That Time We Talked About Spring Cleaning

This is episode number 32 of The Homeowner Show. Whether you're DIY or looking to hire, we're here to help you find the best information and options for you and your home. My name is Kevin Hackett, and here with me is Craig Williams.

Hello, hello, hello, and welcome to The Homeowner Show. We are really excited that you guys could be with us today. We are stoked about what we get to talk about. But if you have not had the chance yet, please go ahead and hit the subscribe button there on iTunes, Stitcher. I don't know, what are you using these days, Kev?

Well, there's Google Play.

Uh-huh.

Yeah. YouTube is actually going to start kicking up here a little bit.

You have some pressing Homeowner Show news updates to present the peoples?

Really long story short, I had to get a new computer.

Yeah.

And so some of that's been delayed, but I got another one going up tomorrow. So we're gonna be pushing some, some content through YouTube soon.

So the YouTube channel is a-flowing with the, the ugly mugs of Kevin and Craig.

It is what it is.

Yep. He's ugly.

Yep.

Nothing you can do about it, folks.

Nope.

The content is amazing though.

That's right.

That's right.

Well, Easter is behind us. That's right. Yeah.

See you spring.

Yeah, so spring is in the air and, uh, you know, lots of people, uh, needing to try to get some things done around their house and maybe even some bee removal. I don't know if you know anything about that, Craig.

Let me tell you, man, it was a rough 3 days.

Let me just tell you this, if you're not friends with Craig on Facebook, you need to go find Craig on Facebook, friend him. He might He might accept your friend request.

I send all the good vibes.

And he put up a video of something special. He was imitating Forrest Gump. Not Forrest, he was imitating Bubba.

I feel like I'm being doxxed a little bit right now.

Oh dude, it was hilarious.

Let me tell you guys a little something. I mean, if you haven't— I mean, if you've been listening to this show for a while, you've probably figured out I have a pest control business, which is inroad to knowing a little bit about the service industry. And so we, we were out at a customer's house doing a bee relocation for these folks. And, and the reason we were doing a bee relocation is because we made a decision in our business about 4 or 5 years ago, uh, not to kill any more bees. Uh, it's just an ethical decision that we made on our— in our business to, you know, suck it up, make a little bit less money, do jobs a little bit

harder, and do the right thing. Um, and so this, this was a particularly difficult I don't even know how to describe them. They're like cones that are in—

Like a honeycomb?

Not a comb, but a cone. They're these cable TV junction boxes that are in some people's yards. They look kind of like little, tiny missile silos. They're green down here. I don't know what they look like everywhere else. I think in states up north, they actually bury the wire. Thank you, northern people, for not putting these things above ground where bees can get in them. Um, but anyway, so it was just— it was— it had honeybees in it.

Okay.

And so we were, we were relocating, which we, we, we did. We really relocated these bees successfully. Some of them, some of them didn't make it. Um, but that's because they were jerks.

Uh, one in particular.

So anyway, like, we couldn't get this thing off, and so like, we were just pissing these bees off. And like, it got so bad that like, I mean, we're wearing our bee suits, and there's some guys that go out there and they don't wear bee suits, which I just think is absolutely insane. Um, but anyway, we're wearing our bee suits, and the guy I'm with, we can't even see each other's faces. There's so many bees like trying to get us through the mesh and our masks. Um, and so I'm down there and I'm working with these bees and I'm trying to get this thing off and I'm digging out honeycomb and trying to like put it

into a box and all. And I'm down there and I'm in the middle of all these bees and like my lip, my bottom lip touches the mesh in my mask. And as soon as I do, man, there is just this bee waiting for me and he stings me right in the lip.

Oh man.

And like, so like there's 2 bad things about that. One is it hurts. And so like your natural instinct is to like stick your hand up there and like try and wipe it off or touch it or, you know, rub it, you know, 'cause that's what you do when something hurts.

It's just a reaction.

And yeah, and so like I go to do that and like I have to stop myself because no, you're about to push 300 bees onto your face if you do that. So the other bad part about that is if you know anything about, you know, bee anatomy or bee entomology or any of that kind of stuff is that, well, one, when they sting you, they die. And what that does when they, when they release that stinger is it actually releases a pheromone into the air that tells the other bees in the colonies precisely where to attack next.

Ah, perfect.

It's like, hey, I got him, go there. I just killed myself for the sake of the colony. All the rest of you suckers kamikaze the same spot. So Immediately after he stings me in the lip, like, I'm just like swarmed. Massive bees, like, all over my face. So, and like, I'm— my, my wife thinks I'm allergic, so she's gonna think that this is just bunk, but like, I'm not allergic to bees at all unless they sting me in the face.

Ah.

Which is their favorite place to get me.

Ah.

Like, historically, like, I've been stung in the face probably 10 times.

Ouch.

And like, I don't get stung that often. But like—

10 times is not a small number.

