Thanks for joining me. In today's episode, I'm going to
talk you through Speed Cleaning Your Kitchen and I'm also going
to give a product recommendation in this one.
You'd be surprised how many reviews I get where people are
disappointed because I didn't give product recommendations.
So I'm trying to talk more about the products I use and yesterday
I purchased something that I haven't used in a while and
decided it was going to become a regular thing when your.
House is a mess and you're feeling the stress.
What you need is a friend in your ear.
Start the job and you'll see it through with Ronnie talking to
you. Make the chaos disappear.
Clean with Me podcast is here. I'm going to assume you're
already dressed for the day. If not, pause the episode and
dress for the day. Straighten up your front
entrance, maybe start a load of laundry, whatever you need to do
to feel at peace about heading to the kitchen and working in
there. So I'm going to assume you've
already done that. Step one to cleaning the kitchen
is always gathering up dirty dishes from around the house.
Arguably, it's taking out the trash, so you're going to need
to do that too. You're going to need to take out
the kitchen trash and reline that wastebasket.
I'm assuming it's full because we have to take ours out every
day. Make sure you have an empty
wastebasket so you can throw things away as you're cleaning
and make sure you've brought everything to the sink area.
You don't want to do all the dishes and then discover there
are mugs on the night stand in the bedroom or an ice cream bowl
while you're gearing up for your kitchen cleaning session.
I want to kind of plug the bonus episodes if you're not already
supporting the show. I'm about to create a new bonus
episode that solves a cleaning related marriage problem.
And I realize some of you are single, but from time to time I
like to give a little bit of relationship advice because I've
gotten a lot of positive feedback that many of you like
hearing that. But that's kind of a deep rabbit
hole to go down. It's going to take me a while to
explain this epiphany I had recently.
So you're going to do more housework in that episode?
It's going to be a longer episode.
In this one, we're just focusing on the dishes and kitchen
surfaces. A while back I talked about the
Dawn Power Wash. You know that spray where you
spray it, spray it on your dishes instead of the
traditional dishwashing liquid that you pour out.
And for some reason, at the time, I just wasn't that
impressed by it. I don't know if I had some bias
going into trying it because I didn't like the price point, or
maybe at the time my dishes were heavily soiled and I'd let stuff
dry on too long and I just didn't feel like it was as
effective as I thought. But kind of on a whim yesterday
I bought some. I wasn't even thinking about the
show. I was just thinking I wanted to
get the most powerful dish soap available, and I felt like
splurging on it. I realize I might be kind of
contradicting myself. I don't remember what I said in
that old episode. I just remember talking about
the fact that I wasn't that excited about it.
And then some of you commented that maybe I didn't use it
right. I don't know.
But I gave it another try yesterday and decided that I do
like it. Yesterday I was doing some work
on the computer and I felt like getting up and moving around and
I knew my husband was going to be making dinner, but he was
kind of relaxing. So I thought, well, I should
clean the kitchen so that he can go into a clean kitchen and make
dinner in a little bit. He would have just gone in and
cleaned, but I didn't want him to have to.
So I started spraying everything with that Dawn power wash.
And I do admit that it's a little expensive for the size
because I'm used to getting the blue dawn liquid kind of in
bulk. Like I get a huge container
obviously makes it a lot cheaper, you know, per oz.
But I mean, that having been said, these little things we do
to pamper ourselves when cleaning, you know, buying a
luxury product like Cascade Platinum dishwasher pods or the
Don Power Wash spray isn't really going to make or break
us. You know, it's not like you
started going to Starbucks twice a day or something.
Sometimes there's just a season where you want to make things
easier on yourself. And then, you know, maybe in the
future when you're keeping up on dishes, you might want to go
back and start getting that giant container of the liquid
again. Entering kind of a busy season
because I'm starting a new part time job in addition to working
at the school, so I'm temporarily going to be doing a
little more than I should. I guess for me, this is a season
where spraying the dishes might be a good idea.
So if you haven't already started on this, it's time to
pre rinse your dishes. OK, if you were using like the
spray and I noticed there was a generic spray too that was
significantly cheaper. So I might try that as well.
But I pre rinsed the dishes first, at least most of them
unless they they didn't look like they needed pre rinsing and
then I just went ahead and sprayed it on.
Maybe you have a spray right now and maybe you don't.
