Thanks for joining me. In today's episode, I'm going to
talk you through cleaning a bathroom and I'm also going to
discuss the concept of setting aside time to clean.
I know I've been talking a lot about cleaning as you go, but
another component to keeping a clean house is carving out a
designated time to clean. Let's get right into the
episode. It's time to gear up for your
bathroom cleaning session. One of the first things I want
you to do is get something into your toilet bowl and give it a
swish. Lift the seat, grab whatever you
use to clean the toilet, apply that to the toilet bowl, and
then take your toilet scrubbing brush to make sure that you've
coated the entire toilet bowl. OK.
That way, we can allow that cleaning product to do its work
while we turn our attention to other aspects of cleaning the
bathroom. I know my previous episode was
not a video version. I was feeling a little under the
weather and and it was just, there was a lot going on in my
house and it was just easier for me to record some more quieter
where I didn't have a camera set up and whatnot.
Once you get the toilet bowl coated with whatever you're
using today, whether it's a dedicated toilet bowl cleaner or
you're just sprinkling in a bleach powder like Comet or
Ajax, it's time to take out the bathroom trash.
Nothing says a messy bathroom like an overflowing wastebasket
or a wastebasket that's in danger of overflowing.
Let's empty that wastebasket and reline it.
And of course, if there's anything around the trash
tissues that didn't make it in or whatever, let's get those
picked up. You know, if you're squeamish
about it or whatever, you know, use some toilet paper as a glove
or wear some actual gloves. But let's pick up any debris
around the wastebasket area and get it emptied out and relined.
You might even want to clean your wastebasket.
If so, just set it aside and maybe take it outside and power
wash it after the episode. But some of you just need to do
a quick empty and reline of your bathroom wastebasket and I
realized I might be able to talk faster than you can clean.
You can always pause the episode if you want, but you don't have
to be cleaning and sync with the episode so to speak.
Just as long as you're moving and generally doing the things
that I'm saying, it's OK if it's a step takes you longer or you
finish a step before I do so to speak.
Not that I'm cleaning along, but some people assume that since
it's called clean with me that I'm cleaning while I'm recording
and I do a few episodes like that, but more often than not,
I'm just sitting and talking to you.
You're cleaning with me in the sense that you're cleaning along
with the sound of my voice, just like on ATV show or a radio
show. They might say thanks for
joining me. They don't mean that you're
literally joining them in the studio.
So just some clarification there.
But for financial supporters, I do sometimes clean in real time
on the bonus episodes. For example, there's a
refrigerator cleaning episode and just be gathering up your
cleaning supplies and pre cleaning the bathroom while I
talk. But there is a refrigerator
episode, for example, where I'm cleaning in real time.
And there are also some older episodes like that even
available to the general public. So if you are interested in
listening to an episode where I was talking and cleaning in real
time, I do have a few episodes like that.
Hopefully by now you're gathering up your cleaning
supplies. You need something for cleaning
the glass. You need a micro fiber cloth or
paper towels or even newspaper. My method of choice is to clean
the bathroom mirror with a micro fiber cloth, which I often
attach to the end of a Swiffer mop to make it even easier.
OK, and then you need either a glass cleaner or glass and
surface cleaner. Then you also need something for
cleaning the exterior parts of the toilet, whether it's
disinfecting wipes or paper towels and some kind of a spray,
or maybe you clean with actual rags and some other product.
Just whatever you use to clean the exterior parts of the
toilet, your vanity area and the sink, the faucets, the mirror.
Let's get those cleaning products together and cleaning
tools like rags and whatnot. Once you get everything
together, you're going to need to do what I call the pre clean.
You're going to need to clear out all of the obstacles.
This could include bath mats or bathroom rugs.
It could include anything that's been left on your bathroom
floor. Perhaps there's dirty laundry,
towels, items that have been dropped and forgotten about.
Let's get that bathroom floor cleared.
And of course, let's clear off the vanity of everything.
There might be items on your vanity that don't belong there,
and also some others that do. So maybe you need to put things
away in a drawer or cupboard and then just set some other things
aside, like your toothbrush holders and your soap dispenser.
And the thing, you know, the things that actually go on your
vanity perpetually, even those need to be moved aside for when
you're spraying your cleaning products.