Astronomically more I've been stung in the face than anywhere else on my body. It's like they know. It's like, we know the place that's gonna cause this guy the most pain and like, you know, social anxiety. Because when I get stung there, I'm gonna get swollen up and look like Sloth from The Goonies and have to walk around in public like that for like 3 days. Anyway, when this guy stung me in the lip, I got done with that job and I went home and I like, my bottom lip was just like 5 times the size that it normally was. It was big and shiny. So if you go to my Facebook page, you can see this video

of me talking like Bubba from Forrest Gump talking about shrimp.

Oh man. It's good. They're all good shrimp.

It's all good shrimp. But if you go there, you can, you can see my, my riff. on the Forrest Gump movie. It's— well, a lot of people have been watching it because honestly, it's—

It's hysterical. It's absolutely hysterical. In fact, so that day whenever I found out what happened, if you remember, I called.

Yes.

So, I called—

And he was just laughing the whole time he was on the phone because he couldn't understand me.

Craig answers the phone.

Hello?

Hello? And I just died. I just started— I couldn't talk for about a minute. I'm just laughing at you. I couldn't talk for a minute.

It was painful. And not, not for the usual reason, which was talking to you, but it was—

Oh man. Well, just know the hazards.

Yep, don't get stung in the face.

You, you made the decision, so— oh man.

It's good, good times though.

Yeah.

So they're, they're happily living in the, uh, the, the, the Williams family apiary over there.

There you go.

So there you go, making honey for me.

There's at least an upside, right?

Well, the upside is I'm gonna get some honey.

There you go.

Suck it, bees.

And you killed one of the bees. He got what had coming to him.

Oh, there's more than one.

Oh, okay. Well, that's just what happens.

That is what happens. Yeah, don't go into public utilities.

You get what you got coming to you if you do that.

That's right.

Well, let's, uh, let's get into our topic today. Um, so, uh, man, it's— it is springtime.

This is like the— I think the way that I tried to describe this to you earlier was I wanted to talk to everyone that was coming down off of the spring cleaning high, which I kind of feel is a little bit like New Year's resolutions.

Oh, okay.

You know, like everyone, you know, like the first 3 days after New Year's, like, is the most packed the gym ever is.

Oh yeah, don't go the first couple of weeks.

Just don't go.

And after that, no big deal. You're good. You get your leg machine back.

Sure. But like spring cleaning, I think, is not in the same league or whatever, but I think a lot of people just kind of have that vibe around Easter time. It's like, let's get the house cleaned up. Let's get— and like, you know, even around here, this is like one of the first times that it's like dry.

Yeah, and sunny.

And sunny. And you feel like working in the yard and you feel like getting lots of stuff done. And so you just, you're feeling good. It's not like 90 degrees yet.

Yet.

Yeah. And so I feel like it's kind of that way pretty much everywhere. Like, this is the kind of time that you, you know, you start planting new plants.

Sure.

You want to clean out that closet that you hadn't gotten to in a couple of months or maybe 3 years. And, you know, you just want to dust off the cobwebs. You want to, you know, mop the floors. You want to get all that stuff done and you start getting really ambitious and, you know, you put that mental list together and then, you know, Easter The weekend comes and goes, the family comes over, you eat a big ham, maybe. If— I don't know, what do you guys have?

Ham.

Ham?

Yeah.

Yeah? You guys do pineapple stuffing?

No, what is that?

Let me tell you guys something.

I would like to know more.

If you have not had pineapple stuffing around Easter—

We need to have it.

You ain't lived yet.

Man, okay.

Yeah, and pineapple stuffing with the ham, so if you're Jewish, you're just out of luck.

All right, Mama Williams, show me what this pineapple stuffing is.

pineapple stuffing.

All right, so, okay.

But, but anyway, and I think that's, that's a big part of it too, is, you know, Easter weekend is a big family getting-together time. You're gonna turn the smoker on, you're gonna roll out the yard furniture and all that kind of stuff, and it's just, it's just time to get stuff cleaned up, ready to go, laundry's folded and all. And but like, you start putting that list together, it can get a little overwhelming.

Well, yeah, absolutely. There— and, and here's the deal, I mean, you've been— and you've been coming off the winter, and, and whether it's just the, the, the weather outside, you just literally can't get to stuff, or you just feel gloomy, or whatever it is, um, yeah, you get this itch to do stuff. And all of a sudden you look around and you go, I got a lot of stuff to do.

Yeah.

And, and a lot of stuff that honestly, for the first time in a while, I feel like doing. And so whether it's a deep dive clean Or it's just, you know, I've got little projects here or there. Uh, we all kind of get into this mode of, and I've got stuff to do. You know, there's a vibe around the hardware stores as people are buying up mulch and, you know, flowers and all this kind of stuff.

It is no coincidence that the stuff goes on sale, right?

Like a plant sale at the, you know, the AgriLife, you know, place.

