A 7-Day Plan to a Clean Entryway

Your front door entry is the first place in your home that is seen by other people, it is the first spot to welcome you home when you get there. It is also the first place where belongings are dumped and dirt is brought into the home. Did you know your entire home could be a whole lot cleaner, just by keeping the entry to your home clean? Stopping dirt at the door will reduce a large amount of the dirt that gets in your home, especially your floors.

Here is a 7-day plan to get your home’s entry in top shape and be on your way to limiting the amount of outside yuck in your home.

Day 1 - Start Outside

Decluttering- There are two sides to the entry of your home. Begin with the one that is seen the most. Pull anything off the front porch that does not belong there. If there are dead potted plants empty pots out and store them away with your gardening supplies for later use.

Cleaning- Now that the things that don’t belong are out of the way, you can focus on sweeping. You can even sweep the siding. Don’t forget about the porch light, remove those spider webs and other gunk. Finish up by washing exterior windows and putting down a large enough outdoor mat to keep as much dirt outside and off of the bottom of shoes as possible. The best mat for the outside is one that acts as a sort of scrub brush on the bottom of shoes.

Day 2 - Get to Deep Cleaning

Decluttering- Pull everything thing out of the entry to another place if it is nice out we suggest the front porch as this will help to motivate you to relocate things to where they belong. No one wants their mess on display for the world to see. If there is anything in this pile that obviously just doesn’t belong put it where it should belong.

If there is no place to neatly store shoes and hang coats this is the time to plan one out. Or you could consider storing them somewhere else. We suggest a nice bench with a shoe rack and ample coat hooks if you do not have a closet in the entry.

Cleaning- Before putting anything back this is the best time to deep clean. Start from the ceilings and work your way down. Dust off light fixtures, wipe down walls, then sweep/vacuum, and mop.

Day 3 - How is the Flow?

Stop and take a few minutes to pretend you are going through the daily routine of coming back home. What do you do? Where do you walk? Are the things in your entry allowing for a smooth transition back into the house? This is where you decide if the plan you made for the organization really will serve you well. Make sure your organization and re-styling plan work well with your lifestyle. Don’t just do something that looks good make sure it will work and actually get used because it makes life easier.

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Day 4- Tackle Problem Zones

Organization Tasks: If there is a considerable amount of people in your home, including younger people, think about areas that tend to get cluttered quickly with stuff. Maybe adding some closed storage space would be a good idea for keeping items out of sight. Even a large amount of coats or shoes can look like clutter when arranged neatly or hung up.

Cleaning: Now is a good time to take a look at those inside doormats. A rug is a huge help in keeping what is coming in on the soles of shoes off of your floor. The best interior doormat is one that is just a little wider than your front door and allows for two or three steps to walk across. With an exterior scrubber mat, the interior mat should be soft like a piece of carpet remnant to wipe the soles of shoes after they were scrubbed on the outside mat.

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Day 5- Bring Back Only the Essentials

Declutter: Instead of bringing every single item back into the entry, even if it would belong there think about bringing back only the bare essentials. Ideally, everyone’s shoes should be stored in their closet in their bedrooms, except for maybe the shoes they are wearing for that day. The same goes for coats. Only have the one that is currently in use in the entry area, the others should be hung in personal closets. At the end of the day, the items that are in the entry can be returned to the correct bedroom to keep things from piling up. We like the idea of implementing a family end of the night tidy up to get this and other items in the home back where they belong at the end of the day so they don’t pile up and become big problems.

Day 6- Make Things Pretty

Now that you have all of the functional things in place, now is the time to bring back the pretty things that welcome you home and others into your space. Bring back any furniture and wall hangings if you took them down. Or bring in new ones to create a totally new and refreshed space. Just remember that a minimalist, less is more approach will enable you to more easily keep this space from becoming a drop zone again.

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Day 7- Make a Plan to Keep it Pretty

The best plan to keeping your entry looking neat and tidy like it is now is to have a proactive plan to stay ahead of the game instead of behind it. Planning some time to do a quick sweep or vacuuming every day in this high traffic area will go very far in protecting all of the floors in your home.