Raising Arrows
Spring Cleaning with a Large Family
Pretty much all of my married life I have wanted to Spring Clean. I would read Amish stories of cleaning before church services and long for a house that had been thoroughly gone over from ceiling to floor. I would hear stories from older ladies who had grown up Spring Cleaning and then carried on their mothers’ traditions in their own homes.
But, try as I may, I could never seem to do a real Spring Clean myself.
Over the years, I have come up with ways to keep my home clean on a weekly basis with little ones in tow, but a full-blown Spring Clean just didn’t seem possible. And frankly, I don’t think I could have pulled it off until this year when my youngest turned 5.
Now, before you click away from this post because you have a bunch of tiny people in your home and you were hoping I would tell you a full Spring Clean is possible, I DO believe you can do something even better than a Spring Clean NOW so that when you are able to Spring Clean it will be a much easier process.
Decluttering!
I have an entire post including a free cleaning and decluttering template you can use to get rid of the excess stuff in your home BEFORE you Spring Clean. And truth be told, the reason the Amish and the older ladies were able to Spring Clean so efficiently and effectively was BECAUSE their homes were clutter free. Otherwise you are just tripping over and cleaning around massive amounts of stuff!
READ > How to Declutter Room By Room
So, even if you feel capable of pulling off a Spring Clean, you should definitely consider the amount of clutter in your home. Get in the HABIT of decluttering your home regularly, and when you are able to to do a full Spring Clean, you will have a much better go of it!
By the way, I have lived in this house with my family of 10 for 3 years now, and we have accumulated more stuff than I care to admit. I declutter fairly frequently (using the exact method I lay out in this post), but I also knew going into this Spring Clean I would have to declutter a bit as I cleaned because I would be digging deep into the nooks and crannies of our home.
So, no matter what – be prepared to DECLUTTER! It is just part of the process.
Ok, on to my actual Spring Cleaning method…
How to Spring Clean with Kids
A few things to note:
- The kids helped. ALL of the kids – ages 5 – 17.
- We took weekends off. We all needed a break!
- We did minimal homeschooling for the 7 days we cleaned. Basically, Math lessons for everyone and Phonics for the little girls.
- I promised the kids a special TREAT for helping with such a large and long chore because I am not above bribery!
I also made a room by room plan for Spring Cleaning. Not like my Decluttering plan, but rather a plan for which rooms we would tackle each day. It looked something like this:
Day 1: Living Room, Boy’s Bedroom, Girl’s Bedroom
Day 2: Kitchen, Master Bedroom
Day 3: Hallways Upstairs and Downstairs (including closets), Kids’ Bathroom
Day 4: Master Bathroom, Main Level Bathroom, Laundry Room
Day 5: Dining Room
Day 6: Main Room of the Basement (large!)
Day 7: Guest Room, Oldest Daughter’s Room (both in the basement)
CAUTION:
Do not try to pack too many rooms into each day! And be aware that you may have to change some of your plans and move some things around. But, the plan is your “general idea” to keep you on track and motivated to finish!
Each day, I gave marching orders to the children, giving them cleaning jobs in the current room, sending them to put things away that didn’t belong, and keeping everyone motivated while tackling the harder chores in each room with my 16 and 17 year olds since they are my biggest helpers.
Speaking of my older children –
One of the cleaning days, I had to take an impromptu day trip. My 17 year old took over and managed the Spring Cleaning for the day. She’s very motivated and efficient, and I knew I could trust her to do a good job – and she did! (FYI: She also cleans houses as a side job, so she knows what she’s doing!)
Spring Cleaning Jobs
So, you’re probably wondering what we did in each room to make this more than just a weekly clean and tidy. Basically, this was a TOP to BOTTOM cleaning of each space. When you are considering the rooms in your own home, remember to start from the top and work your way down as much as possible.
We dusted ceilings, dusted and wiped down most walls, cleaned ceiling fans, washed curtains, moved and cleaned furniture, and deep cleaned every inch of floor space. We even vacuumed the bison on the wall!
In case you are wondering, we LOVE this vacuum! It’s a Shark Rotator Lift Away and it was suggested to me by my readers a few years ago. It is FANTASTIC! No bags, on board attachments, an awesome lift away feature so you don’t have to drag the entire vacuum up stairs (and ladders!), and it can handle all of the girl hair in this house! This has definitely been one of my favorite large family purchases!
Here are a few more specifics of what and how we cleaned…
I washed down all of the polyester furniture with water and a light dish soap combination. I did the fronts and backs of the cushions and let them dry as shown below:
The boys have shelves in their closet, two of which hold their “treasures.” I had them go through all of their clothes baskets and they organized their treasures. You can read about how we organize our clothes closets in the post below:
READ >> Large Family Closet Organization
We organized nearly all of the cupboards throughout the house. Below, you can see our kitchen and laundry room, plus a video I did a while back of our kitchen storage container organization.
One really good job for little kids is going through pencils and crayons! This is one of the chores my 17 year old had them do while I was away. They tested them all and threw away anything that didn’t work or was in bad shape.
I am so happy I was able to do a Spring Clean this year! It was very satisfying! We finished the week before Easter, and I felt like my home was uber clean and inviting for the guests we had that week. Honestly, I felt like a real grown up! And I loved the fact that I was carrying on an age-old homemaking tradition!
So, if you have your house fairly decluttered, and you have enough big people to help you out, I would highly encourage you to give Spring Cleaning a try! Even if you can’t get it ALL done, just shoot for the main living spaces. Get all of the kids helping, and reward them when you are finished! You won’t be sorry you did it!