If you've ever gotten a call that an unexpected guest was 15
minutes away from your house and they had kind of caught you at a
bad time so you had to spring into action and clean your
house, then you've done this kind of home reset.
In today's episode. We're not going to wash dishes
or anything, but we're going to get your house presentable fast.
And then I'm going to tell you about a new series where you can
get your whole house clean. So let's get right in to this
episode. The first thing I want you to do
is get your house smelling fresh.
Maybe you need to light us in the candle, or turn on your wax
warmer, or even open some windows and take the trash out.
Just spend the next minute or so doing something to get your
house smelling fresh because you don't want to wait until right
before the company arrives to light the candle.
You want to let it permeate. And even if you're not expecting
company, which you probably aren't, having a nice fresh
smelling home will help boost your spirits.
You also might want to open your front blinds or curtains and let
some natural light in so that you'll see if any dusting is
needed. We're not going to obsess on
dusting, but we're just doing kind of the bare minimum to get
your home presentable fast. Once your house is smelling
fresh, the next thing you're going to do is just a 5 minute
pickup. Okay, I'm talking about your
front entrance and your main living area where your where a
guest would sit either your living room or family room and
maybe the hallway that leads them to that room.
If you don't have like a front room right on, you know, on the
front of your house, the name front room.
So you're going to spend the next 5 minutes.
Obviously the most egregious problems are any items on the
floor. You're going to pick up the
floor, then you're going to clear off the couches,
straighten those cushions and throw pillows.
And of course you're going to clear off any clutter from your
coffee table in table and so on. OK, but often it's just a few
things on the floor and straightening those couch
cushions if you do have some extra time because maybe your
front room and entryway is perpetually clean.
Of course you could head to any other high visibility areas.
For example, when I'm expecting company, I always clear off my
kitchen island. That's the area in our home
where people tend to just plot things down.
That's also the work surface where we put our large cutting
board and do our prep work in the kitchen.
So when I'm pressed for time, I will move everything off of the
island to a different countertop that cannot be viewed from the
front door. And you may be saying, Ronnie,
I'm not expecting company right now.
Why are we doing this? Think of this as a training
exercise to show you how quickly you can get your house looking
presentable. This is also going to give you a
quick win, and then you can continue on to some deeper
cleaning tasks. Yes, I'm going to recommend that
you do your dishes and clean the kitchen after this episode, but
right now we're just getting your house looking presentable.
Just that surface level cleaning in those first impression areas.
We're going to spend just a few more minutes in your main living
area or front entrance. If you really are expecting
guests, check your front porch too.
Sometimes there's some glaring issue on your front porch.
For example, we live in a super windy area and leaves will just
pile up right at our front door where people would step in those
leaves before coming in. So we definitely have to either
rake those or sweep those away. But I'm assuming that most of
you are not cleaning for guests. I just wanted to explain to you
kind of the thinking behind this type of of home reset and the
fact that it focuses on those first impression high visibility
areas. And this could also be something
you might do if maybe time slipped away from you and your
spouse is on their way home and you want to make a good
impression. OK, yes, I have an episode on
cleaning for yourself instead of your spouse.
But sometimes, let's face it, we realize our spouse is about to
get home and we want them to walk into a clean house.
No, that shouldn't be your primary motivation for cleaning.
It's got to come from within, and you're not always going to
get recognition from someone else when you clean.
So you want to become a type of person who cares how your house
looks, not just when someone's coming over?
Again, I just mentioned company to explain kind of what we're
going to focus on. Because if you thought you were
going to reset your whole house in 15 minutes, you're wrong.
OK? It takes longer than that.
By the way, I just made an episode called Whole House Reset
for subscribers. So if you subscribe on Apple,
Spotify or Patreon, you'll have access to that Whole House
episode which will have your whole house looking presentable
at once. Hopefully by now you've gotten
that front room and entryway picked up.
Let's move on to your kitchen. We're not going to clean the
kitchen. We're not even going to go
gather up dirty dishes from the back bedrooms.
OK? Right now we're just focusing on
those first impression areas. So what you're going to do is
consolidate the dishes to the sink area if they're spread
around the kitchen or you know, on your kitchen table.
Basically, get those dishes into the sink and maybe get any
difficult items soaking, but have them soaking down in the
sink. I want you to have that quick
win of feeling like your whole house looks good.
So a lot of times I tell you to set a pot that's soaking next to
the sink. No, we're going to get
everything down into the sink, OK?
And then if there's any area of your kitchen that can be seen
from your front door or your main living area, let's focus on
that section of countertop and get that cleared off, even if it
means just moving the stuff to another location.
Better yet, put things away where they go.
But we're only going to be working on this segment for a
few more minutes. OK, Maybe there's some kind of a
glaring problem in your kitchen. A pot of chili that you left on
the stove from last night. You don't want someone to walk
in and ask you, oh, it smells good in here, what are you
cooking? Only to find out that that's the
smell of a dirty pot that you didn't deal with.
