It Was a Grand Affair

Yesterday I made Malia clean her entire room. It was an all-day project. She objected, of course, but the need to clean her room so we had time to go to Hobby Lobby and get Jolly a new eye was fabulous (if kind of mean) incentive. Her room is perpetually such a huge mess that being able to play in a completely clean room is somewhat of a novelty to her. As such, this morning she conducted a ribbon cutting before playtime commenced.

She still dislikes the fact that I made her clean everything up at the end of the day, but she had such a great time playing when 1) there was actually space to play in and 2) she could find all her stuff that I’m hoping, with some encouragement of course, that she can learn to pick up after herself without having a huge meltdown or needing me to name each individual item and where it goes in order to get the job done.

When We're Helping, We're Happy . . .

I clean the bathroom on Mondays and today as I finished scrubbing the toilet, I turned around and saw this:


It's super nice to have such a good helper (even if he isn't old enough to use actual cleaning products).


And just a note about the shoes: my bathtub is so big that I have to stand inside it to clean it. So I picked up a pair of $3 waterproof gardening clogs for just this purpose. Matthew knows those shoes only come out when I clean the bathroom.

I Am The Champion!

Let me begin by showing you what the shower in my wonderful red bathroom looked like when we bought our house.

Gross, huh? Of course I cleaned the thing before we moved in, but in spite of the fact that it was germ free, the hard water marks seemed a permanent fixture. You couldn't even see through the glass. And no, it is not frosted glass. So I scrubbed. And I scrubbed. And then I scrubbed some more. I used every cleaner I could think of. I tried Soft Scrub, Tilex, Lime-A-Way, Scrub Free, Kaboom, baking soda, vinegar, baking soda and vinegar . . . nothing was even making a dent in the nastiness. So finally, in my desperation, I turned to the internet for ideas. Most of what I found raved about the charms of all the many things I had already tried. But after sifting through about fifteen message boards dedicated to the topic of cleaning glass showers, I happened upon a small miracle cure for hard water deposits. The solution? Glass stovetop cleaner and delicate duty scotchbrite pads. On the chat board where I read about the stove cleaner, one lady commented that she attached her scotebrite pads to her rotating sander and went to town. At first I thought that was a bit of overkill but many, many arm aching hours later I must admit that if I had a rotating sander it definitely would have been called into active bathroom duty. Nevertheless, after many months of weekly (if not daily) assaults on the thing, I have finally emerged from the bathroom, tired but victorious. Here's the proof:

There is still some work to be done on the grout in the floor and the aluminum frame, but that is nothing compared to what I had to deal with on the glass. So now, I intend to sit back and admire my work from the supreme comfort of my bubble bath. And for those who may be wondering, I did in fact buy a squeegee. One minute a day of squeegeeing the glass is a small price to pay if I never, ever have to scrub it again.

Fifteen Things I Learned While Cleaning My New House

1. Four hands are better than two. Ten hands are even better.
2. A steam cleaner is an indispensable tool.
3. Two steam cleaners are even better because when you run out of water, you don’t have to stop what you are doing and wait for it to reheat.
4. Use your offspring for their intended purpose: as “go-fers.”
5. Soap scum is the enemy and should be treated as such from day one. Otherwise, after about seven years it will be so firmly entrenched in your glass shower that Soft Scrub, Lime-a-way, Kaboom, Scrub Free, Tilex and the steam cleaner barely even make a dent
6. You should clean the floor under your kitchen drawers from time to time lest you sell the house and the new owners find two bibs, 16 assorted ziplock bags, half a dozen randomly sized pieces of tin foil, several plastic packages left over from who knows what, a corn skewer, a refrigerator magnet, two inches of dust, and the instructions for your Pampered Chef garlic press.
7. A conveniently sized stool to sit on will prevent the hours of back pain that occur while cleaning the oven, lower cabinets, etc.
8. A metal scraper is super handy for prying off the dried blobs of who-in-the-heck-knows that appear in assorted places around the house.
9. Keep a couple of bandaids handy for when your two-year-old falls and gouges his hand on the exposed carpet tack strip. Keeping up on his shots is also advisable to that you don’t waste precious cleaning time having a panic attack about tetanus.
10. In your rush to pack before moving, don’t accidentally grab the instruction manual for the oven (which you are leaving) instead of the refrigerator (which you are taking) just because they have the same brand name on the cover. Knowing how the self-clean feature of the oven works won’t help when your ice maker is on the fritz and the new owners may be at a loss when it comes to removing the oven door.
11. Rubber gloves. Can’t clean without them. And buy the good ones so you don’t have to stop every two minutes to dry your hands off and get new gloves.
12. Take a sabbatical from saving the planet and use paper towels. Using 2 . . . or three . . . or five rolls will save you the trouble of having to wash a bunch of incredibly nasty rags when you are finally done.
13. There can never be too much 409. Or Clorox.
14. Clean the cabinets right next to the range before you start the self-clean cycle. Otherwise, you will be a sweat bomb as your contortions while reaching the back of the cabinets result in your ear being pressed against the oven door.
15. Be sure to thank your totally awesome mother-in-law for working by your side and cutting the total cleaning time down by days.