The Montgomery County Agricultural Extension Center.

Exactly. We might have an episode about that.

We might have an episode about that.

Yeah. So, you know, this is just kind of what's going on during this time of year. And so what we want to talk to you guys about is how do you kind of get over the hump, so to speak, of we're excited about getting all this stuff done and all of a sudden, uh, the rest of life happens.

Yeah.

And Easter comes and then summer's upon us. And so how do you kind of get into this routine of cleaning well and making sure that you don't get overwhelmed to where spring cleaning is almost, uh, too big of a chore to actually undertake.

Yeah, and let me, let me, let me just, let me talk honestly here for a minute because—

Do you normally talk honestly?

Never.

Okay.

Unless it's about you.

Okay.

But I don't, I don't know how it is across the rest of the country, but like around here, Easter is a 4-day weekend.

Well, yeah, literally we get Friday and Monday off.

Yeah, and that 4-day weekend is a siren, my friend, that lures you into the rocky waters of things I can get done. Because, you know, I feel like a lot of us can get a lot accomplished on a weekend. Yeah, when we're, you know, when most people are typically off.

Yeah.

You, you throw a 4-day weekend at somebody and all of a sudden you believe that your house is your oyster ready to be shucked. And, and like, I am guilty of this, that like, man, I can do this and I can do that. And I, I start piling myself higher and deeper into these projects and things that I, you know, I've been wanting to get done for a long time. And then when that weekend is over, man, I am so disappointed with myself.

Because you didn't get it done.

Because I didn't get any of it done. And it's not because like I'm lazy or like I'm, you know, ill-prepared to do some of these projects, but like, let's face it, I mean, like, you—

any—

getting started on a project almost is like half the battle sometimes. Because like, once you get started on something, you, you begin to realize, oh my God, I need that tool. Oh, I need these supplies. Oh, I need to do this. That needs to happen first. And I haven't even done that yet. And so like that thing that you really wanted to get done gets backburned further and further until you feel like you're even ready to get started.

Sure. Um, and on top of that, you got Easter eggs to hunt.

Yeah.

And all of a sudden—

And pineapple stuffing to eat.

Someone's got to make it. Yes.

So yeah, I mean, it ain't gonna be me. I'm just gonna eat that thing.

Stuff just gets in the way.

And so Um, I need a nap after that.

Exactly. Um, I, I need to try this stuff, and soon. Anybody out there knows what I'm talking about, bring us some pineapple stuffing, please.

I tell you what's the great thing about Easter.

Tell me.

There's no tryptophan in that ham.

Okay.

So like, you know, you can, you can have The ham and the pineapple stuffing and a little pie.

Yeah.

And then you're ready to go again.

Well, yeah.

Because you ain't sleepy.

No.

I love it.

It's different than the turkey.

It's fantastic.

And typically, ham, there's gonna be leftovers.

Yeah.

Those things are big.

Well, then you got the bone for the beans and—

Yeah.

I mean, it's, it's a, it's a glorious resurrection-filled weekend.

That's right.

Of all sorts.

That's right. Well, so So let's get into this a little bit. Let's start talking about— because there's different, uh, schools of thought on how to accomplish this, this whole cleaning schedule, um, and, and it kind of— we kind of need to break it down a little bit to make it more manageable, uh. So, so talk us through a little bit about what are some of the schools of thoughts are, and then we'll kind of dig into those a little bit.

Yeah, and I think it's important to, to kind of say like We want to make a distinction between maintenance and cleaning and then projects.

Okay.

Because those are just 2 different animals.

Yeah.

Um, and I, I, for me personally, I need to attack those 2 different ways.

Okay.

Um, but that being said, there's basically 2, 2 schools of thought on how you can approach regular things or big projects that you need to do. You can either do the, you know, sort of the old cliché of how do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time, you know. And so you, you take these projects and you break them up into, you know, chewable pieces that are manageable for your time and your schedule and your personality, and you slowly and begrudgingly sometimes knock these things out.

Yeah.

Um, you know, I think, I think like one of the number one like complaints about things on the internet right now is laundry.

Laundry.

I mean, just like that it never stops. And it feels like such a massive project every time you go to do it.

Sure.

And some people actually call this batching. You take these things that feel like big projects and you break them up into small, satisfying little bites so that when you get done with that little piece, rather than like, I did the laundry! It's like, well, No, I put the whites in, right? Yeah.

Yeah, because, because we have to understand that anytime you let something go over any period of time, it piles up. Yeah. And, and laundry is literally— you mean, you, you have— you hear the, the term a pile of laundry, right? Because that's exactly what it does. It piles up. And so Let's just talk about this, this first one for a minute, just this bite-sized type of deal.

Okay, Kevin.

