As someone who used to have a messy room when they were younger, Roo Day has turned things around and has become known to hundreds of thousands online for her nifty cleaning hacks
With more than 850,000 followers on Instagram, Roo Day is known for her nifty cleaning hacks and motivational videos. Whether she’s seeing how much she can clean in 60 minutes, deep cleaning her dishwasher or adding vacuum lines to her velvet sofa, the ‘cleanfluencer’ has the motivation to do household chores that many of us dread. But it hasn’t always been the case.
“When I was younger, my room was honestly the biggest mess. I was the girl who would have cups of tea that would grow their own life forms in every room. Genuinely, all of my friends love to bring that up. I tell everyone on the internet that at the first opportunity,” she says.
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“I feel like for me, I’m just not a naturally clean, tidy person. It’s something that I’ve had to really, really teach myself, and it’s something that came with me being more house-proud. Once you were like paying the bills and you have the house yourself, you suddenly do then become a lot more house-proud. It’s something that I’ve really grown at as I’ve grown up.”
As part of her cleaning routine, fans of Roo will recognise her famous one-hour speed cleans. In a bid to take the dreaded overwhelming feeling that can come with tackling a huge tidy up, Roo gives herself 60 minutes to see just how much she can clean when up against the timer. She sticks a timer on her iPad and takes her followers along for the ride – and people are hooked.
“The motivation is the fact that it is only one hour. I think if you’re not limiting yourself to an hour, the amount that I get done could easily take you a few hours. I found that I was taking two, three hours to get the same amount done that I was getting done if I just put myself under that time limit and if I put my phone away,” she says.
“If I didn’t have the timer, I’d probably sit down, have a little doom scroll, get distracted and find something else to do. Whereas when I’m on a time limit I’m like, no, this is just my one solid hour to do it. I think people can really amaze themselves with the amount that they are able to get done in an hour.”
As Roo knows all too well, some tasks simply add up. Where at first you may think it’ll take an hour to sort the entire bathroom out, three hours in you realise you’re nowhere near finishing. However, that’s where Roo says acceptance is important.
“It’s about saying, okay, all I have is an hour right now. I’m going to start it, I’m going to do the best I can. If you start cleaning your bathroom and you didn’t actually do the shower, you did not actually manage to deep clean the toilet, that’s okay. You can come back to that another day. It’s just about doing your best in an hour and being fine with what you didn’t get done. There’s always tomorrow to come back,” she explains.
As well as sharing her handy – and relatable – cleaning and lifestyle hacks online, Roo has written the book Getting Sh*t Done. Just like her social media pages, the book is bursting with advice on how we can get the maximum done in the shortest time frame and break down everyday tasks into small, stackable habits.
“One thing that I find incredibly useful is weaving it amongst your day and habit stacking it in. Every time you’re making yourself a tea or brewing yourself a coffee, use the time the kettle’s boiling to unload the dishwasher. Or after you’ve had a shower, give it a quick wipe over. I feel like a lot of people will stand there and zone out in the shower, but I zone out while I’m scrubbing,” she says.
“It’s finding ways to tie your cleaning habits to existing things that you’re already doing. It’s such a good way to fit in as much as you can throughout the day.”
Getting Sh*t Done by Roo Day (£16.99) is out now
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