Household Items We Over wash or Under wash: What You Need to Know
Even Dishwashers Should Be … Weird Words
And if you have a dishwasher, then well done you. Goodness, what an appliance that is, and the switch from owning one to not, or the other way around is so jarring. However, many dishwasher-owning households have developed such a habit of washing their dishes that they’re unwittingly using more water than necessary with a prewash. Your dishwasher will do the heavy lifting — just give them a quick rinse to remove some food.
But if you have a decades-old dishwasher, or a not-so-powerful one, then, yes, you might need to do more handwashing. However, as a rough guideline, your utensils shouldn’t require a double scrub if they’re only going in one end.
These Items You Probably Never Cleaned
The traditional way humans clean our homes is to take some chores and complete them before shifting to some other area. Okay, we’re doing the bathroom, then we’re doing the kitchen, and by the time we’re finished – we’ve forgotten all about the doorknobs. Nobody that visits you can get in without opening the door, and if you never go outside and clean that knob once in a while, you are dragging in the germs of everyone who visits you too.
Not something that should take up too much real estate in your brain but a good reminder to give yourself once every couple weeks.
Clean That Trashcan
Trash bags come in handy for a ton of reasons, not the least of which is that they keep your garbage can relatively clean. But once in a blue moon we have a super stinky load of household trash, or we rip a bag and the bin gets a bit gross, and in these times, cleaning out the rubbish bin is absolutely necessary. Pretend you can smell what rotting garbage would smell like in the house, now pretend you pay it 900 dollars a month to be at the bottom of your garbage!
This one can be simply washed with soap and water and it will be just fine. Or you can wash it in the kitchen sick (after you wash the dishes of course) if the bin is small enough.
Don’t Go Crazy Overboard With Your Windows
Of course, you want your home windows to be cleaner, but there is a limit to how much clean it can get. You really don’t need to do much for your windows besides spot clean every now and then and deep clean maybe twice a year at most in order to keep them in excellent condition. And you certainly do not want to get excessive and make your outdoor glass so sparkling that the birds show more interest in your patio door than you do–that way lies injury.
If you have one of your other, once-a-year cleaning checklists, you can add window cleaning to it as well. Really just when you’re doing your spring cleaning or winterizing take care of it and you should be good to go.
Keep Those Pillows Out Of The Wash
You should swap your pillowcases every time you change your sheets. However, your real pillows stay fresh much longer. Because pillowcases protect the pillow from coming into your real skin, these need to be laundered way more regularly compared to the actual pillows. However, if you use too many pillows, the materials inside those comfy layers will become flat, matted, and ruined. So, we suggest limiting it to only a couple of instances annually.
If you’re a big sweater, this might not be as applicable. And trust me, cats can ruin your pillows that way too. In this case, four as opposed to two or three times a year.
Don’t Dunk The Denim
This may be an old hat to some, but it astounds us that there, as of yet, remain peanut-shaped gaps in the knowledge of smart denim care—jeans don’t need a wash every (time) wear! Denim is tough stuff, here to the end, and excessive washing will only ravage a good fabric while shapeless pants fall gracefully in the wash bin. Besides, imagine how heavy wet jeans are, wet jeans weigh way more than any other regular pant.
If you are putting on a pair of jeans to work at a construction site, then that is besides the point. When you get home, throw those stinky things in the washing machine. But for the rest of you cruising around town we would say you have some more time.
No Need to Worry About That Heavy Winter Coat
If you’re anywhere from the Northeastern US, or the Northwestern US, or Canada, or Northern Europe — there’s actually a lot of places you’re going to be dealing with a lot of snow! Cold weather during the winter months is a fact of life, and you’re going to need a solid winter coat to deal with it. Not to fret, you won’t need to wash it as often as the snow will take care of that!
If you wash your winter coats, it can tear the fabric and the inner lining can come out and it may not be effective anymore. Plus, the inside never touches your actual skin (hopefully) so you should have nothing gross on the inside unless you’ve been wearing your jacket on gross clothing.
