Bathroom Cleaning

For those of you who still clean your own households, cleaning day is often a dreaded experiment. Either it be the nooby or the war-weathered vet, no one likes cleaning days. Yet knowing how to do it effectively and quickly could not only make cleaning days less painful, but maybe even rewarding and fun! And there is not a place more important to clean than your very own bathroom. There is a quick and efficient way to get your bathroom done in record time! You could even make it a challenge of sorts.

First of all, grab all your dirty towels and cloths and get them into the washing machine. The sooner you begin it, the better. As soon as you get the machine running, sprint upstairs and get to washing the floors! This should be done vigorously and efficiently, and if done correctly should take no more than a few minutes. Quickly dump all unwanted large pieces of dirt into the toilet, flush, and move on to the next activity. Begin cleaning all the small areas around your facuets, sinks, and toilets. You could do this with a small piece of cloth and disinfectant, and quickly get that pesky dirt out of there. As soon as that’s done, grab your trusty sponge, facemasks, and cleaning products and get into cleaning the bigger objects all together. Each area should not take more than 3-5 minutes, and try and keep yourself motivated to move quickly. The biggest problem of many cleaners is that they seem to “lag” when it comes to cleaning, taking up more time than nessecary.

As soon as everything is cleaning and shine, go get your towels, dry them, and sit back to relax a nice cup of lemonade; you deserved it! Every time you clean, try and time yourself; make it a game. The more productive it feels, and the less it feels like a chore, the more enjoyment you’ll get out of this. After all, there’s a reason some people choose to spend their whole lives doing this!

 Oil paintings

If it is the old, valuable painting, it will be more safety to leave it for professionals. The rest less valuable paintings you should start with wiping out dust with a soft, silk cloth. The canvas are supposed to be cleaned focusing on the small spots, using a wet sponge. When one part of the painting is done, you must rinse the sponge very carefully to not distribute dirt on the whole surface. The interesting way is to use light beer instead of water. In the old guide books you can find grandma’s ways how clean paintings. For instance you can try to use grated, raw potatoes mixed in water.

 The recipe for this solution is simple:

1 pound of grated potatoes mix with water, and put on the fire for 15 min. Then leave the pot in the warm place overnight.

 Gouache, watercolor and pastel paintings

They usually are protected by the glass therefore we use the same techniques as mentioned for window cleaning. There is one important thing we must remember. The pictures can not remain wet because surface can quickly absorbs spills.

 The frame of paintings should be cleaned more often but you need to pay attention not to touch the canvas. You may use a piece of paperboard or the newspaper to cover this part of painting where you wipe the frame. If the frames are old and made of wood, it is recommended only to use dry cloth.

 Provided by E&K Cleaning Services Inc. The best Maid Services Chicago.

Don't look at me!!!

Mice are sensitive to smells, and they do not like many of odors which we are familiar with. Hanging sachets of lavender in the closets, you may discourage the pest from visiting and entering those places. They also don’t like the smell of wild mint and fresh green leaves of tomatoes. In the cupboard you can put slices of lemons on a plate (more rotted, it will better deter rodents).

The first step to get rid of these pests is to secure all possible ways by which the mouse could get to your house. Therefore, we need to patch cracks and crevices in the walls and floor slats and check the window and doors frames, and entrance doors.

Commonly used “poisoned grain cereals” and other ready-made preparations are certainly effective, but as strong toxic chemicals, pose a serious threat to small children and pets. Therefore, if there are children at home if we have a cat or a dog, does not leave those poisoned meal! In the places, where rodents are met most frequently, traditional trap with a piece of cheese, bacon and even a few grains of sunflower seeds should be enough.

The sensitive nose of rodent warns him against any the danger, so after each trapped mouse, you have to scrub the trap thoroughly, or even pour boiling water on it. Mechanical traps are generally very effective, and unless we put an attractive bait is almost certain that within a few hours a mouse will be caught up. From my own experience with mice I know that they never show up alone so if you catch one of them is obvious that it is still at least one around.

Using chemicals we must not forget about the food security. If you find a dead mice or mouse droppings in a cabinet or on the floor they should be immediately sweep and if possible burn out. Remember that throwing them in the trash, we can poison birds and domestic animals.

