If only the dishes would wash themselves. Photo: Stocksy, BONNINSTUDIO Bad household habits are notoriously hard to break – until you actually do and realise how much easier life is without them. Ready to start the year afresh? Try these simple suggestions and immediately improve your every day.
1. Cook then clean
For many, preparing the evening meal is a therapeutic exercise. Wine in hand, we chop, saute and stir, creating a meal worthy of a Michelin star. Unfortunately the less organised among us tend to use every pot and pan in in the process. The result? A kitchen clean up post-meal that makes you wonder if take-away may have been the better option.
Solution: The clean-as-you-cook concept is a real game-changer. Always start with an empty dishwasher, and then stack as you go. If there is a spare pair of hands near-by, recruit them to wash and dry big items like pots and pans as you finish with them. If you don’t, slow down the cooking process and attend to them yourself. By the time you sit down to eat, gathered compliments and taken a quick glance at your sparkling kitchen, you will feel like a certified domestic superhero.
Wash up as you go. Photo: Monty’s Vintage Shop
2. Iron as you go
Iron as you wear is a deadly, time-consuming trap. Consider how luxurious it would be, to peruse a beautifully primed wardrobe each morning, without unravelling emotionally as you dig through your ironing basket for something quick to press?
Solution: Allocate one evening per week as ironing night. Put on a movie, fill your iron, and refuse to leave your post until every item of clothing is steamed, starched and ready-to-wear. Not only is a fully ironed wardrobe conducive to early-morning cheer, you will feel undeniably smug as you sip that second coffee you now have time to drink.
3. Cultivator of dead flowers
Your beautifully arranged vase of fresh flowers says this house is a home. The same flowers two weeks later, says someone can’t bear to face the floral carnage.
Solution: Don’t break your fresh flower habit – they do make a home, but get in the routine of looking after them and prolonging their shelf life. When arranging cut flowers, always trim the stems on the diagonal under a running tap, and replace the water every couple of days. Or, use the sachet of flower food that is attached to store-bought bouquets. It is an effective solution that contains an acidifier that kills bacteria and assists stems in absorbing water – it really works.
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Fresh is best. Photo: Just Jars
4. Vegetable hoarder
It’s the end of the week, and again you discover a fridge brimming with an unhappy hoard of half-dead vegetables. What a waste, what to do?
Solution: Channel your inner-Nigella, and release them from their refrigerated hell, clean well, dry, and salvage of them what you can. Toss into a blender anything green, a handful of cashews, garlic, olive oil and Parmesan, and blitz the lot for a fresh and versatile homemade pesto. Sad tomatoes can be similarly saved and combined with garlic, onion, olive oil and sea salt for a sprightly tomato sauce. Use straight away over pasta, or freeze for the week ahead.
5. Household accumulator
Whether you are starting over or simply refining what you have, a regular household and wardrobe cull is less daunting and more effective than one mammoth annual spring clean.
Solution: Reduce, reuse, recycle and repeat – on a weekly basis. Discard now, not later, and live and enjoy a clutter-free existence.
Photo: iStock, Csondy
6. Leaving the dirty dishes
It takes a certain kind of nerve to leave the dishes for the morning. Sure you feel too tired to clean up at 1am, but do you want to wake up to old Brie, grimy pots and a marathon washing-up session?
Solution: Clean as you cook (see Bad Habit 1) and your pots and pans are already dealt with. Prior to your guests arriving, run your dishwasher though and empty, ready for the reload. As soon as the party is over, restack and turn on. Toss all your table linen straight in the washing machine and run a cloth over surfaces before hitting the hay. When your alarm goes off, all you have to do is put on the coffee and enjoy the feeling of being extraordinarily well-organised. Yes!