This Is the Most Satisfying Cleaning Task You’ll Do All Month

Taryn Williford
Taryn Williford
Taryn is a writer, editor, content strategist, and homebody from Atlanta. I might have helped you declutter your apartment through the magic of a well-paced email newsletter. Or maybe you know me from The Pickle Factory Loft on Instagram.
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updated May 11, 2020
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Credit: Marie-Lyne Quirion

The trick to being someone who is Good At Living is discovering the delight of everyday activities. (I mean, there’s a whole book called “The Joy of Cooking,” and it’s been printed 18 million times in the last 84 years.) Once you identify the good feelings hidden in these so-called “chores,” it’ll be a lot easier to start and stay on top of the things you know you ought to do.

For me the joy of cleaning is twofold. Like a sunny day, doing pretty much anything in the ambiance of a spotless home feels better: Dessert feels more luxurious in a clean kitchen, and TV night is downright chic when you’ve got a perfectly-folded throw blanket to pull over you on your fluffed-up sofa. But there’s also so much pride in just learning to do something and doing it. I used to be clueless about how to pop open my oven’s door to clean the unassailable grime within. But then I looked up my oven’s user manual online one day, gave my oven the clean of its life, and felt like a superhero. That’s the joy of cleaning.

Today, you become a superhero too.

Credit: Joe Lingeman/Kitchn

Your Assignment: Deep Clean One Appliance

Appliances are something you might not think too hard about cleaning, besides the aesthetic stuff like wiping fingerprints off the fridge or cleaning splatters from inside the microwave. Today, choose one appliance — big or small — used in or around your kitchen, and give it a really thorough deep clean.

Your options:

  • Big kitchen appliances, like a refrigerator, oven, stovetop and range hood, or dishwasher
  • Small kitchen appliances, like a microwave, coffee maker, toaster, toaster oven, electric kettle, slow cooker, air fryer, or stand mixer
  • Cleaning tools, like a vacuum, steam cleaner, or air purifier

Once you know what you want to clean, look up the manual. (This is an important step!) Try to find a sticker or label that tells you the make and model of your appliance, drop it into Google like “Dyson DC-17 manual” to find and read or watch the manufacturer’s instructions for cleaning your appliance. You can follow these instructions to the letter, if you’d like, but your main goal here is to uncover morsels of “oh, that’s how you do that!” details that’ll let you get a really deep clean.

If you can’t locate a manual, or the manual’s instructions feel overwhelming, no problem! Here are some instructions for cleaning some home appliances. If you don’t see your target on this list, great instructions are only a search away.

Give your target a good deep clean with whatever time you have available tonight But make sure to carve in some time to marvel at the results and revel in your accomplishment!

This post originally ran on Apartment Therapy. See it there: There’s Nothing You Can Clean That Will Be More Satisfying Than This

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appliances
Cleaning