I’ll be the first to confess that I’ll never win an award for housekeeper of the year. My home is never filthy, but it has what some friends kindly describe as the “lived in” look. There always seems to be a pile of papers on the dining room table, kids’ toys in the living room, and a load of clothes waiting to be folded. It’s not that I don’t enjoy having a clean and mess-free house; rather, it’s that I just seem to have other priorities.
I have a demanding job, so that takes up more hours in the day than I even like to think about. And then there are school activities, chauffeuring my son to sporting events, and errands to run.
But at the root of it all, I’ve figured out, is that I always end up feeling discouraged when I clean. Why? Because it can so often feel pointless. I can’t count the number of times when I’ve spent hours cleaning my windows, only for the sun to come up the next day and reveal the streaks on the windows. Ditto for my shower doors. It’s frustrating to put in that kind of time and wind up with a less-than-desirable result. I’ve tried using tricks my mother taught...