It might be that you're just pre rinsing your dishes and pots and
pans under running water with a scrub brush or a sponge.
Since I'm talking about those sprays, I'm going to kind of
assume in this episode that you're using it, which is why I
didn't tell you to empty your dishwasher or drying rack.
I mean, maybe you did while I was talking.
If so, great, you're ahead of the game.
But when I went in to clean yesterday, the first thing I did
was to get that spray on my dishes again.
Some of them I pre rinse, some of them I just started spraying.
Then I emptied the dishwasher because the key with that
product is giving it some time to do its work.
So once you get everything pre rinsed and sprayed if
applicable, it'll be time to empty your dishwasher and drying
rack to make sure you have a place to put stuff.
OK, And some of you after the pre rinse might have gotten some
items soaking because if you don't have the spray, obviously
you want to get those heavily soiled items soaking.
OK. I often fill up the pots and
pans with hot water, liquid dish soap, place them on the counter.
And then if I come across some silverware that's got stuff kind
of caked on or dried on, I'll set it inside of one of the pots
that's soaking. But kind of the theme of this
episode is going to be pre rinsing and pretreating your
dishes so that you don't have to scrub as much.
I definitely touch on that in every episode where I talk about
dishes, but I want to emphasize it in this one.
The order in which you do things can affect how long it takes to
get your dishes done. So it's key to allow whatever
dishwashing product you're using time to do its work.
I'm going to give you a couple more minutes to get things pre
rinsed and soaking. Obviously some of you are
already washing dishes. Maybe you already did an empty
reload and run of a dishwasher while I was talking.
But setting yourself up for success is key.
You want to, you know, clean out your sink.
You want to have all the dishes brought to the kitchen, then you
want to get difficult items soaking.
You want to pre rinse everything.
If you have a dishwasher, unless it's just the most top of the
line expensive dishwasher out there, you probably need to pre
rinse things and at least scrub the food off of them.
I know there are dishwashers that have a built in garbage
disposal that I guess chops up that debris just like the
garbage disposal in your sink does.
Hopefully by now you've completed the pre rinsing stage
and you either have some things soaking or you've applied a
dishwashing spray to those items after, you know, rinsing or
scraping the debris out of them. If you haven't already done so,
empty your dishwasher, empty your drying rack, and then
continue to put things away in your kitchen.
OK, that leaves time for things to soak and sprays to do their
work. OK, maybe you have seasoning
sitting out cereal boxes. I feel like I need to quit
bringing up these same played out examples.
But those are the items that I find, you know, in my kitchen.
Or there might be plastic wrap and things like that that people
just left out. Toss all that trash and just put
things away and there could be other items in your kitchen that
don't even belong there. Just be careful if you're going
to another room that you don't get sidetracked.
But I don't think that's an issue when you're listening to a
cleaning podcast where I'm talking you through the steps of
cleaning your kitchen. I think that's just something to
remember on a day where maybe you're listening to some
unrelated non cleaning related content.
You know, Be careful about the tendency to get sidetracked
while in another room. Some people keep paper clutter
in their kitchen. I don't really understand that.
I mean, I guess it kind of goes back to a time when people had a
phone, like a wall mount phone in the kitchen kind of near the
end of one of the countertops. You know, people ended up having
like pens and paper and, you know, maybe they were paying
their bills on that phone and that's where that started.
But I definitely don't keep stuff like that in the kitchen.
That said, you know, as you're putting away clutter or
whatever, if you do have a little station, a bill paying
station of some sort in the kitchen, I recommend getting
some kind of a basket or container or maybe clearing out
a drawer for that stuff. I'm really big on having
containers on your countertop for whatever.
Let me give you an example. We have chickens, OK, Each day
my son goes outside and gathers eggs.
And over the years we've used different containers to put the
eggs in. But sometimes, you know, my
husband will designate a container that I use for
something else and I don't really want it going out in the
yard and whatever. Sometimes a container gets left
in the yard. It's a whole thing.
So for some reason, we'd fallen into a rut where my son was just
setting the eggs on like a little towel on the dining room
table. Well, sometimes the cat was
getting up there and slapping. And no, my cat's not allowed on
the table. But irritatingly, it was
attracted to the eggs, and it was slapping them off of the
table onto a chair. Number one, I don't want the cat
to be tempted to get on the table for any reason.
