Day 10 – Spring Clean your Makeshift Home Office

I have been secretly patting myself on the back whilst also keeping score of the number of times I have not snapped at my husband since we have been in lockdown. Yesterday for instance, I did not snap even though he KNOWS where the tea towels are kept so WHY did he ASK me.

However, this morning as I enter our home office (dining room) I find a ring mark on our my sideboard. Let me take a step back and set the scene for you. Since working from home, we have turned our dining room into our makeshift office. Subconsciously, but very rightfully so, we’ve each taken an opposite side of the table and marked it as our own space. Giving each other as much distance as we can get in the current situation. My husband sits on the same side to where our sideboard is located. So, this morning as I walk into our home office (dining room) I spot the ring mark and ask, “When did this happen?” Clearly, I get nowhere but oh how coincidental that there is a mug right next to his laptop. I pick up the mug and place it on the ring mark. It fits! Mystery solved! I am fuming.

I frantically start Googling ‘how to remove ring marks from oak wood’ ‘how to remove white ring marks from new oak furniture’ ‘will you be charged for homicide during lockdown or does the government have bigger fish to fry?’. By the way, equal parts white vinegar and olive oil – rub the affected area with a microfibre cloth then buff dry – worked like a dream. Still researching the last question – will keep you updated.

However, once I started buffing the ring mark, I looked around and the room needs a proper clean. So here are my tips to Spring Clean your new makeshift home office.

1. Create Zones – this is a tricky one since for most of us currently working from home, this is a new set up and so the place you’re currently using isnt really set up to be an office. However, the clutter only makes it worse. Right now our dining table and room is drowning in home schooling material, mine and my husband’s laptops, etc… with added pencils, pens, notebooks, sanitisers and hand lotion thrown in the mix. I got an old jar and a small tray and turned it into our pen holder & desk tidy where it now houses our post its, scissors, pens, sharpies, etc…  I then only kept the items I truly need on the table. The rest like hand creams, fruit bowl, etc.. all got moved, to clear the table as much as possible.
2. Clean & disinfect laptops, notebooks, pens, everything. These are the things we are touching the most. So really they probably do need to be sanitised daily at this point.
3.  Bring in a small bin. This may sound odd, but for the next couple of weeks this is our office space, so to prevent the dining table from turing into a dump until the next tidy, a small bin in the corner of the room will help keep things in order during the day.
4. Have a basket for short term storage – there are things that you will occasionally need, but don’t want it on the table or surface you’re working on. Keep it all in a basket and have it nearby. It will look neat, but more importantly as the basket starts to get full, it will be a gentle reminder to declutter and perhaps purge.

kanikasrivastava

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