Preparations begin again

Owner Questions, Advice & Chat
1

Exactly 2.5 weeks to go until our sitters arrive. Had to start a bit earlier this time as we are gone next weekend to a wedding, so we lose a few days there.

Last week I scrubbed the oven, toaster oven. Wiped down the baseboards downstairs and cleaned some stuff marks on the bathroom wall (how do those get there in the first place LOL).

This week is the big p.i.t.a of a job: our big sectional sofa in the living room. Hubby disconnected it today and vacuumed underneath it, and under all the cushions. We eat and snack a lot on the sofa so those little crumbs do accumulate.

Tomorrow I get to start the fun job of steam cleaning the sofa cushions and living room rug. It takes a few days as I have to do it piecemeal to give cushions time to dry so we still have places to sit.

This weekend will be organize / make space in the pantry and clean out the fridge, including pulling out all the shelves and running them through the dishwasher. Then same with the freezer.

Next week (short week as we leave on Thursday for the wedding) I’ll wash all the guest room linens and towels, as well as give the dog a nice trimming and bath.

When we get back the following Sunday, we’ll just do the normal cleaning: vacuum/mop floors, dusting, wipe kitchen surfaces. Brush off the dog again (she is a fur-manufacturing machine). Clean the guest bathroom and tidy up everything upstairs. Do a final shop for anything needed for the welcome dinner. Sitters arrive that Thursday evening but we are leaving Monday (they asked if they could come a few days early and we accommodated), so we have a couple of days to get our packing done before we depart.

I checked with them today and they have no dietary restrictions, so I will make a welcome dinner of turkey lasagna, salad, and steamed broccoli. Maybe some vegetable soup to start with but only if I have time, otherwise I think there is plenty of food without it. Homemade fruit cobbler for dessert with ice cream. It went over well with the last sitter so we can go to it again…

It’s work but we love how clean the place looks by the time they get here. Frankly if we had no sitters we’d procrastinate forever :rofl:

12 Likes
2

As a sitter who works herself to a neurotic crisp cleaning for the HOs’ return…. Whatever state the house was in to start with… Thankyou for reassuring me I’m not alone in my neurosis.

That aside, you sound like perfect HOs. I might just be a bit worried, though, that you’d expect the same level of excellence in return.. :-/

5 Likes
3

Nope. It takes awhile for dust on things like baseboards and crumbs under the sofa to accumulate so once it’s clean like this, it’s good for a few months. Sitters just have to do basic clean up after themselves then (wipe surfaces, mop if needed, clean dishes, take out trash). We have a robot vacuum they can run when they head out.

It just so happens we host sitters 2-3 times a year so we use it as the trigger for us to stop procrastinating:)

7 Likes
4

I would like to hire you to clean my house. And then I would like to house sit for you and eat all the delicious homemade food. You guys really are going above and beyond! :black_heart:

10 Likes
5

No, you definitely wouldn’t want us as housecleaners. Cause it would look sparkling 2 times a year, then, um, more ‘regular’ LOL.

Come on over, I love to hostess. If you’re in SoCal stop by, I’ll whip you up a nice lasagna :drooling_face:

4 Likes
6

Plus, these sitters are here for 3.5 weeks. So we want them to settle in and enjoy!

4 Likes
7

I had a [non THS] sitter at the weekend. By the time I tidied up for her, I was regretting going away - I should stay home and enjoy my clean and tidy house :smiley:

13 Likes
8

I know, right!!!

1 Like
9

This is why we live clean and tidy all the time and stagger cleaning everything, so it always feels easy. To me, clean and tidy feels luxurious and I see it as part of self-care. Our house is never cleaner for guests than for ourselves.

2 Likes
10

It’s not quite the same situation as house guests don’t leave public ratings and comments on your home’s cleanliness (or at least it would be super awkward if they did).

It’s more akin to getting a home ready for sale and showings. That type of cleaning.

1 Like
11

We’re exactly the same. Our rule is that we live daily how we like to stay in hotels with everything ‘just so’. We have only been able to do this since retiring, but it feels good.

3 Likes
12

Even in that case it’s still not the same. You don’t need to empty out sections of your fridge, freezer and cupboards if cleaning for yourself or houseguests, for example. House guests aren’t going to feeding and caring for your pets so no need for an up-to-date welcome guide, or making sure you have enough food, treats, and chews to cover a month, plus some extra for when you get home. That kind of stuff is unique to house sitting.

It’s different than an Air BNB as well since the visitors there are transient - no one is living there full time and vacating for a few weeks (or at least not most Air BNBs).

Probably the closest is really getting a home ready for sale or rental viewings. Even then it’s different as you don’t have to consider about space for their food and things, not about pet needs.