And then #2 of course I don't want it breaking the eggs.
So I often go shopping in my own house.
If you've been listening for a while, you know this.
I looked in my pantry and I have a little wire basket that I keep
my gravy packets in and I thought that would be a cute
basket for eggs. It would be perfect for the
unwashed eggs. When they're first brought in,
they go in that basket and then my husband has a task of
scrubbing them under running water with a little scrub brush
before he put some in the fridge.
Don't write me and tell me about the fact that eggs have this
protective covering called bloom that makes them stay fresh
longer. Yes, I'm aware of that.
After we wash them, we put them in the fridge, but I realized
they can sit out on the counter for a while before they've been
washed. That's that's what the baskets
for. Took the wire basket that I was
keeping my gravy packets in and I already had a little
rectangular box in the pantry that was a container.
Something came in, I don't remember what it was, but you
know, it wasn't as cute as the basket, but it's inside my
pantry. So I thought, well, this little
box could become the new gravy container for now because I'm
not trying to go out and get a bunch of cute stuff.
Once in a while I do kind of give my pantry a makeover and
get new canisters and things like that.
But I'm not, I'm in a frugal mode right now.
So I just grabbed this box that had recently become empty
because you know how it is. If you have kids, you know this
like, they'll use the last of something, but then they won't
throw away that empty box. There's a little empty box that
was the perfect size and shape for storing gravies.
So I put the cute basket out, put the eggs in it, and then put
that box on the gravy shelf and put the gravy packets in there.
And by gravies I mean gravy packets and other packets.
Sometimes I get the chili packets for making chili.
Yes, I can make chili completely from scratch without a packet.
But yes, I like using packets. And also, another packet that I
use is the Mojito Lime Chicken Marinade mix.
By the way, my favorite gravies are the McCormick gravies.
OK, this episode's full of product recommendations.
And no, it's not sponsored by any of these.
Hopefully, you've cleared the clutter off of your countertop
and given your dishes time to soak or, you know, get cleaner
due to the spray. Now it's time to complete the
process of washing your dishes. Maybe you need to fill up your
dishwasher and hand wash the rest.
Or maybe all you're doing is hand washing.
OK, but for the next 5 minutes or so I want you to knock those
dishes out. Yes I said 5 minutes because
you've already done the pre treating so it shouldn't take
you that long if it does take longer.
Of course no judgment here. You know maybe you don't work as
quickly as I do or you are facing a dishaster.
Sometimes it does take me a lot longer to do the dishes and I
didn't time myself. Maybe it took longer than 5
minutes. Listen to some music after this
if you need more time. Or you know, phone a friend.
One of my hacks for getting dishes done when I don't feel
like it is just yapping on the phone because it, I, I, it
doesn't even feel like I'm doing dishes.
It's kind of like sometimes when you're driving and you're like,
was I even paying attention? Because I don't even remember
the drive home. You were kind of on autopilot
and you probably were paying attention, but it didn't feel
like you were because something else was going on in your mind
at the same time. That's kind of how it is when
you talk on the phone while doing dishes.
But yesterday after I sprayed the dishes, you know, some of
them I scrubbed out, some I didn't, but I got everything
sprayed with the Dawn power wash.
I loaded as much as I could into the dishwasher.
It was packed pretty full. But you know, obviously do it
strategically. You need to leave space for the
water to flow around and everything.
You know, don't, don't get too crazy with it.
But I put as much as possible into the dishwasher and then I
hand washed the remaining items. The only thing that I felt still
needed some soaking was the crock pot liner.
OK, I did spray it, but I just didn't want to do the work to
really scrub it. So I got down almost to dish
zero other than just the crock pot liner.
But most stuff went into the dishwasher, and then I just
started washing stuff by hand. But this is where my product
recommendation comes into play. It was surprisingly easy to wash
those remaining dishes after I had, you know, put everything
away in the kitchen, cleared the surfaces.
It was surprisingly easy. So I decided I do like this
product. I think what I don't like about
it is they don't put it in a huge container.
So you kind of see the level of the product going down quickly
the more you use. Maybe I just need to have like a
bottle of the liquid in the cupboard so that I'm not feeling
anxiety about running out of the spray, like I've got the backup
liquid or something and then that might make me feel more
generous with the spray. A lot of our cleaning struggles
are about our mindset and that's something I'm going to be
talking about in the bonus episode as well.
