How to Manage Your Home Without Losing Your Mind: Dealing with Your House's Dirty Little Secrets

4.5 stars rounded to 5 stars because her methods really work and there's no one else saying quite what she's saying right now.I wasn't sure I needed this book. I'd already been reading her blog and listening to her podcasts for almost a year and I bought a few of her e-books including 28 days to hope for your home. But I bought this book because I wanted to be sure there weren't any concepts I missed and as a thank you to her for her blog and podcasts because her methods have already changed my life. After trying to follow other methods and strategies, hers is the one that works for me.It is nice to have the book to read and to refer to easily if I want to read about a particular method. I do have some disappointment with this book which was one of her concepts "layers of a clean house" was not mentioned that I could recall in the book. That may be me having missed it though. The other disappointment was that I kept hoping for a concise summary of her methods at the end of the book since her writing style can be a bit ramble-y but it never came. So I feel like I have to write one myself to remind me. Which I think I'll do here in my review here so I won't lose it. For those who have read the book the summary will make sense. For those who haven't, it'll seem to make sense but I strongly suggest reading the book for it to really sink in. It'll tell you the whys and hows of her methods and motivate you with humor.Summary:First, do daily habits: dishes, sweeping kitchen, five minute pickup, bathroom checkSecond, do laundry day. Or daily laundry or twice a week laundry. Just have a laundry system that works.Third, declutter, don't organize.Fourth, after the daily habits are coming along, incorporate routines for weekly cleaning but only after daily habits are consistent.Helpful Philosophies:Container conceptEfficiency isn't necessarily the way to go (surprisingly)Simplify decluttering, no half-way pointsTake it there right nowOne in one out only when you've reached equilibriumHousekeeping is not a projectPre-made decisionsNon-negotiable tasksRegrets will happen but you'll get over itDo the easy stuff firstVisibility RuleHead Explosion RuleThe True Value of an ItemLive in the present and not for the future or next stage of your life

I just finished this book last week, and I'm so glad I found it. I've never been able to implement or stick with a cleaning routine, and as someone who grew up in a house where my mom had an entire year's worth of cleaning tasks written down on index cards and filed in the order they needed to be done, it's been frustrating and embarrassing to live in a constantly messy house.Once the author explained Project Brain, it clicked for me. I've always approached housekeeping as a major undertaking, not a series of small tasks that need to be done daily or weekly. When she said the only way her house was going to get clean was to clean it, this made sense to me. I just needed someone to tell me. I've tried all sorts of systems and miracle products, and my house was still a mess.Thankfully, I went into this book with a good system for dishes and laundry. It took many years to get those things under control, so this book definitely would have helped with that. But, now I've moved on to implementing her other daily tasks, and I'm starting to see small improvements. At the very least, there are areas of my home that no longer make me want to cry.I also appreciate that she includes a chapter on decluttering. I'm several years into my minimalism journey, so I very strongly believe that you can make your house look cleaner just by getting rid of a lot of the visual clutter.After reading this book, I now have confidence that eventually I will get my house under control. We've started a nightly "5-minute pick-up" ritual with our kids, and last night one of them actually cheered when I said it was time to pick up!

This book showed up as a recommendation from Amazon based on some other books I had purchased. I had never heard of the book or the author before, but the title caught my attention. I would have purchased the book right away, because it looked like an interesting read, but I was trying to save money. So, I did some research and found out the author had a blog. I started reading that and then began listening to her podcasts. But although I liked was I was reading/hearing, I kept feeling that reading (listening to) the book would be good because it would give me an overview of all of her ideas.So I purchased it, and am so glad I did! Just as I thought, it gives a nice overview of her approach to "keeping house," so now when I Iisten to a podcast or read her blog, I understand the bigger picture and enjoy them better.As far as the book itself goes, I love the simplicity. I love how she has broken down the most critical things that a person needs to do in keeping up with the housework. For me, I've always struggled because of my strong tendencies towards all-or-nothing mentality. I can see all of what needs to be done and if I can't do that, then I tend to do nothing. I've thought so many times I need to find that solid middle ground. If I can't do all of it, then what are the things that really make the most difference? Dana does a good job of defining this in her book.I've been consistently following the plan she set out in the appendix "28 Days to Hope for Your Home" for several weeks and it has made a huge impact! Even while I had the flu and was mostly in bed, I was able to basically keep up on those simple tasks. My laundry is a lot better than it ever has been, and I've successfully switched my thinking over from feeling like I need to get organized to thinking in terms of "just decluttering" and making sure I start with the visible spaces and the easy stuff. I feel like my husband has really appreciated that.So yes, this is a great book. If you are struggling with trying to mantain order in your home while juggling a very busy life, this book is a great one to read. I highly recommend it!!