Um, so I, I'll tell you, my wife honestly should be on the show with us today because, um, she has been a master at figuring this thing out because we— I mean, we're like most people, right? We, we work My wife only works part-time. She works 3 days a week. I work full-time. And so our weekends are, are typically the time when we would really like to spend time with our family.

Mm-hmm.

We'd like to hang out with our kids. We'd like to go to the park. We'd like to enjoy something together, but we got to clean our house. And honestly, I don't mind cleaning our house. And honestly, it probably doesn't take us more than a couple of hours to go through, you know, chores of cleaning our house, you know, vacuuming, dusting, mopping, all of these sorts of things. But we gotta pick it up before we can do that, right?

Yeah.

And so she's kind of said this, this is overwhelming on a Saturday and a Sunday. And, you know, we, we, our family goes to church every Sunday. And so, you know, that's another thing to put into a weekend. So, uh, But she started doing some research and she was coaching me for this episode a little bit. What she has done is she has put together a list that is on our refrigerator.

Okay.

I took a picture of it. Basically, it's a list that works for us. I want to be real blunt about this. Our list is not going to work for everybody.

Sure.

Because she works 3 days a week. She doesn't work those other 2 days of the week. So she has loaded up her 2 days that are her quote-unquote off days with, with heavier amounts of chores to do and are lighter on the other days. But she's basically broken it up into 3 categories. One category is the daily category.

Mm-hmm.

And these are the things that you should be doing kind of every single day, because if you don't, it'll pile up.

Right.

Okay, the second one is the daily, uh, and so that's the daily stuff. But then you've got the each day of the week stuff. Okay, so Monday you've got this category of things to do, Tuesday you've got this category, etc., etc. And then you've got the monthly things. Okay, so, uh, that kind of helps break things up a little bit. So, um, do you want to hear some of the things that are on the list? Yeah, no, daily stuff.

I think people would love to hear like what a Monday, Tuesday looks like for you guys.

Sure. Sure. So, so kind of daily, one of the things— she actually sent this to me today, is funny. She didn't know we were doing this episode, and she sent me this thing through Facebook that was, this is what clean families do every day. And it just went through a bunch of, a bunch of things. And one of them that was on the list is they make their beds every day.

Yeah.

Every single day.

monotonous day. Yeah.

Make your bed. Um, there's something about making your bed that just makes your house feel cleaner.

Yeah.

Yeah. Not only that, your bed is cleaner whenever you have it covered than whenever you have it uncovered. Okay. Um, and then, then little things like wiping down the counters and the sinks every single day. And some of this stuff goes to not just keeping your house clean, but I'm— we're talking about germs. you know, keeping your family safe from, from illness by wiping down your counters and your sinks, uh, both in your kitchen and in your, your bathrooms. And there's a couple ways you can do that. I mean, it's really easy to get one of those little boxes of Clorox wipes.

Oh yeah, they're fantastic.

Throw them away, you're good to go, you know.

Yeah, I don't know if you've, uh— there's actually a famous speech out there. I was actually trying to look it up right now. Um, about making your bed.

Oh, um, okay. It's—

I think it was a commencement speech. Uh, yeah, here it is. The University of Texas by James Clear. Oh, and sorry, uh, Admiral William H. McRaven.

Okay.

Um, the Make Your Bed speech. Uh, it's actually really easy to find.

It's about— We'll link it up in the show notes.

It's about 20 minutes. Um, but like, like, I gotta tell you, that's like, that's one of the things, like, if I haven't done that My, my day is just funky from that point on. Yeah, I mean, it really does make a big difference.

Yeah, there's something about it. It's psychological. Yeah, in some ways. Um, the other thing is empty and load your dishwasher every single day, uh, because if you don't, the dishes are gonna pile up in the sink.

Unless you're one of those paper plate families.

Okay, even still, every other day on the loading and unloading because there's always stuff. You know, and it's gonna continue to pile up. So, right, load and unload the dishwasher.

Just to be clear, I wasn't saying that I'm from a paper plate family. I'm just advocating for those—

there you go—

who might be, right?

And, and this is a big one, is just kind of keep your kitchen straight. Yeah, so the countertops, keep them clear. And, and so what this— what what this video even said is, un— open all of your mail every day. Don't let it just sit there, you know. Don't put it in a place where you're never going to come back to it. Yeah, open your mail every day. Don't let it pile up somewhere. And just kind of generally straighten up your kitchen, because kitchen is a place where a lot of life happens, right? So, um, there are some other things that different lists would tell you to do. These are kind of the things that we do. One of the things that would be really

helpful when it comes to laundry is it says every day put a load of laundry in. Even if you don't finish that load of laundry that day, even if it doesn't get completely dried and folded every day, start a load of laundry every single day and work towards making that a habit and a routine.

That's eating that elephant right there.

It is.

It's like taking it little by little.

Yep. And then the— I really liked this one. Set a timer for 10 minutes and clean. Like straighten up, clean up. Just do something. Yeah. For 10 minutes. And that way it doesn't become overwhelming. It's not like, you know, there's an endpoint. Because if you start— if you're anything like me, once I start something, I, I finish it.

