Cleaning

Think you can’t accomplish all that much in ten minutes? You’re wrong. In fact, taking just ten minutes before you dash out the house to head to work can allow you to tackle a whole set of tasks that might make coming back home a pleasant treat at the end of a long, hard day. Tomorrow, take ten minutes to cross off these ten easy items of your morning to-do list! Do you like to make a bit of a mess when you fix breakfast?

Whether you own or rent your home, whether it’s an apartment or a house, it’ll need maintenance this year. Make your life easier and a little less stressful by planning out your home’s maintenance for the whole year all at once, filling out an annual calendar and setting yourself reminders so you stay on track all year long! A yearly calendar (paper or digital) A copy of your lease (if you rent)Your smart phone or computer 1.

Countertop space is precious, and clutter stands in the way of glorious, wide-open spaces that help you function in the kitchen. When stuff is everywhere, you have to move it every time you wipe the counters. You sacrifice precious prep space. And that same stuff subtly clouds your thinking and saps attention from the task at hand. When you banish clutter from the kitchen, you’re more likely to use the room as intended, make dinner, and eat at home.

Simple, understated, and delicious, yellow mustard has its place in the back row on the condiment shelf, pulled out for the occasional cookout or the quickly assembled sandwich. Sure, it’s tasty but is that really it? Have we underestimated yellow mustard all these years? Not just for hot dogs, yellow mustard has quite the list of alternative uses! From skincare to sore throats, it sure can (ahem) cut the mustard. Mild Burn Relief: First, run the burned area under cold water.

The battle with winter is a long one, fraught with snow and cold. If you need a couple more arrows in your quiver, check out these 25 household practices that help you keep you warm as the temperatures drop, save time in the freezing mornings before work, and hopefully conserve energy during the dark months. Individually they don’t sound like much, but collectively they help you kick winter’s butt to the curb. Cover your windshield wipers with old socks before storms.

Add wax paper to the long list of items with surprising applications and usefulness well beyond their original purpose. Wax paper (as opposed to parchment paper) has a thin layer of wax on each side, and was designed to keep food fresh longer. Its both water resistant and non-stick — two attributes that make this handy item versatile and helpful, even outside the kitchen. Rub a sheet on the teeth of a zipper to discourage snags.

Car wax is designed to fill in scratches, protect paint jobs, and leave a slick shine on metal finishes. Why limit its use to automobiles? Turns out that the substance is good for all types of things at home. Pick up a jar and start using it throughout the house. Here are ten ways you might not know about… You can buy car wax in either paste or liquid form. Applying the wax requires just elbow grease and a clean, dry cloth.

Tea tree oil (or malaleuca if you’re fancy) is widely thought to have antimicrobial and antiseptic properties. While many people use it for health & beauty issues, it’s also quite useful around the house. Unlike other household products, it’s also safe and natural. All-Purpose Cleaner: Fill a spray bottle with water and add a few teaspoons of oil. Shake vigorously and spray to clean and disinfect.

Not having a dishwasher certainly isn’t the worst problem you can have. But if you’re used to having one, switching to only hand-washing can seem like a major inconvenience. Following are some ways to make life without a dishwasher as painless as possible. Soak. To make hand-washing less of a scrub-fest, make every effort to keep food from drying on dishes and pots and pans. If you can’t wash something right away, at least submerge it in or fill it with warm soapy water.

It’s the weekend! Time to relax, maybe slow down a bit, maybe work on a renovation or DIY project. You can improve your home a little (and maybe even make your life a little better). We’ve rounded up some recent good ideas that would be perfect to try out this weekend while you’ve got this extra time. And don’t worry — none of these ideas will cost an arm or leg! In the mood to clean but not clean from top to bottom?

Sometimes getting a bargain isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. There are tons of tips out there for getting a deal on your clothes shopping — shop off season for coats and swimsuits, swing by the store on a Wednesday morning to scope out the new markdowns, use the department store’s extra percentage off coupon, etc.

Living in a compact (read: tiny) one bedroom with my fiancé and our two dogs sometimes resembles a giant game of Tetris. When it comes to cramming our lives, complete with hobbies, home cooking and my photography business, into 450 square feet organization is key. Here are a few of the ways that we manage. 1. Build upwards.

If you live in a small space, you know that it’s tough to keep it clean from day to day. Smaller spaces just seem to collect more unwanted clutter, dirt and dust! Why is that? Well if you’re a clean freak like me, take a look at some of these tips to keep your small space sparkling every day… 1. Declutter. This is rule number one for a reason! If you don’t love or use an item—why do you still have it? Ditch the clutter and free up space.

