My in-laws are coming to visit! We’re very excited to see them, since we haven’t been able to hang out with them since July. But despite the fact that we don’t live in a sty to begin with and that they wouldn’t really care one way or the other, this means that I will spend my entire week cleaning.
You can’t neglect to clean your house when your in-laws are planning to visit you. A clean house is one of the best ways to show respect to your guests, no matter who they are. You can show that you respect them after they show up by moving the pile of trash off of the chair so they have a place to sit down, but it’s a better idea to have it gone before they arrive.
In the past, I have made a list (in my head, admittedly) of all the tasks I plan to complete before the arrival of my guests. Sometimes it’s hard to see what needs to be done, like looking at that shelf covered in stuff that’s been sitting there for the past three months... So? What about it? It’s fine, right? Oh no wait, it’s covered in random stuff. I should probably find an actual place for that blanket that’s not on top of those magazines. Anyway, I look around to decide what I need to do, and the next step is when I plan to do them in some kind of order. Hang on, I have to roll on the floor laughing for a second.
Okay, I’m back.
So I plan to do these things in order. I think, “okay, first I’ll tackle the laundry, then I’ll get the closet in order, then the dishes...” and what actually happens is that I start on the laundry and then forget that I was doing it because my kids distract me or I look at the kitchen counter and think that I really should scrub it off really well while I’m thinking about it or whatever. So then I go ahead and start on the closet but I remember that I’m not finished with the laundry so I go back to that, and get almost finished when it’s time to make dinner but I haven’t touched the dishes yet, so I drop everything and do them while remembering that while I make dinner I should make sure to wipe off the counter quickly if I accidentally spill anything because I just scrubbed it really well earlier and it would be a shame if it got dirty again so soon. And at the end of the day I have about two actually finished tasks and four or so half finished ones and another that I didn’t even start on.
Today, I’m going to go ahead and make my list. But I’m not going to plan to do them in any order, since they won’t get done that way anyway. I’m going to let myself snowball from one thing to another. Maybe that way I’ll have more tasks done at the end of the day.
The final step of the process is to forget something. I always do, whether it’s cleaning tiny hand prints off of every mirror in the house or forgetting to arrange the couch cushions so they’re all facing the same way. Hopefully this time it won’t be something big.
I should at least get the living room cleaned really well so that when my mother-in-law gets here she’ll have a place to sit that’s not covered in baby toys.
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