These easy spring cleaning ideas, along with free printable to-do lists and schedules help you get organized and make your daily routine more efficient!
Easy Spring Cleaning To Do Lists And Schedules
Over the years, we’ve received countless emails asking for advice on to-do lists, cleaning schedules, day planners, and getting organized. That’s why we created our e-book, How To Get Organized: Plan It, Then Do It! —a comprehensive guide that covers everything under the sun to help you stay on track.
This post features a brief excerpt from the e-book, along with a bonus: free printable spring cleaning to-do lists and schedules you can download at the end.
How To Get Organized
I used to struggle with scheduling—sometimes I couldn’t even plan an hour ahead, let alone a day, week, or month in advance. Like many of you, I tried everything, but nothing seemed to stick—until I discovered a few key strategies that made all the difference.
Here are some examples of what worked for me—and what didn’t.
- I made my own plan. It wasn’t perfect at first, but I kept tweaking it over the years and now it works great for me. Figure out what, when, and where works best for you and then do it.
For example, Monday is the best day for me to clean and pull the house together after a busy weekend. Tuesday and Thursday are my “appointments and running around” days. Wednesday is odd jobs and catch up day, and so on. - Before I go to bed each night, I look at my calendar and see if I have any appointments for the next day.Then I open my little notebook (We include examples of my notebook in the e-book) and write down the five or six things I either need to do or really want to get done the next day, other than my normal activities (making breakfast, washing dishes, doing laundry).
- Work the schedule. The issue often isn’t the schedule itself—it’s actually using it. The same goes for meal plans. Many women say, “I need help making a menu,” but think about it, how hard is it, really, to write down a list of four or five foods to eat? It’s not. The real challenge is that we don’t want to do what goes along with the menu – going grocery shopping, putting the food away, cooking the food and cleaning up afterwards. These tasks can feel overwhelming and create mental blocks around meal planning. The same kind of resistance can show up when it comes to sticking to a schedule.
Often, once we write something down, we feel guilty for not doing it. It’s easier to say, “I don’t know how to do it,” or, “I tried, but it didn’t work.” By doing that, we are not really giving ourselves a fair chance at making a schedule work.
Have you ever told a child to complete a task only to hear the child say, “But I don’t know how!” even though you have shown him 100 times how to do it. What he is really saying is, “I don’t want to do it.” We do the exact same thing when it comes to schedules.
The truth is, the hard part isn’t making a schedule or writing out a menu—it’s doing the tasks we’ve written down. Recognizing this is the first step to overcoming the resistance and making real progress. - I don’t write everything down. I have a problem with schedules that say, “On the third Monday of each month, wipe the fingerprints off the walls.” First, I don’t want to have to look at those dirty fingerprints for a month while waiting for it to show up on the cleaning schedule. And next month I may have no fingerprints at all, so what do I do with my day then?
For the amount of time I spent telling myself why I couldn’t do something, or for the time I took to write it on a schedule, I could have quickly cleaned and gotten it done. This is especially true with small daily tasks. Time yourself. Most things take very little time. In the amount of time it takes for me to think and write down, “I need to clean off those fingerprints,” I can have it done. - I discovered I didn’t need a schedule for most things. I don’t really need to write down on my schedule to:
Everyone knows they can’t walk around naked all day and since I love my food there is no way I would forget to eat breakfast, so why write it down? I do realize that when you first attempt scheduling, you may have to write down the order in which you want to do things. I’m merely warning you not to over-complicate things. Don’t allow your schedule to become a crutch.(I also know the “get dressed” is for those of you who would stay in your pj’s all day, but that’s a whole different book!)
- Try different things. My poor daughter has struggled like I did trying to find a plan she could follow. Some friends suggested she vacuum the whole house on Monday, dust on Tuesday, etc. but it just wasn’t working for her. She finally figured out that what works best for her is to pick one room or two small rooms and clean one room really well each day of the week. Of course, she does the usual “daily things” like dishes, laundry, and making the beds, but she adds one room for each day. It isn’t as overwhelming to her.
These tips just scratch the surface of what is in our How To Organize And Clean Your Home e-books. The e-books include charts and schedules for those who love them and alternative suggestions for those who hate them. Hopefully, no matter who you are, it will help you to get one step closer to getting things under control.
-Jill
The How To Organize And Clean Your Home ebook set includes 3 ebooks to make it easy to organize your home, eliminate clutter, conquer the laundry pile and reduce your stress with better organization. Learn more here!
Here are some free printable spring cleaning to do lists and schedules you can download and use:
Free Printable Spring Cleaning To Do Lists And Schedules
- Detailed Cleaning List
- Individual Daily Cleaning Schedule And To Do List
- More Variations On the To Do List – so you can choose which works best for you
- Meal Planning Printable List With Shopping List
- Honey Do List – This will make it much easier to get your husband to work on the honey-do items!
I’d love to see this book. Is it new? I can’t find it on your e-books page. Thanks, I’ve been needing some new inspiration.
It’s being released next week so look for it in the newsletter.
Tawra
Great ideas. Especially love the tip about having “errand and appointment days.” That way, you save gas (and money) because you’re not out every single day – and probably feel less harried because you’re not running like mad every single day!
For a few months after we had twins, (following 14 older children) I actually DID write down to eat breakfast, and get dressed, because it was something to cross off my list. I needed to feel like I was getting traction somehow!
Beth
I am looking forward to reading this book. I work 12-hr shifts from 6pm -6am. (workdays alternate each week.) It seems I can never get everything done. Maybe this book will give me some new ideas.
We are old! My mother often mentioned how when they had to call a doctor for my grandfather who was frequently ill; everyone had a job to do so the house would be in good order when the doctor arrived. In these days of EMTs arriving in seconds, no time to clean up. So, I try and have the house “doctor ready” before going to bed. Works for me and in the morning you are ready to go! LOL
Not sure about other busy moms, but if I don’t write down eat meals I will forget. I have gone whole days without eating and only remember when I am headed to bed or at dinner time. I wake everyone up, make breakfast, feed my kids and then spend the morning helping my bf find his keys, wallet, etc or helping a child who forgot to set something out and noe it is missing…or any number of thing but eating. After the school age kids are at school, then I can sit down and eat, but if it isn’t written down, I will clean up, play with my toddler and completely forget about food until lunch. Repeat similar slightly different scenarios for all other meals unless we are having a family dinner… My family finds it odd, but for me the first sign of hunger is feeling faint…
Love your suggestions and would like your free printables. Thank You
Hi from Canada Tawra,
You just mentioned there was a free e book om your site but a cant seem to find it. I love your ideas and would like to utilize some of what you mentioned on your recent youtube video
Wishing you and your family stay safe and healthy
Anastasia