Clean your house in 1 Hour!

Zone 1: BedroomsApproximate time: 10 minutes per bedroom

Do a clean sweep. Strip dirty linens and toss in the hamper. Stash unnecessary items clogging your dresser or nightstand in nearby drawers or closets. Empty the wastebasket. Think "hotel"-you want spartan surfaces to help the room look tidier.

Make the bed. Take a tip from hotel maids: Rather than trying to tuck sheets under the end of the mattress, lift up each corner of the mattress with one hand and tuck with the other. It's faster.

Check out 10 laundry-day shortcuts.

Deal with dust. Using a dry microfiber cloth, start with a piece of furniture in one corner and work your way around the room clockwise. Dust each surface, working back-to-front and lifting knickknacks as you go, and dump the dust right onto the floor. Your cloth should only touch each part of the surface once (no constant back-and-forth). If there's a lamp on the nightstand, clean it top-to-bottom first, then dust the tabletop. Use your long-armed duster on mirrors and wall art.

Vacuum. Start from a back corner and vacuum your way out the door, using long firm strokes. Save time by only running the vacuum over each strip of carpet once-not twice. Don't worry about missing an inch or two.

Zone 2: Bathroom
Approximate time: 9 minutes

Do your prep work. Spritz the sink, vanity, shower and tub with your all-purpose spray and let sit.

Tackle the toilet. Sprinkle baking soda into the bowl, give it a thorough scrub with the toilet brush, then flush. Next, spray a microfiber cloth with all-purpose spray and wipe down the outside of the toilet and tank.

Check out 10 alternative household cleaners.

Clean the mirror. Spray on glass cleaner and, starting in the top corner, wipe in a circular motion.

Go back to the sink. Use the toothbrush to quickly scrub hard-to-reach spots around the fixtures.Then, working back-to-front, start in one corner and move horizontally, wiping the counter, vanity, fixtures and handles.

Wipe down the shower and tub. No need for a full scrub-just give them a quick swipe with a dampened cloth, then pull the curtain shut.

Mop the floor. Using a water-dampened microfiber mop, quickly mop your way out of the room, beginning in a far corner and ending at the doorway.

Zone 3: Kitchen
Approximate time: 12 minutes

Do the dishes. Load the dishwasher and start the cycle.

Declutter. Spend a minute or two removing any clutter from countertops-put items back in the cabinets, stash papers in a drawer. The emptier your counters, the cleaner your kitchen looks.

Pretreat. Notice hard-to-remove gunk on your stove or countertop? Scrape it up with the credit card. And use the eraser sponge to tackle any stubborn stains.

Discover 10 things you can clean in the dishwasher.

Clean the counters. Wet a microfiber cloth with all-purpose spray and wipe countertops back-to-front, brushing crumbs onto the floor.

Wipe down appliances. Swipe the fridge, dishwasher and stove with
a damp cloth.

Tackle the floor. Starting in a far corner, sweep your way out. Then give the floor a fast once-over with a water-dampened microfiber mop, again working your way out.

Zone 4: Living Room
Approximate time: 15 minutes

Clear the clutter. Quickly scan the room to see what's out of place. Stash scattered items like remotes and DVDS in drawers; neatly stack magazines on the coffee table.

Find out how to curb paper clutter at home.

Dust. Start in one corner of the room, and follow the same how-tos as in the bedrooms, working top-to-bottom and back-to-front so that the dust falls onto the floor. And if you have blinds, swipe them with the long-armed duster.

Make glass gleam. To clean glass surfaces, spray a microfiber cloth with your glass cleaner and wipe in wide circular motions, working from one back corner to the front.

Vacuum. Speed-vacuum yourself out of the room, starting in the farthest corner.

Arianne Cohen is a contributing editor to Woman's Day and author of Help, It's Broken!: A Fix-It Bible for the Repair-Impaired.
Photo: © Tamara Staples/Getty/Woman's Day





This article originally appeared on WomansDay.com.

What I have been working on

I am almost done with Goo's room. It's painted and on Friday the Father - in -law and I put in the laminate floors. Goo is going to get a lot of cool things for his bedroom for Christmas. Maybe a giant Wolverine... Goo thinks that he is going to grow up and grow claws just like Wolverine so when I asked what he wanted in his room that's what he said.

I will put up before and after pictures later. Just for a teaser I will show you the before.

Hmm Maybe The Chateau Left an Impression on the Kids

The other day Goo asked if he could play Lincoln Logs. Well, I guess it was awhile ago since it was right before we moved to the Villa. Goo played quietly for almost an entire hour and when he was done he rushed over and asked me to take a look at his creation. He said it was a house just like ours.

NOTICE THERE ISN'T A CEILING ON THE HOUSE???

Mr. Direct With $29.00 Glass Sinks

When C and I bought our glass sink for $59.00 last year I was excited about what a great deal we got. However since then I have found Mr. Direct.