Sure.

I have a hard time stopping. And now, getting going is not always the easiest thing for me, but once I get going, it's hard for me to stop. But that timer kind of puts you in a, oh, this is 10 minutes. I can do anything for 10 minutes. Pick up, straighten, sort, do something for 10 minutes. And those are kind of the daily— do that every single day.

Yeah.

All right?

I feel the need to tell this infamous family story about mail. My, uh, my grandfather, uh, who's not with us anymore, he was a, uh, he was a brigadier general in the Air Force. So he was a pretty high operating guy, operating at a high level.

Sure.

Um, and in his career. And, uh, so my grandmother had always been, you know, the person who took care of the home, you know, and, and just made sure that things ran efficiently there. And I, if I remember right, I think this actually happened after he retired, which actually makes it a little bit more funny. But from what I understand, my grandmother had plans to go out of town. And so, she was leaving him at the house by himself for a few days. It might have been a little bit longer than that. I don't remember exactly the timeline. But I remember the house and I know the people. My grandmother always told the story that she came

back home from the trip. And I remember that if you walked through the— there was the garage door and the front door. And you'd have to walk out the front door to walk out to the street to get to the mailbox and bring the mail back in. And she said she'd come back home and she'd walk through the front door and there was a big dining room because they had a big family.

Sure.

I mean, there's like 5 brothers and sisters and they all had spouses by this time and kids. And so it was a big dining room. She said she walked in and like that dining room table was just full of mail.

Oh, God.

And you got to remember, this is back in the time that was like pretty much the main means of communication was mail and telephone. I mean, there was just mail coming all the time. And she said my grandfather was in the living room sitting in his chair. And she walked in, she goes, what happened with all the mail? And she said that he just looked up at her and goes, It all just came so fast.

And there it was.

There it was.

Yeah, it's weird. Because things pile up.

And they pile up, man. And it doesn't take long. And like, here's the weird part about that, man, is like, if you don't, if you don't address those things regularly, and I'm not saying, you know, like that, you know, Kevin's family schedule is maybe like the schedule that works best for you, but if you don't address those things regular, you're going to be paying interest on that stuff later on.

Oh yeah, absolutely. Big time. Yeah. So kind of some of the Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday stuff, um, I'm just gonna kind of give some, some brief examples, but, but here's the general idea. Kind of think about all the things that you feel like needs to be done in your house to be clean.

Yeah.

And assign it to a day. Assign one thing to a day, or 2, or 3, or 4 things, however many it takes to kind of fill up, uh, all of the stuff that needs to be done. So for example, on Monday Tackle the bathrooms, right? Clean the bathrooms.

All right, is that what you guys do?

Yeah.

Okay.

Yeah, so on Mondays it's bathroom day. And so, you know, the counters are going to be cleaned, the sinks are going to get cleaned, the toilets are going to get cleaned. We're going to clean our bathrooms, right? All right. Um, Tuesday is going to be bedroom day. Okay, so changing the sheets. Okay, week. All right, um, making sure that stuff is up off the floor, making sure that things are put away in the drawers that they should be in, right?

Yeah.

Uh, bedroom day. Uh, Wednesday is a kitchen day. Okay, so beyond just kind of wiping the counters down, this is clean your stove, uh, actually clean your sink with Comet or whatever it is that you're gonna clean your sink with.

Brasso.

Okay.

No, don't do that.

Don't do that. Bar Keepers Friend, whatever it is that you're gonna use. Clean it. Okay, um, make sure that, that things that are on the countertop that maybe didn't get put away before, put them away. Organize things. Okay, so, uh, kitchen day on Wednesday. Thursday, uh, living room and dining room. Okay, so, uh, just tackle those rooms. Um, and then Friday is gonna be a floor and a miscellaneous day. So vacuum, sweep, mop, um, and kind of a catch-all head and get that done. It needs to probably be done. And then Saturday is typically our outside day. You know, it's mowing, it's, you know, weeding, various things like that.

You make the children do all that, right?

Of course. Why do you have children? Yeah, so it's kind of your outdoor day, um, and, and maybe a catch-all room if you, uh, catch spaces. So if you've got a playroom or a craft room or a, you know, a laundry room or something that you just need to tidy up, make a Saturday and a Sunday kind of that, that type of deal. Um, and, and it's one of those things that for us, um, if you don't put some things on a schedule, it doesn't get done, right? But here's one of the things my wife told me before we started this podcast tonight. She said, if I miss Monday, I don't try to do Monday on Tuesday and Tuesday on Tuesday.

Right.

You just skip it. If you missed a day, it was a ridiculous day, things were long at work, the kids were, were, you know, out of control, stuff just came up, right? I missed Monday. Don't worry, there's a Monday coming.

Yeah.

