21 Cleaning Tips for Thanksgiving Gatherings
Having a Thanksgiving dinner party can put a lot of unnecessary pressure and stress on the hostess. One of these stress factors is the clean up before, during, and after the guests leave. Below are 21 tips to help make clean up easier and (almost) pain free.
Clean Up Before the Thanksgiving Gathering
1. Paint chipped off your wall? Use decorations to cover imperfection in your home when you don’t have time to fix it.
2. Check your inventory of cleaning supplies. For example, do you have rubber gloves for cleaning the bathroom and another pair for washing dishes?
3. Do your cleaning the day before. Delegate the chores to your family so you can concentrate on prepping food for the party.
4. To make clean up a breeze, line the bottom of your oven with foil or use a foil sheet. If you have an older type stove, the ones with coil elements, you can foil the bottom so you don’t have to worry about cleaning up boil over. The foil can be tossed at the end of the night.
5. If your oven is dirty, do a quick clean up by hand or use the oven’s self clean feature.
6. You can quickly vacuum before the guests arrive especially in the kitchen when you’ve spent mot of the time preparing the meal.
7. Make sure your dishwasher is empty on the day of the party.
8. Have a cleaning kit for your washroom and kitchen area.
9. Double line your trash can. This makes it easy to remove the trash and it’s extra protection in case your garbage bag spring a leak.
10. Set aside a different size of containers for leftovers.
Clean Up During and After the Thanksgiving Gathering
11. Take your tablecloth outside and shake off all the food bits. Then pre-soak it in your washer.
12. Before using your dishes for baking, line them with foil or use a cooking spray.
13. The best way to keep messes at bay is to clean as you go.
14. Get the family to help.
15. To save time, rinse your dishes; soak your pots and pans for easy cleaning later.
16. Load as many items possible in the dishwasher. Big items like pots and pans can be washed by hand.
17. Wash big items like pots and pans, platters, serving trays or dishes, Corning wear etc. first to get them out of the way.
18. This isn’t so green, but use paper plates and plastic forks for dessert.
19. As note in #8, it’s not too green, but use paper napkins.
20. Wipe up any spills before they set so you don’t have to slave away scrubbing.
21. And last but not least, take the time to enjoy your guests.
Thanksgiving is a time to gather our families together, remember all of our blessings and enjoy the time we have! Entertaining during the holiday season should be enjoyable–not stressful!
I will thank the Lord because He is just; I will sing praise to the name of the Lord Most High. – Psalm 7:17 NLT
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