About MR Direct

MR Direct International is located in Toledo, Ohio. We supply and distribute our own "MR Direct" brand sinks and faucets. Since we are direct there is no "middle man" to mark up prices. We are able to offer a superior quality product at an affordable price. We proudly stand behind all of our products with a Limited Lifetime Warranty. Customers may purchase our sinks and faucets through the online store or a phone order. Mr. Direct has glass sinks identical to mine for $29.00. HOLY COW Right? Glass sinks are so pretty and they add such a sophistication to your bathrooms but Mr. Direct doesn't stop there. They offer sinks in Stainless Steel, Glass, Bronze, copper, stone, and porcelain. They are made right here in America so you know what that means?? Buy from them and Americans can feed their families... Buy all your sinks there and who knows maybe they will hire even more Americans... I found this leaf sink when I was browsing online at their site and I want this so bad for the kids bathroom. It gives it a kids vibe but one they can grow with. What do you think? Visit their site and tell me which sink you wish you had.... Leaf glass sink $79.00 PS. I wasn't paid for this post. I just really love their products... Mr. Direct website Link

BlogDash

BlogDash is the media database that actually helps the media.

The media relations industry is broken.

Today, the media is the masses. You're the media. I'm the media. It's easy for brands to get overwhelmed without the proper tools.

All the "PR management" tools and "media databases" that exist today suck. They were built for traditional media and the way media relations used to be done: mass messaging, news wires, press releases...spam. To make it worse, they're clunky and hard to use.

We provide a platform that focuses on open communication, real relationships and no spam in the hopes that we can demolish the bad blood that exists between bloggers and PR today.

We also make our platform stupidly easy to use.

WHAT IS Blogdash

It's very simple.
Bloggers choose which kinds of opportunities they're open to being pitched about.
Brands find and connect with the right bloggers for their projects or campaigns.
Boom. Opportunities are created that actually helps both sides. It's magical.

Features for Brands:

• Filter through a database of more than 25k bloggers to find the ones that will really care about your product, company or story.
• Upload blogger contacts and BlogDash will return a list with full profiles for each of the bloggers.
• We gather publicly available information about bloggers, and organize it in one profile for you:
  • Bios, location, publications, social networks, blog stats, twitter stats and more...
• Create and manage outreach lists to keep track of your campaigns. You can export them to excel too!

Features for Bloggers:

• The sweetest part...BlogDash is 100% free for bloggers!
• Choose the kinds of opportunities that you're open to being contacted about.
• No spam. We don't let users mass message bloggers.
• Add a badge to your blog to let brands know they can contact you through blogdash with opportunities.
• If you never want to receive an opportunity of any kind, you can opt out.

Why did we create BlogDash?

We did blogger outreach for a long time, and knew how sucky it was to find and gather information about bloggers.
Blogger outreach can be amazingly valuable, for brands and bloggers, when done correctly. Until BlogDash, there were no tools made to help you do blogger outreach the right way.
We worked with bloggers constantly, and knew that 99% of the time, they were open to receiving some opportunities, as long as it was targeted and valuable. The problem was, unless they created a pitch policy on their site, brands wouldn't know what the blogger was looking for.
If the brand didn't want to take the time to research the blogger and engage with them, they'd probably just end up sending out the same message to all the bloggers they found and hope for the best.
This approach did not work. It's even made people doubt the value in blogger outreach. All the time it takes to find the bloggers, gather that information, engage with them and pitch them just wasn't worth it, so they resorted to PR management tools and spam.
With BlogDash, we wanted to change that. We reduce hours of research into minutes. We give you the powerful filters you need to narrow down the blogosphere and the platform to respectfully engage with bloggers.
BlogDash makes blogger outreach valuable again.

Blog of Possibilities

One of my favorite movies is Last Holiday with LL Cool J and Queen Latifah. In this movie the title character played by Queen (named Georgia Byrd). Georgia has a book she keeps all her dreams in called her Book of Possibilities. I watched this movie last night for probably the 500th time.

Today I've decided to make this blog into mine as well.

So today the first possibility I want to write about is...

1. Selling my book.

I've been writing a book for years now and Ive got it pretty much sketched out and have even written the first 2 chapters.

It is a possibility... All dreams are aren't they???

Am I Getting Carried AWAY??

After Noah made a surprise guest appearance in my kitchen yesterday C and I started talking about the Kitchen remodel we were planning on doing next year. I think and C agreed we might have to move it up a bit. The cabinets are in great shape and there doesn't seem to be a reason to change them out, not to mention the expense this saves it is so much GREENER to not buy new. We will probably just refinish them and change out the doors, drawers, and hardware.

We want to change out the floor, the back splash, and the counter tops. I thought C and I agreed to laminate in the whole downstairs to tie it all together. However, with the flood and our previous issues in the Chateau we have decided to do tile. I think C is still impressed with my super awesome grout lines in the bathroom. I've never tiled anything as big as the kitchen before but it's all the same I think.

I found these two patterns at Floor and Decor. (Yes, my favorite store for tile, and wood).

They are both ceramic but look and feel like stone. They are 12 x 12 in tile and each are $1.29 a sq ft.

They are both great. I think I like the first one best. What do you guys think???

Am I getting carried away with faux stone???

Someone Call Noah

When I got downstairs this morning I discovered a flood Noah would have been proud of. Something is leaking under my sink (sound familiar?). I found this out because as I walked over a tile that is broken it squished and water bubbled up from underneath it. It kind of reminded me of the oil that bubbles up after Jed Clampet shots at the rabbit.

It looks like it's a long term leak and its to the point that it has eaten away the grout between a few tiles. So it looks like we might be replacing the black tile floor far sooner than we wanted.

Floor and Decor here we come.... AGAIN!