You know, and so, you know, do Monday next Monday. Um, don't try to play catch-up all of the time.

Right.

So that was something that she suggested as well. And then there are some monthly things that really do need to get done on a monthly basis. And some of those things are— they're different for different people. But some of the monthly things are going to be things like maybe clean out your refrigerator.

Okay.

Probably not something you're going to do every single week, but—

No.

Yeah. You know, maybe there's some stuff that just needs to be thrown away. Maybe there's, you know, check the labels, make sure you don't have expired things. Um, you know, those sorts of things. Um, maybe you do, uh, your shades, you know, your blinds, wiping those down, fans, cleaning those, baseboards, cleaning those, um, windowsills. Uh, if you're a family that needs to flip mattresses, maybe it's a flip mattress, uh, thing once a month. Um, you know, just, uh, just some of those things that need to be done regularly but don't have to be done every week or every day. Uh, maybe it's cleaning your coffee pot, something like that. Needs to be done. Doesn't have to be

done every day or every week, but monthly it needs to be done. And maybe you even need to go to yearly, you know, where you say, in April we're doing this, in May we're doing this, and it's just kind of a yearly thing that we do once a year. Maybe it's, I got to clean out my gutters, you know.

Yeah.

Those sorts of things. Well, I know that it's, you know, it's the fall and my gutters are clogged by November, so November's gutter cleaning month. Um, so those are, those are kind of some suggestions. And I'll tell you, there— these, these, um, ideas and, and cleaning schedules— and you can Google cleaning schedules.

Oh yeah, there's people that have made calendars.

They're all over the place for this. Print them off, just print them off, put them on your refrigerator, put them in a place where you remember. And, and those are a way to tackle this cleaning thing.

Oh yeah, and I'll say this. I mean, I think one of the most powerful things that you can do for yourself when it comes to things that need to get done is writing it down.

Yeah.

I mean, like, for whatever reason, mentally, that just makes it like officially stamped by you, approved, and ready to go. And when you write it down, for some reason in your brain, you've already committed to the completion of that event. I don't know what it is about that. I mean, that's why just about every guru out there will tell you to write down your New Year's resolutions. Because for whatever reason, it's solidifies it in your mind as something like, I need to get done. Unless you don't take yourself seriously.

This happens with me all the time. Like, I'll tell people, I need to remember to do that. I better write it down. I write it down and then I go, I won't forget it now.

Right.

I don't need to remember it anymore because I wrote it down. I'll never forget it now. But if I don't write it down, it's out of my brain.

Let me also say this. I mean, if you were listening to Kevin and you were hearing some of the stuff that he and his family does and you're hearing that and you're like, man, that's stuff I need to do. I hate doing that. Let me point you towards a resource that I've found extremely powerful in my life. It's actually a book called The Power of Habit. It's by an author named Charles Duhigg.

Mm-hmm.

It was actually a book I started reading early on in some of my personal transformation stuff. But in that book, he— I mean, he's a journalist and he sort of explores how habits work and what they do for people and how they work psychologically. And he really breaks it down into a habit loop. And it's like the cue, the routine, and the reward.

Mm-hmm.

And so, what he says is like, look, if you can figure out the cue and what it is that you're actually— so, most people have bad habits and then they have good habits. And so, the trick to breaking a bad habit is to figure out what the cue for that habit is and then replace the routine with a different routine and then give yourself a reward for when you do something different.

Okay.

And then he goes like, that's, that's breaking the cycle of the habit and replacing it with another one.

It's psychological. Right.

And so like, I've heard a couple of people talk about it like, well, my— so I don't know what their cue is, but their routine is to go running. And so what they've— what they do is to give themselves a reward for going running is like, that's the only time that they let themselves have chocolate.

Okay.

Is when they go exercise. And so, you know, the cue is, you know, basically, hey, I need to exercise. So then they go exercise. Well, the exercise is the routine and the reward is like a little piece of Dove chocolate or something like that. You know, which may or may not cancel out the run. I don't know. But you're building into yourself this routine of good habit rather than bad habit of Sure. And so that book is really, really helpful for just understanding your brain and helping yourself set up good patterns in your life and how to break bad ones and just understanding how they work. It's a really, really good book. He's written a couple, but

that's probably his best one.

Okay, cool.

So getting into the other side of things, because we're kind of talking about breaking things up into bite-sized pieces, and we can probably talk about this one a little bit less because it's not that complicated, but I think it's really easy— not easy, it's really difficult to break these things up into bite-sized pieces.

Yeah.

And so then you— and so like for me, like if I wanted to like remodel my bathroom, breaking that up into little bite-sized pieces—

It's unreasonable.

I think for some people it's not, you know, but some people it just fits their personality better. Some people it just, it fits their schedule better to just like break it up and they have the discipline to do that. regular so it doesn't take as long. If I try and do something like that, man, it's gonna take me forever.

