And for the record, no one has ever shown up unexpectedly, but that’s not really the point, now is it? 🙂

  5. Jeannett’s question — “if someone showed up unexpectedly, would I be totally mortified?” — causes my breath to catch in my throat because most days I would be mortified.
    Melissa, thank you for showing me such a simple system for keeping a house that is presentable. Now, if someone would just drop by unexpectedly…
    Pam

  6. I am terrible about washing dishes. I live in a tiny apartment without a garbage disposal or a dishwasher and I love to cook. Unfortunately that makes for almost an extra 30 minutes of cleaning every evening. On busy workdays, I often struggle to find the energy to wash, dry, and put away the dishes.

  7. I’m a flylady girl myself. I make sure my sinks are shiny and my bathroom counters are wiped down every morning after I get ready for the day. Just like you, I make sure the kitchen is clean before I go to bed. Nobody likes waking up to a dirty kitchen. Every Friday is field trip day here, so if the kids want to go they have to help clean in the morning. They are in charge of their bathrooms, bedrooms and the toyroom. That gives me time to vacuum and mop and clean the other bathrooms.

  8. Oh my gosh… I am soooo glad it is not just me that struggles with this. I love your routines and in thinking through them, it is ALL of these things that make my house feel clean too, so maybe I’ll start trying them!

  9. I totally agree – routines are the key! I have a 6-week-old and simple routines are my lifesaver. Doing dishes ASAP… a couple cleaning chores each day… wiping down the bathroom and sweeping the kitchen floor daily… picking up after breakfast and before bed… making the bed every morning… just these simple things contribue to upkeep and motivate me to continue keeping up!

  10. People often comment about how “perfect” my home seems or what a great housekeeper I am! HA! It is so not true! All I do is use your same method of cleaning up at night – cleaning up the kitchen is a must because I can’t stand waking up to a dirty one! I also do the “five-minute quick clean” where I grab all the toys and put them away and just generally straighten the main living area. It makes it so easy to speed dust or vacuum whenever absolutely necessary! 🙂

  11. Melissa, I really loved this post! You make some very interesting points about things to do to make the everyday a little less daunting. I like the morning routine – that’s SOOOO important! And the sinks! Although I’ve read the Flylady’s posts in the past, you said it in a way that really spoke to me.
    I’m all about finding a little peace in a chaotic world! Thanks for this post!

  12. I recently made my own confession in a post called “It’s time to come clean”…simply stating that ‘I’m coming out of the closet’- with the fact that I don’t like to clean either. 😉 However, I do, do tidy.
    I so appreciate you, Melissa, with the way you’ve pretty said what I wanted to say in my post – yet in a much more clean and uncluttered manner. Thanks for reiterating my thoughts. ((smile))

  13. Great post! I really would like to get a little more “ready” for the day in the morning, too. I’m SAHM so sometimes it feels pointless to do so, but when I do it I feel so much more motivated!!

  14. Fun post ~ so nice to see another mom who considers “clean enough” to be OK! Although, I am not as concerned with the sink/kitchen…I am OK with leaving stuff until the next morning if I just need to get to bed NOW. I am more refreshed to tackle it then {some times ;-}
    My issue is the dust. I don’t like to dust so I leave it until the kids write me notes in it or until I get REALLY sick of seeing it. {scary I know but its true}
    Any tricks in the dusting department?

  15. As a mother of two young children and a work from home husband, I have learned that it is easiest for me to have three daily clean-up times. That way my house never becomes a total disaster and in the event that someone unexpectedly stops by(which happens a lot at my house, actually!), more than likely they will catch my house in some stage of cleanliness.
    Stage one: I make sure my beds are made and the dishes are done before I leave the house in the morning or before we start on any kind of playing at home. Coming home to a pile of dishes or unmade beds gives me an instant case of the crabbies.
    Stage Two: Before my girls go down for naps or quiet time, we pick up all the toys and put all the lunch dishes in the dishwasher.
    Stage Three: Before bedtime, the girls clean up again. I also make sure the kitchen is clean and if my day has been busy running (and not at home), this is when I take 20 minutes to do one task: dust, laundry, bathroom, whatever. I recently heard the quote, “If you say good night to your house, it will say good morning to you.” What is better than starting your day knowing that your house isn’t a disaster?
    (Oh, and because we live far from family, I count on weekend visitors to be my motivation to really clean….if I know someone is coming in a couple of weeks, I let myself get REALLY lazy on cleaning until it is a few days closer to their arrival).

  16. “Clean Enough” allows you the time and space and energy to be who God has called you to be in this season. There’s just enough discipline and enough grace to make it all work out well and free you up to be the woman you really are.

  17. I learned from the FlyLady my first year of marriage and I am so thankful. Now, with 2 little ones I can keep things running smoothly with a few simple FlyLady routines. And when the laundry gets backed up, I just remember to reboot the laundry and drive on!

  18. I have a morning and evening routine that keeps me track. I work full time as a teacher and routine is part of my personality. IN the summer I have morning, mid day and evening routine that allows me a bit more freedom cause I am home. I think clean enough is up to each of us and what we can do.
    blessings

  19. I like the way you think! I am neat and tidy by nature but if I want to actually enjoy my family, “clean enough” is the order of the day. Thanks for the great post!

  20. Whenever my house starts to get really out of control, I plan a get together at my place because I know I’ll panic-clean, and then it’ll be easier for a few weeks.

  21. Gotta love Flylady! And the reminder of cleaning up the kitchen BEFORE bed – too often I don’t and then I regret it in the morning!
    Something else I do is limit my kids toys in the playroom (or area) and box up many that sit in the basement and come out as we take others down – this can be daily or weekly. The kids enjoy their toys more and we all have much less to pick up!

  22. I use the Flylady system too. I wonder how I ever functioned without it! I have morning routines & before bed routines. I too put a load of laundry in first thing in the morning….I do the weekly home blessings, etc. It’s made a huge difference. If I start getting off my routines, my house truly suffers. Most of the time I can have the house “company ready” in about 15 minutes.