Sometimes cleaning the bathroom can feel daunting because you're
keeping a lot of clutter on your vanity.
This happens a lot in a bathroom that's shared by multiple people
or maybe a master bathroom that no one ever sees.
There can be a tendency to kind of spread things out.
I definitely recommend having a place for everything and maybe
even having trays or baskets to kind of corral this stuff if you
do need to keep a lot of stuff out so that you can quickly move
those items aside to clean. But let's get all of those
obstacles out of the way. And during this pre clean stage,
you might also want to check the inside of your bathtub or shower
to see if you need to toss any empty containers.
OK, once you've gotten everything out of the way and
you have all of your cleaning products ready, it's time to
work on the vanity area. Once I get the toilet bowl
soaking like we did at the beginning, I like to turn my
attention to the vanity area. I'm talking about scrubbing out
the sink, cleaning that, cleaning the actual countertop
part of the vanity, the hardware, and then spraying and
wiping down the mirror. And in case you're new to the
show, my little hack for cleaning the bathroom mirror
that I'm super excited about is attaching a micro fiber cloth to
the Swiffer mop. You know how it has these little
holes where you shove the pre moistened cloth into the four
corners to attach it? If you've ever used a Swiffer,
you know what I'm talking about. And maybe you're using a
different brand that works the same way.
Well instead of attaching that pre moistened pad for mopping
the floor, I attach a dry microfiber cloth in that same
way. And then I spray the mirror with
a glass cleaner and mop the mirror.
And even if you're not mopping your mirror, let's say you're
just using the micro fiber cloth.
The secret to cleaning glass and mirrors is to wipe them longer
than you think you need to because you're spraying on a
glass cleaner and wiping it off and it looks like it's gone.
And a lot of people stop there. But you need to continue to wipe
after it is dry or appears dry to remove any streaks.
That's the secret to that street reshine.
But I've just found that I'm better at it when I'm using that
mop because it applies the perfect amount of pressure and
it's very systematic. And I love it for mopping my my
master bathroom mirror because it's a huge mirror and there's a
lot of natural sunlight that shines on it.
So it's very unforgiving. I could be wiping down that
mirror and then I walk away and look at it at a different angle
and I'm going to see streaks unless I do that mop method.
So that's that's the hack of the day.
I should have, I should have had that Swiffer mop with me.
For those of you who are watching the video version, I
need to remember to do that next time I do a bathroom cleaning
episode. But I do have a little
demonstration on my Instagram and on my TikTok.
I think it's on my personal Instagram now.
Don't forget to follow me on social media.
There's going to be a link in the bio that has all the things,
the different links for my social media accounts, ways to
unlock bonus episodes and ways to purchase products.
OK, believe it or not, I am a Mary Kay beauty consultant.
It's not something I spend a lot of time on, but this is the skin
care I use and I joined for the discount, so it does help me
financially if you purchase Mary Kay skin care products through
my link. And of course, I also have
Amazon links to cleaning products, and as an Amazon
affiliate, I earn a small Commission from your purchases
of those. And then of course, supporting
the show by unlocking bonus episodes helps me greatly.
A way to help me without spending a dime is to give this
podcast a five star rating on whichever app you're listening
on. And of course, follow me on
whichever social media accounts you're already on.
Like, let's say you're not a TikTok person, but you're on
Facebook. Follow the show on Facebook or
follow it on Instagram. Anyway.
Hopefully by now you've cleaned your sink and vanity area and
faucet and mirror. The next thing I want you to do
is turn your attention to the bathtub or shower.
We don't always clean those in the bathroom cleaning episodes
because like I told you, I often clean the bathtub and shower
separately from my regular bathroom cleaning sessions.
But when I'm combining them, what I do is I get the bathtub
wet and the bottom of the shower wet.
I'm just going to talk as if I were cleaning my master bathroom
that has both A to band a shower, but I realize you might
be cleaning, you know, just a bathtub shower combo or just a
stand up shower. But I get those wet and then I
sprinkle some Comet or Ajax when I'm feeling flush.
I use the scrubbing bubbles products in the bathroom.
But lately I've been in kind of frugal mode.
So I'm I'm sprinkling some Comet in there, but on the shower
floor and then the bathtub, the bottom of it and the sides.