Well, see, that's sort of like this room we're sitting in. Yeah, that— I think that's a lot of people's problem. I've got a project I'm working on right now that it's 2 or 3 months in.

Yeah.

And it's like it's never gonna get done.

Yeah. You know, so the, the, the flip side of that is to— now I was listening to an interview with a guy talking about this today. He's like, look, if I have something on my plate plate, I just attack it with all the ferocity within me until that thing is done. And I was listening to this guy today and he was like, look, over the course of 3 days, I sent like 1,000 messages over LinkedIn. I had 200 phone conversations and da-da-da-da. And this was just something, I think it was about somebody he needed to hire or something like that. And it was like, he was like, look, I mean, like, when I have, when I have something sitting in front of me, I just

attack it until it's done.

Yeah.

And it works for him.

Sure.

You know, and because that's the kind of projects that he has sitting in front of him. If he doesn't get them done, it's probably going to cost him money and all this kind of stuff. But like, when it comes to like your home, you know, like with the dishes, yeah, that may not be the best approach because you're going to eat the next day and then stuff's going to get dropped because you're just attacking the dishes ferociously. And I don't even know what that would look like, honestly. I'm sure someone Somebody out there does it really well. Send us some footage out there.

There you go.

But, you know, like, like, if you did need to remodel your bathroom, like, you'd probably— because it's your bathroom, use a bathroom— you'd probably want to get that project done as quickly as possible. And so, like, if you're doing it yourself, man, you, you better, you know, give yourself as much attention and bandwidth to that project as possible until it is absolutely finished.

Or you got to clear your schedule. You gotta make, make space and time for that. You know, let your, let your spouse or your family know, hey, listen, I'm unavailable for the next couple of days. Um, you know, make it a priority.

Yeah.

And in doing that, you may have to set yourself up with some other things. Hey, I've got some other things that are either going to be pushed to the side for a couple of days, or I've got to double up on some things so that I have time to do something. Which is, you know, going back to what you said about the 4-day weekend. I mean, you know, you have to clear your schedule if you expect to get anything done over a 4-day weekend, 'cause if you don't, then stuff is going to come up and you're gonna think pineapple stuffing.

Yeah.

That's what my weekend is now about.

A 4-day weekend is just an opportunity to procrastinate.

Exactly, yeah.

So, and I gotta say, like, this is actually probably my favorite approach is to just like attack it.

Yeah.

I actually, I mean, like, there's a part of me that enjoys like, Look, I'm just too busy for that right now. Yeah, I don't have time for it. Yep, because I like getting stuff done.

Yep, I'm like that too. And once I start on something, it's hard to get me stopped. People call me Attack It Hack It. Uh, actually, nobody calls me that. They should.

Not even the missus?

Oh, she calls me other things.

Okay, no, we need to work on that.

Yeah, yeah, but I, I know what you mean, man. It, it sometimes for me, I have one speed whenever it comes to it. Like, even, even going out and doing yard work, I have one speed. And I come in and I'm like absolutely exhausted. And my wife's like, man, you're just really, really tired. No. Yeah, because I did that in the amount of time that some people would, you know, do nothing.

Yeah.

You know, and I'll just like— I, I get things. I have, I have a mode whenever I get into that, that space, I just do that thing. And, and not everyone's like that, but, but I think that's one of the things that, that this episode is really about, is know who you are.

Right.

And know your family, know your rhythms well enough to know this is how I have to get things done. If you work work, uh, you know, 40, 60 hours a week, and you're, you know, maybe you and your spouse are both working that amount, man, your, your evenings are the only time you've got to do nothing.

Yeah.

And so your weekends are going to have to be a little bit more packed with some of this stuff. But if you have any, any time at home, you're gonna just have to, you know, get up off the couch, turn the TV off, um, you know, maybe put some headphones in, listen to some episodes of The Home It's time well spent. Absolutely. And, and just, just get some stuff done.

Yeah.

And I'll tell you, um, one of the things— we've got young kids, but one of the things that I— we kind of joked about it earlier, um, but, but my kids are already— we are already creating rhythms in their lives to help them do some of this stuff. Um, for example, Um, it's, it's spring. One of the things that comes around during spring is book fair at, at schools. So book fair was happening and we started, you know, I've got a 4-year-old and a 6-year-old, and for my 4-year-old, he was going crazy. He was like, he was like, if I make my bed, can I get a dollar for book fair? I'm like, yes, every day if you make your bed, I'll give you

a dollar until book fair. Now we're not doing that indefinitely. But yeah, but for the time being, and he made his bed, he did a fantastic job.

Yeah.

And it was just a— it was one of those deals where even if he didn't do a fantastic job, we're teaching them healthy rhythms to try to get them to do some of these things as well. And, and he's 4. I mean, he can come out and do the yard and pick up sticks with me, um, or, you know, do something else. Find a way to involve your kids, involve your family, and then it doesn't seem so much of a Whenever you're all doing it together.

