Cleaning Solution

I found out we were having house guests the night before.  Which sent me into a panic.  Not that I don't love having people stay at my house, I do.  And I love cooking for them.  But, what I hate is cleaning it.  With 4 kids and 2 dogs cleaning is a vicious cycle that never ends.   One that I prefer to not even start.

Because, cleaning turns me into a raving bitch.

It's true.  Normally I'm a laid back, Type B kinda person.  I don't request that my kids take their shoes off indoors nor do I fuss about them making their beds.  Because I already have enough to nag them about.  And because I haven't made my own bed and that would make me a hypocrite.    

I mean, I am a hypocrite, but my house guests don't know that. 

So, I assign each of the kids jobs.  And they each give me a dissertation on how each of the other kid's jobs are easier and how unjust the world is.  Then I rant about how much I do around the house and how unjust that is.  That's when I start listing every thing I do for them at the top of my lungs in miniscule detail.  Which eventually convinces them to do their job so I'll shut up.  Of course, after that,  I still have to inspect their work because inevitably, it's done half-assed.  (I don't know where they get this from.)  Then, I make them do it again.   It's like they love to hear me bitch and complain or they would just do it right the first time.  But noooooooo, that's never how it happens.  Plus, managing all these kids individually makes the whole process takes 2 hours, at minimum.

And that's just to get my kids to do the minimum.  

I take the job with the maximum work for the maximum fool-the-houseguests-into-believing-you-actually-live-like-this-every-day effect.  Which is washing the floors. Which is a long, multi-step process. 

1.  Remove stray dirty socks/abandoned shoes and other random kids items from floor.  And/or yell at kids to do this.  (However, the latter will significantly delay the process.)

2.  Vacuum.  

3.  Then, when your vacuum really sucks, in that it doesn't actually suck anything up, like mine, simply keep running it over the item repeatedly.

4.  After 5 minutes of trying to suck up a single crumb, reluctantly empty the canister clogged with dog fur, candy wrappers and pennies.  

5.  When that doesn't work, investigate further and hesitantly and with heavy eye rolling to denote protest, rinse the filter and set it in the sun to dry.

6.  Warily sweep the floor while muttering expletives under your breath because you're on a time constraint and don't have time to wait for the filter to dry to use the vacuum.  

7.  Kick the dogs and kids out of the house.  Put the kids in charge of watching the dogs.

8.  Wash the floor while swearing and complaining to yourself about the kids and dogs who aren't around. 

9.  When daughter puts hands up to the window to watch through the glass, yell at her through the window that  she'll be cleaning up said fingerprints when the floor is done.

10.  Fold laundry upstairs while the floor dries downstairs. Why did I ever want to be an adult?

11.  Polish the floor.  Seriously, why don't we get laminate?  Or a dirt floor.

12.  Yell at anyone who attempts to come into the house because they "forgot" you were cleaning the floor and didn't hear you yell at everyone else to stay out.  

13.  After you finish, the phone rings and someone has your dogs at their house because the kids "forgot" to watch because they were watching you wash the floor.  

14.  Yell at kids for not watching the dogs and make them go get the dogs and bring them home.  So the kids and dogs can come ruin your now finished, half-assed clean floor.

15.  Ensure your fingerprint artist cleans the windows and add on all the other windows in the house because you forgot about cleaning those.  Add this one to the win column.  

Is there a better solution to cleaning your house?

There is:  Don't have kids or dogs.