Christmas Cleaning

Saturday morning. Stealing time to visit my e-community before I do my baking and cleaning. I love baking; I detest housecleaning. In fact, I can pretty much predict how this day is going to unfold. I'm going to go nuts baking and then, somewhere around noon, I'm going to realize I only have a few hours left to clean the house. I'll tidy up the counter, cover all my baking and survey the damage before deciding what I can do in a few short hours.

I live in a century home with 12-foot ceilings, hardwood in almost every room, 6 foot high windows, lathe and plaster walls, and a dirt basement. I note the basement because I believe it accounts for my dust problem. There's a kid in the neighbourhood that claims to be allergic to dust. I have my doubts though. He's slept over and suffered no ill effects. Maybe his frequent visits are helping build up his immunity. He's a friend of my son and they spend a lot of time playing video games in son's bedroom. Of all the rooms in the house, that one is the least-sterile. I don't venture in much except for daily laundry deliveries and good-night kisses.

I have two bathrooms. The bathroom is my least-favourite room to clean. My husband got angry one day because he overheard me telling my son...."If you want a happy wife, then take it upon yourself to clean the bathroom." He said that I was telling my son that I wasn't a happy wife. It's not what I meant but I felt bad. I just meant that I hated cleaning the bathroom and a little help would be appreciated. When I was younger, my sister and I would negotiate our cleaning duties. She took the bathrooms, I did everything else. She would be done in 30 minutes and I'd clean half the day; all to avoid scrubbing toilets.

I got a job at a bar when I was in college. I was a waitress. One of my responsibilities was to clean the bathrooms. "Do you realize how disgusting it is to ask your servers to clean the bathroom?" I asked. "Cripes! Customers in a restaurant don't even like to see their servers USE the bathroom much less CLEAN it." They compromised. I had to clean the bathroom at the end of my shift. Small victory.

There are 7 rooms downstairs and 6 rooms upstairs in this house. There was some talk of an addition, but I couldn't imagine this house getting any larger. We already have a "hunting room," and a "piano room." If you have to make up new names for your rooms, you probably don't need them. A living room, kitchen, dining room, bathroom and bedrooms -- that's all you need. I've read my fair share of decorating mags and I've never seen a "hunting room makeover." Maybe I'll call Debbie Travis and see if she's interested in breaking new ground.

Some rooms are easy to clean because nobody uses them. Some rooms are hard to clean because we just open the door, throw in our (insert name of unwanted item here) and close the door. That's how the hunting room got started. It was where my husband stored his hunting paraphernalia. Now it's a hunting room because you have to hunt for anything to find it in the mess that lives there. We could have a tenant inhabiting that room. We'd never know.

The kids are waking, the bird is chirping and Mamma Cat is circling my feet. Time to begin, I think.

Pumpkin squares, biscotti, mincemeat tarts and the last batch of shortbread. I need to thaw the turkey, plan dinner and dust. Vacuum the rugs, launder the cushions and mop the floors and...oh yeah...clean the bathrooms.