How often do you vacuum?
On the Making it Home yahoo group (where I sometimes peek in to read and be encouraged by other wonderful ladies seeking to make their homes a beautiful place for their families), it was recently being discussed how often each family vacuumed their carpets. I thought it was an intriguing question and one maybe some of you would like to chime in on, too.
Growing up, we vacuumed the "middles" almost everyday inspite of having carpet which was intended not to show dirt. Something about having nine people tracking in good country dirt all day long just called for lots of vacuuming.
After getting married, I was pleasantly surprised to find I could often vacuum only once a week or less and the carpets looked great. Then I had Kathrynne.
I didn't know adding one little tiny person to our home would change things so much! (Call me a naive first-time mom!) It seems something is always being spilled, little bits of this and that are always being strewn around, and somehow small particles of food make it into almost all the rooms of the house.
However, Kathrynne has really helped me to have a better, more relaxed approach to life - she's helped me to put things into perspective. Whereas I used to always try to have my house "perfect" and I literally couldn't stand if things were messy or out of place for long, now, although I do clean and pick up and organize and vacuum, it's okay if there are some things out of place or some crumbs are on the floor. We live here after all! I'm usually doing good to get our carpets "quick-vacuumed" 2-3 times a week and I'm happy with that. I'd rather have semi-clean carpets sporting a few crumbs here and there and a calm cheerful attitude, than perfectly clean carpets and be a stress basketcase over keeping them that way.
So, how often do you vacuum? If you have children, have you noticed an increase in your need to vacuum since they've become toddlers? Just curious. :)
posted by Crystal Paine at 10:48 AM
34 Comments:
We, or should I say my ds, vacuums pretty much daily. I have 3 teens and a dog ~ should I say anything else. Between them being home all day, everyday and a dog that is extremely active there is always something to clean up. I am working to do it less, simply so that my ds doesn't have to do it all the time but for now its his job. Btw, what type of carpet cleaner did you get? We brought one a few months ago but its not really that great or powerful.
Thx for sharing ~ have an awesome day.
Hi Crystal! I usually vacuum, as a rule, on Monday and Friday. But with two littles, I am considering adding Wednesday to the schedule. Even with frequent vacuuming, our carpet (which is only 6 months old) has been getting worn rather quickly.My family does not wear shoes on the carpet, which helps somewhat with the wear and tear. I have a much easier time keeping hardwoods clean. Hopefully, next time we need to replace it, we can afford hardwoods in the bedrooms as well.
Since in our household we do not allow shoes worn in the house, we don't vacuum the carpet as often, maybe once week or every other week. However, we at the moment don't have children. I can imagine once you have children, it'll be a different story.
Growing up we didn't wear shoes in the house, but with 7 people living in the house, we still had to vacuum every other day to keep the carpet looking nice.
4 kids ages 3-9. EVERYDAY.
Carpeting didn't need vacuumed often when we were first married. With two sons, a dog, and a dad(90) that purposely brushes things to the floor rather than the trash(rolls eyes) added to the equation...well, it's a daily and sometimes more than once thing here.
The sharing of a friend(the family was a finer furniture/carpeting/window treatment store) was that dirt left in carpeting is what wears it out quickly(walking on it turns dirt into little teeth that gnaw at the fibers). Same goes for fabric furniture and curtains(and flooring in general).
I've heard of a mix of baking soda and cornstarch(I'd be leary of this addition in high humidity locations) OR Borax(this one is supposed to repel fleas, too) scented with a few drops of essential oil and sprinkled on the carpet and left for a short time before vacuuming actually freshens the scent and cleans at the same time. I've done baking soda and lavender oil and find it no longer white looking once picked up by the vacuum. The carpet doesn't emit a pet odor(dog is lab/golden retriever mix and a surprisingly clean smelling dog even in winter months...maybe the baking soda freshens him, too!).
Hi Crystal,
We have two children at home full-time (homeschooling) and two adult sons in and out with college and work as well as a dog that sheds what seems to be small pomeranians!
I NEVER vacuum, but my children vacuum our two rugs daily, and sweep/swiffer daily as well.
We move furntiture and vacuum behind once a month.
I think it might even get worse as they get older. Anyway, it does if you allow them to do projects. My kids are always making something or experimenting with something.
Don't you just love the look of freshly vacuumed carpet with all the clutter gone?! I'm sure I only see this a feww minutes each week. Maybe that's why it's so beautiful! :) Kids....you've gotta love 'em! We just vacuum as needed which is often!