I like to use a 32 ounce cup when I'm cleaning the bathtub
because it makes it easier for me to rinse the sides after I've
scrubbed them. And then I use the Scotch Sprite
shower scrubbing tool. So once I've got the bathtub wet
and sprinkled the Comet around the bottom and sides, I take
that tool, which gives me some leverage.
It's a scrubbing tool on a pole and I scrub the sides and bottom
of the tub. When I go to rinse it, I'm going
to just stick the 32 ounce cup under the faucet and then pour
that to rinse the tub with the shower.
The rinsing is a little bit easier because it it sprays
right into the bottom of the shower, so you just rinse it
with the with the shower head. But I've found that when I'm
cleaning my garden tub that does not have a shower attached, the
cup really comes in handy for rinsing.
And even at a previous house where I had a bathtub shower
combo, I like to use a cup for rinsing the tub because the
shower head didn't point exactly where I wanted it to point.
OK, but we're just doing a quick scrub of those crucial areas.
The entire inside of your bathtub and your shower floor.
And remember when I talked about mopping the mirror?
The way I clean the shower walls, the shower doors is the
same way. I use that Swiffer tool.
But in that case, in the case of the shower walls, I actually
attach the pre moistened mop pad and I use that to clean the tile
of my shower walls. And I also have tile walls in my
bathtub shower combo in the kids bathroom and I clean the tiles
the same way in there. Oftentimes.
I mean, I mix it up a little bit.
Sometimes I'm, you know, taking a shower, cleaning the shower
walls by hand. But when I'm cleaning from the
outside, I often mop the shower walls.
OK, but sometimes I'm just cleaning the inside of the tub,
the actual tub basin that needs to be super sanitary because
people take a bath in there. Sometimes I'm just cleaning that
with the Comet and the scrubbing tool and then rinsing it and
then doing the same with scrubbing the shower floor
because another option for shower walls is to use a daily
shower spray. So just a thought there.
But of course you need to scrub the floor.
That's what's going to get dirty and discolored in a shower.
OK. And you want to keep it
sanitary. You know, what if someone in
your family has athlete's foot or something, I don't know.
But you want to definitely use a bleach product to scrub the
shower floor. OK, I'm going to give you a
couple more minutes to quickly scrub the inside of your bathtub
basin and rinse it, or to scrub your shower floor.
Or if you have time, maybe you're cleaning the shower walls
as well, but that could always be done in a different session.
But I wanted to talk about the concept of setting aside time
while you're working on those showers.
And of course, when you're done with the shower or bathtub,
you're going to clean all the exterior parts of the toilet.
The seat behind the seat, the rim, the hinge area, the
exterior part of the bowl, the floor around it, the flusher
handle, the back of the tank. You know what the exterior parts
of your toilet are. And then you're going to give
the inside of it another scrub now that the chemical has had
time to do its work. And then you're going to sweep
and mop your way out of the bathroom.
You always want to end with the floor, whether you're doing it
by hand or with a broom and mop. OK, so that's what's ahead.
But while you're finishing up with those tasks, I wanted to
talk about setting aside time to clean.
Obviously, we try to clean as we go.
Hopefully you're doing dishes after meals or at least once a
day after dinner or just before bed, for example.
And maybe you've even gotten into the habit of putting things
away as you're getting ready in the bathroom and giving that
manatee A swipe, You know, doing bathroom touch ups in between
deeper cleans. And maybe you've gotten good
about putting your clothes in the hamper or making your bed
when you get out of it, or not leaving a room empty handed.
And you know, in that way, keeping your living areas tidy.
Those are all great habits, but none of us are going to be
perfect in every area. We can't control everyone in our
family. We might have little ones, we
might have pets, we might have situations where we just don't
have time to clean in the morning.
I remember years ago during an era where we went to a Sunday
morning service and a Sunday evening service, my kids would
often want to have a friend over between the church services.
Like someone who went to church with us would come out to lunch
with us and then spend the afternoon at our house.
And then we bring them back to church for the evening service.
And I remember I always needed a little bit of advance notice for
that because when we would cook breakfast in the morning before
church, we would just leave an aftermath because I would be
making sure everyone looked presentable for church.
And cleaning the breakfast mess was the last thing on my mind
unless I knew we were going to be having a guest over.
