Friday Challenge (Yes, we're a day late.)

The Continuing Adventures in Lawn Care really threw me for a loop. We have big plans this weekend - I need to go to the grocery store, Demonspawn is spending the night with a friend in another suburb and needs transport; then tomorrow DearDemon returns from my stepdad's just in time for friends to come over for dinner.

Did I mention that the house needs a good cleaning as well? Eek. Or that DamnHusband works till Saturday evening? And I raid tonight!

So let's talk about the challenge of when you suddenly realize Company Is Coming. What do you do? What are your priorities?

Here's what I try to make sure gets done:

1. Send one demonchild around with some sort of box to collect The Things Which Do Not Belong. Said box can be stashed away to be dealt with later, or they can actually Put Things Where They Go if time allows (or if I just need to give them something to do to keep them out of my hair).
2. Have demonchildren start sweeping and vacuuming up the copious amounts of dog hair that seem to explode out of nowhere. We have one, very short haired dog - and yet we have the appearance of dog hair from an entire kennel's worth of differently haired dogs. When gathered up, the resulting hair ball looks to be bigger than my dog. How does this happen? Are there late night Dog Hair Parties that I am missing?
3. Demonchidren then make sure the guest bath trash and kitchen trash have been emptied.
4. Demonchildren are responsible for cleaning the playroom (which these days is pretty empty, but the table still collects crayons and papers and such) and generally making sure anything the dog chewed up has been trashed, or given to DemonPrincess2 so she can cry about it for the next three hours because it was her Favorite Piece of Random Crap Ever That Can Never Be Fixed and I tell her too bad, so sad, don't leave it out where the dog can get it. (Yes, I am that mean.)

Lest you think that I force my minions to do all of the work, I am actually busy doing the things I don't yet trust them to do to my standards of cleaning. If they miss a dog hair, no big deal. On other things, cleanliness rules (for me).

1. I blitz the kitchen. Sink cleaned out and deoderized. Counters disinfected from gods know what (including scraping off wax, crayon, or any other disgusting crusty substances that may have at one point in time been peanut butter.) I am thankful once again for the granite which will never show black sharpie marks and congratulate myself on picking it out.
2.  Run around and put a new cube of Scentsy in each warmer that's out. I don't actually care how full it is, as long as it doesn't overflow, it gets the perk-up. Win! The kids would totally turn this into SplashMountain of Wax, so they don't get to do it.
3.  Give the kitchen table as best of a scrub down as I can, like the counters. No one wants to set their drink down in the middle of conversation only to have a look of horror come over their face as they stare into the abyss of I Swear That's Strawberry Jelly and Maybe Crisps.
4. The Guest Bathroom. My floors may look like a horror show, but I promise the Porcelain Throne shall have the appearance of cleanliness with the lid up OR down. And that place where you wash your hands will actually be a clean place to do so, with soap, and a clean towel (pardon the bleach stains).
5. Gathering up any large random items like projects, ironing, or the like and shoving them into the laundry room as the doorbell rings.

Time: Approximately 15 minutes. If we had an entire half hour, the chances are greatly increased that the dog hair is actually mostly gone, and I am not facing piles in the laundry room of Things to Put Away Later. Longer than that and I may even have been able to scrub the peanut butter and yogurt off of the fridge handles and use the Stainless Steel Polish so that it doesn't look like Gozer's children haunt my house and live in the appliances.

What's your plan?