Last year we ran an article on how to avoid the dreaded dirty diaper smell, one of the most odorous odors a new Mom or Dad must face. And you couldn’t resist! The rest of you joined in, with your incredible tips on how you’ve defeated the dastardly diaper. Read on for all you need to know about how to conquer the stink! 1. First up, flush it away! Dumping solid waste out of any kind of diaper—cloth or disposable—will help a great deal with the smell.

Warning. This is an awkward post. It’s deep winter and many of us are trapped indoors without the flow of fresh air from open windows. I, personally, have become quite conscious lately of daily smelly moments both at home with guests and at work (the elevator is the worst) where I’ve been trapped by someone passing gas or simply wished the bathroom at home would air out quicker. I myself will plead guilty on occasion.

Your walls are gleaming with new paint, but only three days later do you remember that you forgot to clean the brushes. Blame the chaos, the kids, the fact that you don’t have to be old to forget the obvious. Either way, that expensive paintbrush is trash for sure, right? Wrong! With a little patience — and minimal elbow grease — you can restore your brushes to their former glory. Paint tends to build up right near and inside the metal band, called the ferrule.

I can get a little ambitious when the weekend comes around sometimes (all the time). It’s easy to say yes to events and parties (or dream about hosting my own), create DIY project lists a mile long, think I’ll finally have time to deep clean every corner of my house and plan on organizing my closet to boot. What I do to avoid weekend burnout? Try and use my home, as it is, as a recharging retreat, so that when Monday rolls around I’m more energized than exhausted.

We’re always on the hunt for the latest and greatest (and easiest) cleaning tools, so when our Apartment Therapy Office Manager Nelly came into work the other day raving about a project that transformed her dingy, rental bathroom grout, our ears perked right up. No doubt it has to do with the fact that she’s expecting, but Nelly’s been doing all sorts of nesting lately.

I’m not usually one for New Year’s resolutions, but I am always interested in rejuvenating my space, work and life in the New Year. January is a great month for cleaning up problem areas, whether they are physical problem areas in your home, or work and financial issues. Here are a few of our top tips for simple tasks to help get your new year get off to a great start! 1. Declutter your desk or work area and go through important papers. Tax time is coming!

Is it completely germophobic to be cleaning your kids’ stuffed toys every month? Of course, I’m asking for a friend of mine (wink)! I completely understand that our kids need to grow their immune system by being exposed to various degrees of bacteria, still, I can’t look at these toys and remain calm. It makes me cringe. Just like that tiny chalk mark the teacher used to forget to erase on the board back in school. Ok, there goes my free-spirit reputation!

Sometimes things just smell old. There’s no two ways around it. If you’re a vintage or thrift shopper, then chances are you’ve come across this in the past. Baking soda has been known to do the trick for upholstery, but what about items that aren’t made from fabric? Check out this simple trick!Do you have a treasure that smells a little musty? Well Karen from The Art Of Doing Stuff has a great solution.

Even though my house might not reflect it sometimes (hey, I’m human too), I actually greatly enjoy cleaning. That said, I loathe cleaning baseboards. Sure to do them right it involves buckets and cleaners, rags and… ugh. Just ugh.Forget all that drama and do this less than desirable task far less with the help of a fabric softener sheet.Remember when we talked about some tricks and tips on taking care of a home with pets?

All it took was two episodes of “Hoarders” and I knew that the next morning I was going to…had to…go downstairs to clean out our apartment basement storage area. Hidden downstairs was a slowly expanding Jenga pile of boxes, the majority of them empty, but all kept under the presumption I’d need them later for moving or resale. It was time to get serious and clean house for 2012…The biggest source of empty boxes were for electronics and appliances.

Tackling the smallest projects in my home always seem to create the most happiness. Sure giving a room a new coat of paint is exciting, but most of us live with some silly repair need for far too long, so when it’s finally fixed, it’s like this marvelous miracle. So today, I’d like to talk about the area under your sink. Did you know it could make you happy? Oh it totally can.

I recently bought my first pair of “serious” jeans. The reason I know this is because as I was standing at the register about to pay A LOT of money for them, a cool dude who was standing next to me at the register said, “Oh, you’re going to like those.” “Do you have a pair?” I asked him. “Nope,” he said, “But you’re going to like those.” I felt like a first time drug or Ferrari buyer, not a shopper for a new pair of pants.

