I don’t know about the rest of you Mammas, but I struggle everyday to keep my house tidy.  I visit in envy, other peoples homes that are always the epitome of tidiness and wonder how in high heavens they have enough time in the day to keep such a clean house.

Granted, I am a work at home Mom so while I am at home all day, I am not home running the sweeper and chasing dust bunnies.  And granted, my children are at home all day with me and it took me a long time to realize that those families with pristine houses often have their children in daycare so there isn’t that element of everyday ‘lived-in’ crud developing.  You can also add in there that I have one very large long haired dog and one very round long haired cat, but all these excuses don’t get my house any closer to clean or even tidy on most days.

Before I started working from home I had a tight cleaning routine that kept our house in presentable shape at every hour of the day.  Now that I have to fill my free minutes with billable hours, that cleaning schedule no longer works and my dishes don’t get washed until it’s time to cook a meal and my laundry doesn’t get washed until it starts to overflow into the next room.  And I get embarrassed when a friendly neighbor just pops by to say “Hi!” cause usually, my house is a wreck.

So, I have been searching for solutions to my cleaning issues.  I have tried to convince the universe to somehow add more hours in the day.  No luck there.  I have tried to get my life partner on board with helping out a bit more, but that lasts about a week at best and in his defense, he does work 10 hour days and is only home and awake for around 15 hours a week which should be spent with the kids.

Don’t get me wrong.  I am not like a closet hoarder or anything, not that there is anything wrong with that.  The opposite is actually true, I am a minimalist at heart and am constantly de-cluttering our lives and passing along the things we no longer use or need, but in our small house with two children under 6, things seem to be almost everywhere, almost all of the time.

I am hoping to tap into some of your secrets and thought I would also share some of mine.  Like eucalyptus oil in the toilet tank keeps it smelling fresher longer.  Just putting your candles on a sunny window sill rather than lighting them can generate a bit of fragrance at different times of the day.  And bubbles don’t do the cleaning, you do.  So if you are avoiding natural soaps because they don’t have enough bubble power, change your thinking.

So I am left here again, peeking curiously around my mess wondering if I am missing the boat on some natural Mamma secret to keeping house? Where do you keepers of the home find the available minutes to clean and what are your tricks for getting the job done in as little time as possible?