And then I'd have to get up super early to make sure that I
was able to clean up after the breakfast mess.
Or I might take a shortcut and get Donuts and try to avoid
making a breakfast mess. So breakfast messed on a church
morning is an example of a time where maybe you're not cleaning
as you go. And you might have other
examples like that. Maybe you do a breakfast before
work and you're not able to do the dishes because let's face
it, we only want to get up so early.
And we all have different priorities.
And I'm sure there are situations where you're letting
things slide. You know, maybe when you get
ready in the morning, you try on a few outfits and kind of mess
up your room and the process. Also, even when we're cleaning
as we go, we don't tend to deep clean.
I mean, are you really, you know, removing those stove
burners and cleaning those burner trays at night after
cooking? Maybe not.
So I encourage you to have at least one time per week that you
do some deep cleaning. You know, maybe you could deep
clean half of your house one week and then half of your house
the next. That's where those longer bonus
episodes come in. For those longer cleaning
sessions where you have 30 minutes or an hour to do some
deeper cleaning in your home and not that you have to be
listening to an episode to deep clean, you might have other
podcasts that you listen to while you clean.
You could listen to one of my episodes and then listen to
something on a different topic to to finish out the cleaning
session. Of course, I don't make enough
episodes for all the cleaning you should probably be doing
unless you're cleaning along with free runs.
OK, you don't always need to be working with a current episode.
Some of you have not gotten back and listened to the older
episodes. So if you crave novelty and you
want a fresh episode to listen to, you could always go back and
listen to some of those older episodes.
Hopefully by now you've scrubbed out a bathtub, a shower, or
both, and you're cleaning the exterior parts of the toilet,
giving that bowl another scrub. If it still has discoloration,
you might need to scrub it with a pumice stone on a handle,
especially if you have hard water.
Get that toilet full sparkling clean and then wipe the exterior
parts of the toilet. You got to get down on your
hand, the knees for that part and clean the floor around it
because when you mop, the mop's not going to get behind the
toilet or whatever. So that's why it's always a good
idea to clean your floor around the toilet bowl while you're
cleaning the exterior parts of your toilet.
And I always say this, but when it's a small bathroom, I like to
use the pre moistened mop pads that are designed to attach to
the Swiffer. I use those to clean the
bathroom by hand and I bathroom floor by hand in a small
bathroom. And I do it in much the same way
that one would wipe up crumbs from the counter after making a
sandwich where you're kind of grabbing up debris.
And that way you can sweep and mop in one fell swoop.
In a small bathroom, it's a little shortcut.
In my larger bathroom, I sweep things into a dustpan and then I
mop in a separate step. But that's my little hat for
cleaning a tiny bathroom floor, just doing it by hand in one
fell swoop. OK, I'm going to give you just a
couple more minutes to basically mop your way out of the bathroom
or wipe your way out of the bathroom.
I realized that you might need to sweep first or you might be
doing it all by hand, but I encourage you.
I know it's busy this time of year, especially if you have
kids in school and you're dealing with end of the year
activities, but I encourage you to listen to a bonus episode
sometime this week and do some deeper cleaning in your home,
OK? You'd be surprised how much you
can get done in an hour, especially if you focus on the
areas of of your home that need the most work.
And if you don't have an hour to dedicated to deep clean of
court, deep cleaning, of course you can listen to individual
episodes like this one, you know, focus on the bathroom one
day, the kitchen the next, all while maintaining those daily
habits of trying not to make a huge mess in between deeper
cleaning sessions. By the way, I'm going to make a
bonus episode soon about traveling, what to do before a
trip as far as your house, preparing your house, doing some
packing, and just kind of some money saving hacks for traveling
this summer. So be sure to subscribe to the
bonus content for a small monthly fee.
Special thanks to those who've already done so and to, of
course, to anyone who has supported the show in any way.
Even following me on social media helps.
Thank you so much for listening. I hope your bathroom is
sparkling clean. Don't forget to put it back
together. Put those rugs back in there if
you're not washing them today. And you know, arrange your
toothbrush holder and soap dispenser and other items on the
bathroom counter. Hang up some fresh towels.
Make sure there's plenty of toilet paper and other products
in stock. Thank you so much for listening.
I appreciate each and everyone of you.
And as always, happy cleaning. I'll talk to you in the next
episode.