Deep Cleaning the Kitchen

With two small (read "messy") people and a large hairy dog running about the place, and the constant use for crafts, creating, cooking, baking, getting ready for dog-walking and access to the garden, cleaning my kitchen is a non-stop job.  As a result, I have the "maintenance" tasks, that get done as and when required, but every now and then the room needs a really deep clean.  I would love to say that I just empty the entire room and crack on, but as everybody knows, that doesn't really work with a very lived-in kitchen.  So here's what to do:

• Stand in your kitchen with a piece of paper and a pencil.
• Choose a starting point and move clockwise around the whole room, making a list of every job to do. As most people are busy with jobs or children, you'll want to break the jobs up quite small.
• Just crack on and do as much as you can as quickly as you can, gradually crossing off the list until you've finished.  Once you're done, even if the kitchen looks messy again almost straight away (because it's in constant use), at least you'll know that you've cleaned all those nooks and crannies, and there aren't any horrible corners lurking that "you really must get around to sometime".

 

Everybody's kitchen is different.  Mine is large-ish and includes a shoe and coat back porch area, a corner where the dog sleeps, and a walk in pantry.  Here's my list:

• kitchen floor
• clear off and sort out the hat and coat stand
• clear out the hat basket
• check and clean the drinks cabinet
• clean and sort the CD tower
• clean the pantry floor
• bottom shelf in pantry
• pantry shelf 2 (rice and pasta etc)
• pantry shelf 3 (tins and jars)
• pantry shelf 4 (cereals and flours)
• top shelf in pantry (?)
• clean bins
• clean table
• clean microwave
• clean surfaces by cooker
• clean tiles behind surfaces by cooker
• shelves by phone
• shelves by radio
• plates cupboard
• cooker hood and extractor
• oven
• grill
• hob
• saucepans cupboard
• tupperware cupboard
• bottom drawer
• middle drawer
• cutlery drawer
• glasses cupboard
• mugs cupboard
• pull cooker out and clean behind
• fronts of all cupboards
• pull front base boards from all cupboards and clean underneath
• tops of cupboards
• spice rack
• fish tank 
• shelves by fish tank
• kitchen doors
• shoe racks
• coat hooks
• floor in shoe cupboard
• clean dishwasher
• cupboard under sink
• surfaces and tiles by sink
• sink and area
• kitchen window and area
• clean washing machine
• defrost and clean fridge and freezer
• top of fridge
• recipe books
• gardening books
• sort out big plant
• patio doors
• dog bed area
• conservatory doors

Woah!  I'm exhausted just looking at it!  But... one job at a time... one room at a time... At the end of the list I know I have a clean kitchen, then I just carry on with the maintenance tasks until the next big clean!