We’ve all experienced that moment of panic when you find out a friend or family member will be stopping by and you know your house is in no condition to receive visitors. Body temperature rises. Adrenaline spikes. But no worries – I have five easy steps you can follow to make yourself look like an organized person within minutes.
Step 1: Close doors to unsightly rooms. Don’t waste your time picking up every room. If the room is not crucial to the visit, close it off. Guests will typically respect the closed door (and if they don’t – what the heck, reward their bravery and let them have a peek). Now don’t go trying to close off the guest bathroom or the kitchen. Sorry my friend, those are crucial rooms. And no, closing off doors doesn’t mean you can barricade the front door to ward off your surprise guest altogether. Just follow steps 2 – 5 for the remainder of the house and you’ll be alright.
Step 2: Hide that laundry. If your family is anything like mine, every family member is ready, willing and able to run clothes through the washer and dryer, but that’s where the laundry support ends. Not one of us “knows” how to fold and put it away until every basket is overflowing. This of course is unsightly and a dead giveaway that all is not organized in paradise. My solution is simple (and no, it isn’t to fold the laundry and put it away; let’s not get crazy). Instead, shove it way down in the baskets so it doesn’t pour out the top, cram as much clean laundry into the dryer as you can; even stuff it in the closet if you still need room. You will enjoy the appearance of being caught up, without actually being caught up. The warning with this is that the clean clothes will get balled up and you may need to iron more later. And when I say “iron,” I mean throw the clothes back into the dryer with a wet towel and steam those wrinkles out.
Step 3: Closet space is your friend. Take a page out of your childhood playbook when your parents asked you to clean your room and you shoved those unsightly toys under your bed and in any available nook and cranny. Now, if you’re going to use a closet, you should probably choose the one you haven’t already shoved full of clean laundry. But other closets and deep drawers can be utilized to the fullest. Games, blankets, papers, toys; even dirty laundry if desperation calls. Just make sure you don’t put any items in the coat closet the guests will be using. Your secret will be discovered far too soon.
Step 4: Empty the kitchen sink and throw out the three R’s – Rhyme, Reason, and Rinsing. You don’t have time for scrubbing, organizing, and neatly stacking those dishes into the dishwasher. Just shove, shove, shove. You may want to run the dishwasher as well. One time my secret was revealed when one of my guests tried to put her dirty glass into the dishwasher. I witnessed her look of horror at the mounds of crusted dishes piled every which-way in my dishwasher. If the dishwasher is running, no one will bother with it. You can always run a second wash cycle later.
Step 5: Use lighting to your advantage. You can dim the lighting in the more cluttered, unsightly rooms and turn on lights to brighten and spotlight the cleanlier rooms. When it comes to dust and unvacuumed carpets, dim lighting is an ally. Your room looks better. Even you and your guest will look better. It’s a win-win.
That’s it. Simple, right? As long as your guests avoid the closets, the running dishwasher, and don’t randomly flip on a light switch, the secret of your disorganized, chaotic life will be kept safe. Now, if you do have time to prep the house for guests, and want to do it in an over-the-top, neurotic way, check out my previous blog of My Top Five Impractical, Nonsensical, Yet Hard-Fast Rules of Hosting. Happy Monday everybody, and welcome to another week of chaos!