Yeah, it's good stuff, man. And it's, it's honestly, it's, it's difficult to be that intentional with the things that you do.

Sure.

And so, I, I mean, like, that being said, I, I think one of the— like we said before, I think one of the most helpful things that you can do if you struggle with this, and I think just about everybody struggles with this from time to time, because there are things that are going to come up that are just absolutely going to wreck your schedule.

Yep.

Whether they be family emergencies or events or holidays or whatever it is. I mean, something's gonna mess your routine up.

Yep.

And so, if you can fall back into, these are my priorities, these are the things that have to get done from week to week, if you have those written down, it's gonna be easier to not be as hard on yourself and not be as just like anxiety-laden and just like you can't get any— like, why would I get started because I know that I'm never gonna get done?

Mm-hmm.

But rather just have a list of things and go like, okay, these are the things that I can get done. And, you know, if you get into that space of feeling like I can't get anything done, that's just you lying to yourself about what's possible. And what you need to tell yourself is like, look, at the end of today, at the end of today, what is it that I could have accomplished that would make me feel good about the way that I spent my time?

Sure.

You know, and that could be reading a book to your kid.

Yeah.

It could be that day, but it could also be like, I put a load of laundry in the washing machine and I went to bed.

Yeah.

I mean, that could be what makes you, you know, because that's better than the nothing that you were planning on doing because you felt so down about what you hadn't done already.

Yeah.

But you did that one thing.

Yeah.

And, and then tomorrow, like, you get up, what is it that I can get done today that would make me feel good about what I got done in this house? And it doesn't have to be a big thing, you know. And again, like, we want you to approach this with your personality and your schedule.

Sure.

And go, what's going to work best for me? What's going to make this house optimized to— because I think most people feel like they end up serving their house rather than their house serving them.

Yeah.

And it shouldn't be that way. Your house should be there to serve you.

That's right.

And, and to provide you with shelter and comfort and a place for your family to gather. And so what, what is it that's gonna provide you the opportunity to make your home that place for you and your family?

Yeah. And, and I think this is a good opportunity to just say, listen, if, if you're— if you and whoever is living in your house, if you're working all the time, you know, there's a good chance that you've got some money that you're spending towards something that you could back off of a little bit and hire someone to come in and clean your house once.

Yeah.

And if that is the thing that makes you sane, if that's the thing that keeps you from having high anxiety, is saying listen, I'm gonna pay somebody $50 every week, or I don't know how much these people cost, you know, just say it's $50 a week to come in and clean my house. Man, do it.

Spend that money.

Spend the money. And, and if, and if you're not the person that has that expendable income, then, then find a way to do it. Because at the end of the day, you know, one of the things we've said it regularly on this show is that Craig and I are big into, you know, winding down and not making life so stressful and anxiety-laden. And, and I've talked to a number of people just recently even who said, man, my house is just causing me so much anxiety, I can't stand it. I don't even want to go home because I see all the stuff that needs to be done. Um, so, you know, we, we want to, we want to just encourage you, and that's really what this episode is about, encouraging you to find ways, uh, to

tackle projects, um, and, and realize that there's ways for it to be done. And listen, we don't do it always well. I mean, there's plenty of weeks where, where we just look back and go, well, that was just— that didn't happen, you know? And we wind up spending a full day on a Saturday or a Sunday just doing nothing that we really want to do but doing the stuff that we have to do. But, uh, you know, our goal is to not have to do that.

Yeah. And I'll say this, I would imagine I'm just guessing that a house cleaner is cheaper than a therapist.

Oh, yeah!

If you allow yourself to remain in a state of anxiety and burden, you're eventually going to need that therapist.

Sure! And it causes health problems on top of that.

Yeah! So why not just hire the housekeeper?

Do what you have to do.

If it's a project in the house and you're worried about whether or not it's If it's cost-effective for you to do that, Homeowner's Show has a calculator for you.

Check it out, man.

Yeah, go to the website, homeownershow.com. You can check out the project calculator there. You can figure out whether or not it'd be worth your time to do that project yourself or hire a professional to do it. Maybe you heard that professional here on the show and you can get them to come out and do your project for you.

That's right.

So, man, we covered a lot of stuff today. You got anything else, Kev?

I think we cleaned house.

Good springtime vibes.

See what I did there? All right, man. Well, uh, well, listen, uh, thank you for listening and downloading today's show. Uh, you know, you can always find out more information about us and what we do at homeownershow.com. You can send us a message, uh, maybe you've got an idea for a show at info@homeownershow.com. Uh, but, but listen, thank you for, for listening and downloading, and we would love if you would take a moment and head Over to iTunes, leave us a rating and a review. That would be fantastic. We appreciate all of you guys. Join us every Tuesday. We will be here with a new episode. Until then, see you later. See ya.