Laundry is a time consuming task that has a tendency to build up and become overwhelming. If you live in a small space, laundry procrastination can take over large areas of valuable space making your apartment feel cramped and chaotic. We all know the simple solution to this problem: do your laundry every week! But busy schedules always seem to get in the way of regular household chores.

For the last several months my husband and I have had fans in our windows at all times. We had a hard time getting any breeze in them, but because the fans were in place, we hadn’t had a problem with bugs and mosquitoes coming in. As the temperatures dropped this past weekend, we removed the fans and all sorts of creepy crawly and flying friends came in, so it was time for some screens! Off to the hardware store we went!

Some of the expensive dishwashers have these great fronts that seem to blend into the rest of the cabinetry. While if you have the money, you can get yourself one of these, we found found that hacking your own dishwasher a lot cheaper, since the only things you need to buy are some cabinet fronts.You can use any kind of cabinet fronts that you like, but they need to match your current kitchen cabinets. Once you’ve chosen those, it’s time to start hacking!

White risers can do a lot to brighten a staircase, as evidenced in the entryway above. However, like white floors, pretty and bright doesn’t always equal maintenance-free…but it doesn’t have to equal nightmare either. Here’s how to make them work. I recently completed the risers in our entry hall, and I can tell you first hand that like most painting projects, preparation and the right paint is everything.

Q: Maybe someone can help me with this tragedy? This is my beloved Superflat exhibit print poster. Eight years ago I got it mounted, but when I moved to NY I didn’t ship it out and stored it in my parents’ basement. Now I’ve moved back and discovered they had a flood one year and this poor print got some water damage. Is there any way I can remove the stains without damaging the print? I was thinking of a Mr.

Q: We have TrafficMaster Dimensions Allure flooring installed in a bathroom. We have some scuff marks and some dulling in some areas. What do you recommend in caring for this type floor? Is there a particular cleaner? Can you use wax of any kind. We are happy with the flooring but need your advice on the questions above.Sent by RobertEditor – We’re going to first quote the Allure owner manual to advise you to never use a wax on the TrafficMaster surface.

Every well-run home is teeming with tricks and shortcuts to keep it humming along. We’re sharing our best quick tips — for cleaning, organizing and repairing stuff at home — to save you time and money. Click through for today’s helpful hint, and links to tons more… Use regular DISH SOAP!! It has the ability to be gentle on your paint brushes while removing the sticky, slick paint behind.

Outside of using them for composting, worms just haven’t been on our radar. That is, until they invaded our Walnut tree (worm jerks!). So we sat down with our old friend Google and tried to find out exactly what was taking over our tree and how to make it stop. Were they web worms? Bag worms? Or the Eastern Tent Caterpillar? Find out the differences on each and how you can keep your trees in check after the jump.

Yesterday’s post on lessening laundry conjured a few hints about keeping between-load clothes looking and feeling fresher. Courtesy of Granny, a French roommate and the corner liquor store…GET NAKED—remove clothes immediately upon returning home, slip into something more comfortable and allow it to become more pheromone-rich.VODKA—Old costumer’s trick: Turn clothes inside out, hang, and spritz with any plain vodka or a 50/50 vodka-water solution.

Cleaning Stainless Steel Sinks has always been a pet peeve. Once it was discovered how clean and shiny they REALLY could be, the OCD about keeping them that clean….hasn’t stopped. And why not when it’s so simple to do? Click through the jump to check out how to use common household items to clean even the dirtiest sink naturally and in under 5 minutes. Stainless Steel sinks always seem to deceive you.

We thought we’d share with you our tried-and-true method — call it the lazy person’s way — of keeping our vintage silver tarnish-free.We assume it works because the jar is air-tight — we use the silver every day, but obviously not every single piece. (We haven’t noticed scratching, but we don’t actually just toss it in there. And since all of it is vintage, and most of it is from the flea market, scratches are okay with us.

It’s been a tough month around our household. A series of bad health incidents was capped off last night when we discovered our cat Eames had urinated on our bed. A small, but noticeable amount of blood was at the center of the large damp spot that soaked all the way down to the mattress itself. This is often the sign of a urinary infection (we think recent overnight guests stressed his system), so now the little fella is at the vet getting tested.

We were recently sent this bit of info by our father, who revelled at the opportunity to contribute to the blog. It’s a great little story about the invention of WD-40, which, it turns out, was never intended for lubrication at all and has, as its basic ingredient, nothing other than fish oil!“I had a neighbor who had bought a new pickup.

Hello AT,We live on the top two floors of a three-unit building. We have a new downstairs neighbor who is painting her apartment before moving in and the paint fumes are invading our unit.