Extending the Clean Smell
Updated: Aug 28, 2019
There are times when the room is “clean enough” but it could do with some freshening and tidying that is simple and quick to accomplish. I call this “extending the clean” at my house. It’s when if I do a little picking up and “freshening” of the room I can forego the actually heavy duty cleaning for a couple more days. In most cases this means I can wait until the weekend before I have to dedicate the time for actual elbow grease level cleaning.
One of the ways I like to extend the clean is to freshen the air of a room. That sometimes makes all the difference in the world in terms of how much it actually needs to be “cleaned.” This works because our sense of smell often triggers our emotions and in this case our thoughts of having to clean. If it smells good, it must be moderately clean. Amazingly, this does seem to work and also gives you motivation to do the little tidying up that result in that moderate clean look as well.
Who doesn’t love this time saving idea?
Over time I’ve found some aromas and scents work better in certain rooms for accomplishing that “extending the clean” desired effect.
Bathroom

Diffusing 3 drops doTERRA Lemon with 3 drops Peppermint and 3 drops Breathe give a nice crisp clean bathroom scent.
You can easily mix this in a spray bottle as well for quick spurts of clean and freshening the potty area as needed. Simply increase the drops to 10 each and mix in a 6 to 8 ounce spray bottle. Fill the rest of the bottle with water. Shake before each use.
Kitchen
I love a nice smelling kitchen. I won’t say it makes me want to cook but it does make me want to hang out in the kitchen and look like I’m about to whip up some fantastic super mom level snacks.