Well, we all do it differently. There are even recommendations how to complete all cleaning in 19 minutes (found it on internet once). I found fascinating the description of routine used to clean a house In England in fifteenth century. Here it is:
“She'd driven the staff and herself hard, so that every corner of… house was properly scoured with hot water, finely ground cold ash from the fires and good fat soap she'd made herself. The windows had been polished with vinegar and three-day urine until they winked and flashed in the pale spring sunlight, and the expensive collection of silver chargers in the hall, and the pewter vessels in the kitchen, had been carefully buffed with a paste of the finest river sand, pounded hard in a pestle to make it finer still, before it was mixed with alum and more vinegar.
All the room hangings, had been beaten outside in the heber, the linen in the bedrooms boiled and blanched and hung out over the budding hedges in the kitchen garden - just coming into leaf - to dry in the last of the blustery weather; and the fine Turkish carpets were scattered with dampened sawdust before being vigorously shaken and beaten in their turn and hung back up on the walls.
Now the whole house smelled sweetly of beeswax polish and the fresh spring flowers placed in all the public rooms, and Deborah had gone to bed the previous night with a satisfied feeling that much had been accomplished.”
p. 80
The Exiled by Posie Graeme-Evans