The More Vacuuming the Better
All we know is that somebody’s spouse is going to hate us for this, but the more vacuuming you can do around the house, the better. Doing daily vacuuming can save spaces like the living room or the kitchen. Carpets literally chew dirt for breakfast, hardwood floors get dusty, and a clean home is a happy home, so it’s just nicer all around if when you come home from the outside world, everyone gets a fresh start as much as possible.
Naturally, we’d say to refrain from vacuuming until after all your roommates are up, or before the neighbors go to bed. Nevertheless, it will certainly save you on cleaning your house.
Let Neither of Us Mentions The Thing That’s In There
As the saying goes, a phone has more bacteria than a toilet seat. This is because our phones come into contact with all the germs that our hands touch on a regular basis while a toilet seat only comes into contact with our mostly-clothed rear ends. Well, the same applies to our keyboards as with our telephones, and when was the last time you cleaned yours?
Keyboards may be a little harder as the dirt and the dust will fall in and get trapped between the keys. However, a once-weekly disinfectant wipe should suffice.
Everything and the sink of the kitchen
I think there are two types of people in the world when it comes to kitchen sinks. Some are the type to wash the sink after every single use of the nucleus of the household and others are the type to forget about it for weeks at a time. We know, we know — we get that it seems weird to clean the thing you just cleansed a bunch of other things inside of with soap and water, with soap and water, but trust us, it really works!
And if you follow through with this habit, you will not be able to stop doing it. It just takes a quick wipe around the sink when you’re done washing dishes to create a habit, and keep your kitchen smelling as good as they can be.
Facetime- Save A Tree, Don’T go overboard with Towels
Who remembers when hotels introduced a policy where if you hung a towel up, it was assumed you were going to use it again, and room service would replace the rest of the used towels? I mean that one policy, not only was it convenient, it was also saving us money, it was helping the environment, and we could use it in our own homes, too. Towels do not go bad after one use (unless you never allow them to dry properly).
Depending on how often you shower, bath towels are often only used for up to a week. When it comes time to wash them, just be sure not to put so many at once in your washer that it is overstuffed with towels.
Never Mess with Antique Furniture
No one builds stuff like they used to, and that benifets society but god was hte world not ready for old mothers in attics with their 1950’s coffins.box.furniture. Plus, you weren’t ever supposed to eat on the couch or do anything entertaining. However, now we know that was because too much moisture can ruin upholstered furniture. You can vacuum that every now and then, but don’t attempt to do a DIY on these things unless you are a professional.
The same goes for upholstery; it should be cleaned as often as it gets used, even if that means hiring a cleaner. Clean once a year, if you have plenty guests.
Wait, They Don’t Last Forever?
We kid a little bit with our title here (and prick up your ears — sponges won’t last forever, either, but never you mind right now), but you get the idea. However, believe it or not, some people don’t know how to wash their sponges from one use to the next, and are actually transferring more grease onto their dishes. This occurs when an individual does not rinse and wring out the sponge, allowing contaminated water and bits of food to remain inside the sponge.
Rinsing out the sponge after doing the dishes helps it last longer and also makes it an easier job for the next person who has to wash the dishes.
Don’t Let Soap Anywhere Near This One
This one hurts (we love to cook) but we know millions of cast iron pans have been ruined over the years by amateur cooks who have no idea how to clean them. Therefore, if you ever wondered what the heck we are talking about, we need you to listen closely. Never, never, ever clean a cast iron pan with soap.
The soap will remove the oil layer that protects your pan, and will make it rust within a matter of hours. Simply rinse, scrape off any charred edges with a scrubbing brush and then dry the pan on a burner over low heat. Then, put a tiny fraction of your selected cooking oil on the pan surface and preheat it to reseason the pan.
Dont Forget to Give Rubber Duckies Some Love
Ernie from Sesame Street had the coolest rubber ducky way back when. Seems every kiddie or muppet, on up, has a rubber ducky this days. They have all different kinds of funny hats, and all different characters, which is awesome too. However, the nice thing about rubber ducks (and bath toys in general) is that they hardly need a wash!
Bath toys will last for a very long time if you ensure that you are squeezing out excess water from them when not in use.
This Is What The Top Sheet Is For
Okay, lets be real; if you love your bed, its probably because you have one nice comforter to sleep under every night. That’s one of those things that we like to splurge on when you need a new one, because you use it every day, and, if you’re anything like me, you’re going to want one that will last. Nevertheless, even the best quality quilt is not going to hold up for the years to come if you wash it every week.