Something like that definitely needs to get pre rinsed, filled
up with hot soapy water. By the way, in a lot of episodes
I tell you guys to use the the cascade platinum pods as a
secret weapon when you have like baked on food in a pot or a pan.
But I recently found out that it can be dangerous to pull them
apart when they get stuck together because of how alkaline
it is or something it can get in your eyes.
It's never happened to me, but I just wanted to kind of throw
that out there. This is not sponsored or
anything obviously, but I do like, I do like dropping those
pods in to a difficult item to kind of to kind of supercharge
that soaking session. And the way I keep them from
sticking together because I already didn't want them to
stick together and like come apart is I, I buy the bigger
boxes of them. They come in a nice plastic box
when you buy a larger number of the pods and then it's in kind
of a waterproof container. Because I found that when I was
keeping them in the little bags, sometimes the bags tipped over
and the pods ended up falling into the sink and getting wet.
So even when I want to buy a small bag of them, just because,
you know, money is tighter, whatever, I, I always keep that
box and then pour them into the box.
So just a little safety tip there.
Don't have your kids working with those pods.
They can be a little bit dangerous if they burst open
while you're handling them. Basically, Hopefully by now
you've consolidated any mess in your kitchen.
The next thing I want you to do is head to your guest bathroom.
You're probably going to need a few cleaning products.
I'm talking maybe a glass and surface cleaner and a micro
fiber cloth and some paper towels because this is not a
disinfecting session or anything.
This is just a quick bathroom touch up.
When I'm doing a bathroom touch up, I only focus on about the
bottom third of the mirror because that's where those water
spots spots are from the splashing.
You know, you don't always have to clean your entire mirror,
especially when you're doing a quick touch up just to get your
bathroom company ready. So you're going to focus on
spraying and wiping down the bottom part of your mirror, your
faucet, your sink area. You're going to grab any clutter
that doesn't belong on your bathroom vanity area and stash
that away. You're going to wipe the toilet
seat and the rim. I do appreciate those of you who
are listening on Spotify and you keep the video open because that
does help me when you don't minimize the video.
But of course I want you to be working while you listen.
OK, so like I mentioned, you're going to clean the seat and also
the rim because, you know, men lift that seat and they're going
to see if that room is clean or not, right?
So let's do that quick touch up of of the toilet.
And of course, you know, like I mentioned, the vanity and sink
area. And then of course, turn your
attention to the bathroom blower, pick up any towels,
stray laundry, anything like that.
If it's a small bathroom, you could even use that glass and
surface spray to quickly spray and wipe down that bathroom
floor. But you probably don't need to
go that far right now. If, especially if you've been
listening to my show and you're cleaning your bathroom on a
regular basis, you mainly just need to pick it up during this
quick bathroom rescue. OK, the last step is to check
for any areas in your living, living room or front entrance
that need dusting, any just super dusty surfaces.
Sometimes you know you want to grab a microfiber cloth with a
tiny bit of water on it and just dust your TV screen because that
might be a focal point for your guests.
OK, but what's going to have the most impact, because I know you
dust probably on a regular basis, is to quickly vacuum your
front entrance, your main living area, and any hallway they might
see. Obviously I don't know the floor
plan of your house, but when I'm expecting guests, I vacuum my
living room, entryway, and hallway because I've got just
one hallway and if my kitchen island is cleared off, they're
not going to see any mess in the kitchen.
OK, I realize you might have a different layout so your
priorities are slightly different, but I kind of created
this session with my own house in mind because everything I
just mentioned is literally what I do when I'm doing an emergency
15 minute home reset for whatever reason.
OK, you fill in the blanks there.
While you're vacuuming, I want to tell you about my upcoming
series, Crawling Out of the Hole, which is a six day
recovery plan for those of you who are struggling with either
getting your house clean or keeping it clean, that series is
for you if you want to get your whole house clean in the course
of a week. But if you feel like you can get
it clean in an hour, the Whole house Reset for subscribers is
for you. You can unlock both these longer
whole house sessions and these crawling out of the whole
sessions that focus on just one area for like 40 minutes by
subscribing to bonus content. For a very small monthly fee,
you can unlock these longer episodes and get on the full
program and get your whole house presentable.
And if you're listening on Spotify or Apple Podcasts, these
episodes are already being advertised to you.
You can also access them through a Patreon subscription.
And I'll put all the links in the description of this episode.
And I realize your house might be bigger than mine and you
might need a little bit more time to vacuum these key areas.
And if your guest or your spouse hasn't arrived yet, I, I
encourage you to go ahead and tackle the dishes after you've
vacuumed and wipe down those kitchen surfaces and maybe even
sweep or mop your kitchen floor. Most of my episodes do cover the
kitchen toward the beginning of the episode.
But again, to be on my full program, you need to subscribe.
But just listening to these three episodes helps me too.
So I appreciate each and every one of you.
And as always, happy cleaning. I'll talk to you in the next
episode.