13

Im with Maggie and Bonny , im happiest when my ‘fridge is sparkling and organized and my couch has no crumbs! I keep my house in beauty and order, as it makes me feel good. I was a house cleaner throughout grad school, I love a clean spacious home. Just am happy that way, not for anyone else’s reasons. My house cleaner does surface cleaning bimonthly, I do “ deep” cleaning on a daily basis, yet don’t find it interfering with my full and active life. Different strokes… remember “ you do you?”

3 Likes
14

Of course, hosts have to decide whether it’s worth the effort. And how clean they keep their homes and how much cleaning is needed will differ. My most recent sits for instance included pristine homes and those hosts said they’d had regular cleaners in before I arrived. However they normally keep house, whether cleaners and/or themselves, it worked.

Personally, I don’t need a sit home to be turnkey-home-selling ready. I’m just there temporarily as a sitter.

Our own home preference wise, we have listed our houses in the past without needing extra cleaning. Yet our real estate agents have always described our homes as turnkey. I could list today and not do any extra cleaning before showing. That’s just how we choose to live.

Everyone’s mileage will differ and how much cleaning they want or need to do will differ.

1 Like
15

Of course, everyone can live as they choose in their own homes, of course.

Frankly I don’t clean sofas, ovens, cabinets, ceiling fans, baseboards, etc daily but hey, if that’s what you like go for it. Everyone can live how they please.

I’m just pointing out that many aren’t quite that detailed everyday, so preparation for a sitter may require more effort.

Edited to add: it is everyone’s choice how they love, but personally I wouldn’t be happy if my home looked like a hotel or a ready to sell place. That feels cold to me, as I look around my living room this evening, we have blankets everywhere the dog likes to lay, my hubby’s puzzle is half finished on the dining room table. The nail trimmers are left on the table to recharge after I trimmed my puo’s nails. There are books and catalogs on the side tables. Mail is on another end table, to sort through later. Some packages are on the table by the door, we’ll open them tomorrow or the next day. My pup has her toys scattered about the floor, and some dust bunnies have grown under the table under the TV. We have jackets slung over the dining room table chairs. I’m pretty sure something expired loves in my fridge but it doesn’t smell and hasn’t grown legs so it’s good. To me, that’s home. I do not want to live in a hotel, hotels are not home, and it feels too sterile for me. I love life’s little everyday messes.

I should do some laundry tomorrow but I may just wait till the next day, cause my pup was a !!superstar!! on her therapy dog shift at the hospital today (we sat with a grown man who cried for a good 20 minutes hugging her, and she just sat next to himcalm and steady, like she was saying it’s gonna be ok…) and its more important that we go to the beach tomorrow so she can run and swim free to let off some of that steam (she does feel it when we leave, kinda like humans take work stress with them out of the office). And yes she’ll get sandy and muddy make the car dirty and require a rinse off at home. Meh, the fun is worth it. And maybe we won’t even clean the sand out of car till the weekend, oh the horror :rofl:

4 Likes
16

Yawn! We spent the day w our two dogs at a remote beach, came home, rinsed em off and still have a beautiful clean home to enjoy for bbq. Yawn. You do you.

1 Like
17

That’s all fine, I think the yawn comment was snarky and unnecessary, but yes you do you then.

Also if we can all do as we please, no need to keep harping on your squeaky clean home? Just go clean then?

1 Like
18

We weren’t always like this, but we are nowadays mainly to being retired though I think, and living very differently to when we worked. I also think we changed when we saw how our daughter in law managed her home and how nice it was to live in that way. It took a few months changing our habits, in that we now complete all the loops (is how our DiL describes it). Every event/task has a start a middle and an ending.
A messy home is one with lots of incomplete or concurrent loops. So the answer is to always finish the event loop in the now. The endings usually involve putting back to how it was before starting the ‘event’. My DiL is a Chemist and my son is a Physicist… so they think about things differently maybe.

2 Likes
19

Is there somewhere I can learn this? :grin:

I feel sure my life would be much easier if I did it too!

20

Google and you’ll find a bunch of approaches.

For me, it was a practice I built starting as a kid, because I’ve always liked order and cleanliness. My parents would return from work and find that I’d done cleaning and tidying every day, without being asked, once we kids were old enough to be left at home. We had a small place, so it was easy to stay on top of.

Context wise: We kids always worked in our family shop well before then — doing all sorts of cleaning and other chores. That’s common among many immigrant kids with families who run small businesses. All of our family friends’ kids did likewise.

For my husband and me, we started sharing housework as soon as we began living together, when I was a college intern more than three decades ago. He was raised by a single mom to be highly self-sufficient, doing cooking, cleaning, etc., so we’ve never struggled with sharing duties/chores. (One of the many reasons I appreciate my wonderful late mother-in-law.)

This is an example of mindful cleaning (I am Asian and a clean, tidy home feels like a calm Zen garden to me):

IMG_8307
IMG_8307797×1970 317 KB

2 Likes