Unless you sweat profusely, or your comforter is unprotected, we recommend the same rule as you would with pillows: launder comforters every three or four months.
Tip 6: Don’t bring your dogs in the shower every time
While most dogs hate having a bath that suits this next tip nicely because lots of owners are bathing their dogs too often. As long as you don’t have a true adventurer that’s in the muck and water daily, you can get away with monthly baths for your pup. Of course, this will also depend on the dog, but in general this is a decent guideline.
If you notice your pup gets anxious with baths, try calling a local groomer. They can help to make your pup more comfortable and give them a proper clean.
That makes it sound like, even if you’re not talking dirty, that phone ain’t clean.
Every day you are walking around touching doorknobs, keyboards, pens at the post office and bank — all things that other people before you have used, and likely not cleaned. So, when you walk away and jam your hands into your pockets, and then pick up your cell phone and start texting, you are contaminating the touch pad surface with those germs. Which is why, at the end of each day, you might want to think about wiping your phone over.
You need only use disinfectant wipe consumer used commonly. You don’t have to be insane; But, this will prevent any of that bad bacteria from the outside from entering your house.
They Wear Jerseys — What Else Are They For If Not To Get Dirty?
If you’re a pro, then cool, wash your jersey after every game (though if you’re a pro, chances are there’s someone already doing that for you). If you’re just a kid or a casual fan, though, your jersey might never need a wash all that frequently anyway. It is all usage based, hence you can keep repping those team colors until you stink them off.
If you are going to wash jerseys with any iron on decals (such as numbers or nameplates), a good trick is to turn them inside out so the washing machine doesn’t melt the glue that holds those decals on.
Choose One Sleep Set For Each Week Of The Month
Similar to some of the other products on this list, you frequency of cleaning this will depend on what type of sleeper you are. Sleeping according to most people is the part of the day you feel most relaxed, hence their pajamas are so clean they can wear them for four to six days without washing them. But if you sleep a little more active or sweatier they will be less clean before the 12 months are up.
If you have acne as well, the oils on your skin are going to cling to a dirty shirt, and then be pressed right back into you the next time around so you might want to change your pajamas more than normal.
If You Dry This Well, You’ll Never Have to Worry About It
Winter gloves and winter hats, on the other hand, are much more about drying than dirt. The snow will wash a hat or pair of gloves out right away if they are worn properly. However, if you get inside and leave the gloves or the hat on a heater, they will not dry, remain wet, and mold and stink.
An easy guideline is to clean your mitts and hats annually, either at the beginning or the conclusion of the wintertime period. And make sure they are well dried in the season!
Watch Our for Your Mirrors
Understandably, you’re looking at an image of a public restroom, a facility most people do not have in their houses, but please hear us out. Over washing a mirror will not only scratch the surface, but can, in time, chip away at the mirror backing, resulting in peeling and damaging the integrity of the mirror. Rather than slathering that entire space with detergent every week when the bath is tidied, it merits basically cleaning the reflect down with some towels.
A detergent can come in handy about once every two months, to give the mirror a little shine but don’t plant your use to much.
With these, a telltale sign is the smell.
Every respectable chef strives for a clean kitchen, but just how clean should it be exactly? However, we believe everyone has collectively lost their minds a bit on how frequently they be washing their kitchen towels. If there is a spill, just wipe up the mess: throw away the towel! Towel to dry hands: Wash! This gets tiresome and wastes washing machine water! Those towels are probably fine if they just smelled bad.
However, we would advise against drying dishes with a somewhat worn towel, as this merely dirties items that are already clean. Instead, use a dedicated hand/kitchen towel and dish towel.
Your Feet Aren’t As Clean As You Think
Having some spare bath mats at hand in your home bathrooms, will set the contrast between an effortless, comfortable and clean bathroom, or a sloppy one. Bath mats prevent you and your guests from going for an unintentional swim on the wet floor, they absorb droplets as you step out of the shower, and they give your feet a dense place to rest (and keep off that cold tile — unless you are a person who has a carpeted bathroom, in which case, ew). However, they still should be washed approximately weekly.