Squeaking door hinges may be noisy for several reasons but the best way to fix it is to make a solution of the kitchen oil and the graphite form the pencil. Lift the door about one inch and grease the hinges.

How to clean a fridge

The fridge became the “first-aid” appliance and it is integral part of the kitchen. If we want it to work properly, we need to defrost and clean it at least twice a year. It is not only ice removal ( new fridges have self-defrosting system) but mostly to get rid of unpleasant smells, dirt and all bacteria. Check the condition of your refrigerator. If you think that it is time to clean it, follow the instruction listed below or hire the professional Chicago maid service who could save your valuable time.

We definitely start with unplugging the fridge. Then we need to remove all products, drawers, shelves and leave the door wide open. Products should be wrapped in paper to keep the low temperature as long as possible. If you have a second fridge, remember to check what can be kept in the fridge and what we can put into the freezer. Shelves and drawers need to be cleaned by warm, soapy water, then rinsing and drying. It is not recommended to remove the ice using any sharp tools like a knife or a screwdriver because it easy to scratch and damage the interior. Don’t put any pot with boiling water or a hot iron!! The fridge must defrost by itself and we can only pour out the water.

After defrosting, we start cleaning the fridge interior by using warm, soapy water with soda ( four tablespoons of soda per one gallon of water) and soft cloth. Then we rinse with clean warm, water and then dry. Traces of mold on the walls of the refrigerator we need to clean with dish soap or water with vinegar ( ten teaspoons of vinegar per one gallon of water), then rinse and dry. Any scouring powders for sink cleaning is not recommended to use.

Next step it to wipe out the fully unfrozen fridge with alcohol damp cloth and wait until the fridge gets rid of the unpleasant smells. After that we can put back products on the shelves and drawers. Do not plug in the fridge if it is still moist. The wet parts could freeze up in the fridge and the whole process should be repeated.

Crystal-clear windows

Using a wet sponge with soap water we need to wipe out the window and frames. It is important to keep the sponge cleaned and change the water very often. When we cleaned all dirty spots, we need to rinse the window also using a sponge and then wipe out thoroughly with a dry soft rag.

Almost every housewife has her own favorite method of cleaning window screens. Some of them use water with detergents, then rinse the screens and wipe them out with a soft rag. Some clean them using paper towels and special cleaning product like Windex with ammonia D. Very popular and effective way is to clean the windows with vinegar and water. Every method is probably good if our windows look crystal-clear without streaks.

If we need to remove paint from the window it is better to use a sharp razor but we should be very careful not to scratch the glass. This method is very effective but a full attention is required. When the glass breaks and it is no way to replace it very quickly we can use the liquid glass to fill the gaps. It helps to keep all broken parts together.

The frosted glass door inside the house should to be cleaned with warm water and vinegar in proportion of 2:1 ( 2water : vinegar). Using a soft rag we wipe out the glass and immediately rinse and dry.

Use this rag to wrap the rubber brush and sweep the ceiling in a direction perpendicular to the window. In this way - if any traces of the sweeping will be less visible.

If you find out that the paint on the ceiling starts to peel, don’t panic and don’t call the painters. Let’s try to deal with this evil itself first. In this case you need to prepare the alum solution ( five table spoons of alum and four cups of water ) and immerse the painting roller and drag it around the ceiling.

Apartments in older houses may have some ceilings decorated with molding, where the dust settling. Put the solution of the potato slurry with cold water, and after drying, gently clean with soft brush. If molding is not very dirty, just clean up using vacuum cleaner with a small round brush.

Corduroy, velvet upholstery - wipe it using denaturated spirits or water with ammonia. In any case, must necessarily be careful not to introduce excessive moisture to the interior furniture. Cleaning velvet, be sure to perform the operation three times: for the first time - in accordance with the direction of the hair, the second time - the hair and the third - with the hair.

Mixed fabric upholstery (with man-made fibers) can be cleaned with warm bran. Heated in oven wheat bran should be spill out on the surface of the furniture and wipe by hand, lightly pressing on dirtier areas. Leave them for 10-15 min. and clean it using a vacuum cleaner or a small broom.

Old silk upholstery is very soft, such as embroidery, not suitable for cleaning, You can only slightly dust dirty spots.