Be plugging away at those dishes could have even gone a step
further. If your dishes were heavily
soiled and you had them soaking or you had them sitting out with
the spray on them, you could have also scrubbed your
countertops, your large appliances, your stove top.
I mean, you could have even swept the floor because once
you've wiped down your countertops and stove top and
all of your dishes are just, you know, in the sink area, you
could even sweep at that point. And that would give the product
even more time to do its work. And you could even consider
respraying things before scrubbing them and rinsing them.
The key is just doing things in the proper order and giving the
products time to do their work, but also staying in the kitchen.
What I don't recommend is, you know, and obviously the
exception proves the rule, but in general, I don't recommend
leaving the kitchen. After pre rinsing or spraying
things, exception would be if you know somebody was going to
stop by and come to the door and you know, maybe your priority
was having your living room look good.
You were going to be doing dishes after they left.
So you just thought, well, I'm going to pretreat these.
But when you're not expecting company and you know, doing
things in some certain, you know, order of priority, I think
it's key to stay in the kitchen while things are soaking and
being pretreated and just putting everything away and
cleaning all of your surfaces in the meantime.
It's an efficient way to get your kitchen clean fast.
By the way, I mentioned wiping down your appliances.
If you've got kids or messy cooks or any number of things
can lead to this. You will sometimes get some
build up on the front of your dishwasher or even the outside
of your refrigerator or the outside of your oven.
And this is especially true if you're not spraying and wiping
those daily. So sometimes you need to get an
abrasive sponge and actually scrub before you spray and wipe
the front of your large appliances.
This is not as true with the dishwasher, but I feel like it
happens sometimes with the front or it is true with the
dishwasher. It's not as true like with the
refrigerator because the the stainless steel refrigerator we
have is in kind of a well lit area of the kitchen.
So it would be very noticeable if we did not spray and wipe it
down. But the dishwasher is in a
darker area, shadowy I guess. So sometimes you know, you're
just spraying and wiping it and you're not realizing it needs a
good scrubbing and little fingers are smearing stuff on
it. OK, Hopefully by now you've
gotten your dishes done and you're working on the surfaces
of your kitchen. You know, maybe you want to
start by wiping down your upper cabinets and your large
appliances. You know, maybe some of them
need a scrub. Of course you're going to want
to scrub your stove top countertops.
Clean out your sink. It it's a it's a nice finishing
touch after doing dishes to shine up your sink.
Because the better your sink looks, the less likely you are
to just pile things into the sink.
Just a thought. Obviously, Fly Lady's whole
system was designed. If you've ever listened to her,
she's another cleaning influencer.
Her whole system was designed around shining your sink to kind
of get you out of that rut where you've always got a sink full of
dishes. She viewed shining your sink as
a springboard task. That was the first step in
keeping a cleaner home because that was, you know, an important
part of her journey. After this episode, you're
probably going to want to sweep and mop your kitchen floor or
maybe go over it with a Shark vacuum, something that's good on
hard floors. I guess the lack of product
recommendations stemmed from the fact that years ago when I
started this podcast, I thought that maybe cleaning product
companies were going to sponsor me and you know, I So why would
I provide like free advertising for companies that aren't paying
me? But companies that sponsor
podcasts, they're just very specific companies and they're
not usually cleaning products. Yes, you'll probably hear me
promoting products from time to time that I like, but they might
be betting or those like meal kit services and things like
that. I hope you got a lot done during
this episode. Don't forget the finishing touch
of cleaning your kitchen floor. So thanks to those who are
supporting the show for a small monthly fee or via some other
method. I appreciate you more than you
know. And when you support the show,
you unlock longer episodes. And lately, I don't even always
make a free episode. Sometimes I just make a bonus
episode if I'm pressed for time. So subscribing to bonus content
will ensure that you'll have a weekly, I mean, with few
exceptions. OK, I might get sick.
I might, you know, have an emergency come up.
But you'll, you'll usually get a new episode every single week
and often 2 episodes including the free 1.
So special. Special thanks to those who've
unlocked bonus episodes. But even just listening to the
free content helps me. I realize not everyone's able to
subscribe. I appreciate each and every one
of you. And as always, happy cleaning.
I'll talk to you in the next episode.