Keep a few extra bath mats lying around and you can easily have a rotation and always have some in the wash and some to use. So, you’ll never have to be away from that solace.
Look Out for Your Stove
How messy you cook will affect how much work your oven will need to be a clean place. Here are a couple of examples of common cleaning items that we recommend — our philosophy is if you are moving into a new apartment, treat yourself and deep clean that oven. Just clean up the mess you make after (or leave it out and they will eventually still follow you). If you try to make your kitchen a Michelin starred restaurant every day, you will only waste hours probably.
However, if you like to clean your oven, then you do you. A bit of cleaning solution isn’t going to hurt that stainless steel and glass monstrosity.
You Can’t Wash These Too Often Or They’d Probably Get Ruined
That khaki jacket you wore to the beach party, your rain jacket you wore hiking, your dinner jacket—you’re probably washing it too frequently. Generally, your jacket doesn’t touch your skin, so it cannot absorb any odour from the body. So if you have one that is still clean on the outside, unless you spilled multiple servings of food on it, you can typically let it ride and wash jackets 1–2 times a year tops.
Jackets are also bulky items which can use a lot of room in a wash, definitely not the place you want to be putting them mixed in regular loads.
No Shampoo For You
No matter what you do, nothing beats that feeling of coming out of a hot, steamy shower. It means you’re all cleaned and your skin is fresh, but what about your hair? Most likely, if you are shampooing every single day, then you are just drying your scalp and damaging your hair for no reason. There are many different opinions out there on this topic, but we recommend shampooing no more than twice a week and conditioning afterwards, as needed.
If you have no idea which one your hair needs, talk to a stylist and find out what they have to say. Everyone’s hair grows with assorted dampness & tediousness, thus its necessary you figure out a routine that helps you.
Maintaining the Cleanliness of the Car is a Sunk Cost
This is one we hate to admit to, but we do it. After all, why bother with a clean car when you know it is going to get dirty again in a matter of minutes? But as with any thing, if you never clean your car, dirt and dust will accumulate, trapping moisture under the surface and producing rust that ultimately eats away the vehicle. So whether you wash the car or not just once over from time to time.
This is even more true for those living in areas with cold climates, as road work crews will put salt on the road, and in turn speeding up the process of rust.
When Last Did You Clean Out The Fridge?
In American English we have this funny little idiom saying someone cleaned out the fridge if they were very hungry and had a lot of food. But when was the last time you cleaned out your refrigerator? And yeah, you actually do want to know if the cream cheese in the back that expired in 2018 is still good, right? Is that Coca-Cola already lost its fizz? Over in the drawer at the bottom where the fruits and vegetables go, is that stuff all still too good to eat?
Now, no one has time to go through their fridge every day, but doing a bi-weekly review of your fridge can prevent you from ever taking a bite of something that went south.
Wrap up those in those sheets for a start
What is it about hotel beds that has such a comfort level? Perhaps it is the oversized duvets OR perhaps it is the knowledge that, you don’t have to make the bed or perhaps it is JUST sleeping in a freshly laundered bed! Even though you might not have noticed, washing your sheets and pillowcases instantly revitalizes any space, and it will most likely help you sleep better too.
When it comes to the sheets and pillowcases that we use each night — and that are pressed against our skin for long periods of time — everything gets very smelly very quickly if you let them slip from the wash rotation.
How Do These Even Get Dirty?
Curtains are one of those things, like ovens, that really do not need to be cleaned nearly as frequently as we imagine. If you are moving into a new place, sure, wash those curtains and get the other person’s smell (and their germs) out of your new home. But after that, you can escape with a good beating of the dust off the curtains – and maybe a tumble dry here or there every few months to keep them smelling fresh.
Aside from this, curtains rarely need to be washed more than once a year. And we recommend integrating it into spring cleaning, where you get to flush out winter by sprucing up your whole home.
Trust Us, It’s Going To Be Dusty Up There
It sounds a little crazy for such a communal item in your home to dust, because it is constantly spinning and moving around, but trust us, if you haven’t looked on top of your ceiling fan in a while, you might want to do so. These things snare and ensnare dust better than any other novel device in the home so be sure to get up and dust the blades and body of it once a month, if not more. It will keep your house clean as well as increase the quality of the air.
