Thanks to Christine from I Dream of Clean for sharing a guest post this week while I’m on vacation!

Are you someone who doesn’t like to clean? Who likes to take shortcuts when it comes to maintaining your home?

If you are like 90% of women out there, your answer is a resounding, “yes!” (By the way, I’ve heard it said that 85% of statistics out there are made up on the spot

My personal philosophy is that any shortcut that makes it easier to keep my home clean is a great one.

That’s why I implement daily habits like making up the bed each morning and taking 5 minutes to clean the kitchen every night. It’s also why I organize my house in a way that makes cleaning more efficient. If you’re looking to spend less time cleaning, here are a few organizational suggestions to consider:

Keep all cleaning products in one location.

Instead of keeping a few cleaning products in one bathroom, some in the storage room and others under the kitchen sink, pick one location to keep ALL of cleaning products. Granted, you should probably keep dish detergent in the kitchen and laundry detergent by the washer and dryer. But I’m talking about products used throughout the house. When you’re ready to dust, you don’t want to have to get the furniture polish out from under the kitchen sink and then grab a dusting cloth off the laundry room shelf.

That’s too many steps.

Those will likely deter you from cleaning. At least it does me!

Keep kitchen items together when it makes sense.

My son eats oatmeal every. single. morning. I used to grab a bowl from one cabinet, the oats from another, cinnamon from the spice basket and honey from the pantry. Now I keep all the ingredients together in one cabinet and it saves me about a minute each day.

The same is true for coffee. By keeping the coffee filter and beans beside the coffee pot, it can save valuable time.

The time savings may only a minute but those minutes add up!

Keep office supplies corralled.

How many times have you gone scouring around the house looking for a pen or a piece of paper? If you make it a habit to keep office supplies together (i.e. on the same shelf or in the same box/basket) you’ll always be able to find what you’re looking for.

Keep toys in the kids room.

I’m not saying kids shouldn’t be able to bring their toys into the living areas of the house. They should!

But when toys begin to take over the house, it becomes impossible to keep clean.

We do our best to limit the amount of toys our children have and get rid of those they outgrow. This allows them to enjoy and actually play with the toys they have. And it helps our home stay more organized and doesn’t cause me to spend hours upon hours cleaning up their mess.

Keep purging. And then purge some more.

It’s possible to have a messy home living a minimalist lifestyle. But, more often than not, when your house is a disaster, it’s because there’s too. much. stuff. packed in there!

By making it a habit to purge often, you’ll find that you don’t have to spend as much time cleaning.

THAT makes a busy mom happy!

So, tell me, how do you organize your home to make cleaning more efficient?

Christine blogs at I Dream of Clean.  She has a house full of boys so cleaning up their mess is inevitable. Over the years she’s learned a few tips to make the chore a little more enjoyable and she’d love to share them with you. Give her a month and she’ll help you take 31 days to make cleaning a habit!