Look, we shouldn’t even have to clarify this but here we are — turn the ceiling fan OFF before attempting to wipe up there.
The Microwave Is Splatter Heaven
One sign food is hot in the microwave when you reheat it for microwavable meals is the food starts bubbling and popping under the heat — although then you take it out and it’s half-cold, but anyway, the food popping like that sticks to the walls and ceiling of the microwave, and if you don’t get it out fast enough it will crust there even thicker and harder to clean.”
As a general guideline, wipe the microwave after cooking anything messy and give it a deep clean once every other week.
The More You Clean These, The Easier It’ll Be
We’re sorry if you had to scrub a truly nasty latrine in real life, but you can back us up on this one. The more frequently you clean your bathroom, the easier this clean is going to be. And the more gunky bacteria you allow to accumulate, the tougher it becomes. It is a very stark equation, but one that some people often seem not to grasp.
If you clean the bathroom weekly, you will never know it’s dirty. And it’s certainly easier to deal with than, say, scrubbing out your stovetop.
Run That Empty Cycle Once A Month
The washing machine is for washing clothes, and like your kitchen sink, it is used for some of your other household items. And, as something that gets used as often as your kitchen sink, that washing machine is going to get dirty. While the thing is always running with soap and water, dirt and soap scum can get stuck and have a hard time getting away when clothes are tumbling around in the drum. Its also why you should, once per month, run your unit through on high heat empty, so your washing machine is as squeaky clean as any part of your home.
In fact, the same applies to dishwashers! It is simply a run on high heat, allowing the water jets in both machines to cleanse the inside of the machine rather than your dishes or clothes.
How to Keep Your Mattress Clean
Although you clean your bed sheets occasionally, few people consider how to clean their mattresses? Yes, OK fine, those won’t fit in any standard washing machine, so we’re going to need to be a bit creative with our use of washing machines, but we should be changing and washing our mattresses every 6 months or so anyway. You can also simply vacuum the surface of the mattress to remove dust and dirt.
If you’re buying second-hand, or if you haven’t cleaned your mattress in years, a steam clean would do wonders. However, don’t push it, because that’s probably only once in the year.
But These Where Introduced and Have Other Things to Clean Out Besides the Lint Filter
By now we hope you are aware you need to empty the lint out of the lint filter each time you have put a fresh batch in the dryer (and don’t even get us started about that lady making fairy floss down there). That said, it wouldn’t hurt every few years to dive into your dryer and see how much lint you can pick off the other components it’s clinging to.
Lint can find its way out into other parts of the machine. Left unchecked, this will cause a perfectly new dryer to burnout in a few months,
More Wind, Less Dust
Chances are, if you use a desk fan to stay cool or for white noise at night, that thing hasn’t seen a wash in some time. These little appliances, we get so used to using, that we miss all the duties of maintenance they need. Dust can amassed on the fan blade when you have fans, which will then affect air quality and the fan speed. However, they should be right as rain post-cleaning.
If you have been sneezing a lot in recent days without understanding what was going on, then go check that fan on your desk. Do you have dust caked in around the inside? That’s what has been in your face and making you sneeze!
It’s All About That Microfiber
Because we don’t regularly touch the screens on our TVs, other than our phone screens (and not too soon after all), they don’t require regular cleanings. Well, they do have a static charge and will draw some dust but besides that, maintaining a TV is about as much work as you can imagine. A microfiber cloth and some water, once every few months, and you simply clear the screen + the vents in back.
These vents are critical if you intend to leave your TV on for extended periods of time. If these stop working, the TV might overheat and fry itself.
Clean, Then Lubricate
Attention, die-hard cyclists: you probably see where this is going. But if you’re a neophyte and new to cycling, the mechanical side of it all is probably way beyond your pay grade still. Now here is an essential tip: about once a month, you will need to spray your bike chain down with degreaser and then oil it afterwards. This will help make sure your bike stays that way for a long time.
Fail to clean the chain and the old grease and gunk gets stuck and eats your bike alive, Fail to oil the chain and the chain rusts away even quicker.