How often do you sweep your kithen floor? At least twice a day here.
I love the Making It Home group...
what an encouragement!
Our vacuum is out of sevice temporarily and our home is really suffering for it!
We are used to vacuuming high traffic areas at least once a day...we live on a graveled country road and you would be amazed...even with a door mat what is tracked into our home!
Tracy
I hate to admit it...but we only vacuum when people are coming over! This comes out to be about once every 2 weeks, and we sprinkle baking soda before hand.
(I love company...it's the only time the house gets clean!)
Other than that, I just spot-clean anytime the baby spits up on the floor :).
I have a 10 month old and I vacuum the living room every day, other rooms 1-2 times a week.
I'm so horrible about vacuuming! We don't have kids and we don't wear shoes inside, and I vacuum probably once every other week. (Or whenever company comes over! :-)) To be honest, the carpet is so stained after previous residents and two cats that I don't feel like vacuuming does a thing. I have a feeling when we actually own our own house and are paying for the carpet we'll take a bit better care of it. :-)
When it was just me and my dog, I used to vacuum once a week in the high traffic areas and once every couple of weeks in the bedroom. Now that I'm married and have lots more carpeting, I need to vacuum every 3 days. If I try to wait a week, it isn't pretty. And we try to be very careful! But it just happens. ha ha.
Trixie
With two toddlers, I vacuum 1-2 times a week in high traffic areas and the infrequent areas get it 1x a month or so. We've got an A-Frame w/loft bedroom & music room, so we hardly walk around up there, and lugging the vacuum upstairs is not an easy thing (especially 7 1/2 mths pregnant)!
Every day in the living room/dining room. A couple times a month in the bedroooms.
Mary, mom to 8
We vacuum the living room everyday - or we did before morning sickness hit. I have only vacuumed a few times in the last month but I am starting to feel better now so hopefully we can get back on track.
The bedrooms and rec room get vacuumed a couple times a week.
With 5 kids from 21 mo to 11, a dog, and a cat, we really do need to vacuum often.
We also clean the living room carpet a couple times a month. I love my hoover carpet cleaner! When we bought our house last year we NEEDED to replace the carpets so we invested in a carpet cleaner at the same time.
The kitchen is supposed to be swept after each meal (many little ones equals much mess). Whether that actually gets done or not is another story. The kids do make an effort to get it done and that is all we ask.
Our home consists of linolium flooring that looks like wood all thru out the place. But we have 2 big area rugs, one in the living room, one in the master bedroom and also a hallway rug. I vaacume the rugs once per week with some Glade carpet powder. I try to sweep the floors at least once per week because for some reason dust just loves to accumulate quickly and it's just me and DH!
I sweep and mop the bathroom and kitchen floors twice per week though as it's used more frequently and dirt is more noticable.
We vacuum every day - sometimes I don't hit the bedrooms, but kitchen and living/dining room has to be done every day. It's just me, my husband, and one year old son, but neither I nor my husband can stand to not have it clean! :)
I let my son run around with food all the time, so that is a big part of the mess! I would go crazy if our vacuum broke - I would probably run it back and forth over the carpet even if it didn't suck just so I could have the nice clean lines! :)
With 8 kids, 20 shoes, a cat and a dog in a very small house, we vacuuum the living areas 1-2 times/day. The kitchen gets swept at least 2-3 times/day as well.
The bedrooms need it a couple of times/week but rarely get done because they are rarely entirely picked up.
=:o
We vacuum 2 time per week, although when there were babies and toddlers in the house, some rooms were vacuumed daily :~)
I vacuum about every other day. I also use a Swifter Carpet cleaner.
I usually would vacuum everyday, but sometimes it is every other day. I have 4 children ages 8-2, no pets, and we do not wear our shoes inside.
We schedule to vacuum once per week. We have mostly hardword floors with some area rugs. I only have wall to wall in one room downstairs, the front staircase and the upstairs hall. We have a very old house - like 100+ years!
But we do use a carpet sweeper daily. My 5 year old has that in his chore pack to do daily. No electricity, no moving parts. The brush only rolls as you push it. You simply empty the trays when full. No need to recharge. They are great. Noiseless too. Which is nice in a house full of much noise all day! We broom sweep the foyer hardwood daily as it gets lots of traffic and we sweep the kitchen 2 or 3 x's per day!
Look into those good old fashioned sweepers. They still make them. Resturants use them all of the time. They are a great help.
Thanks again for all you share.
BTW, I'm reading the supermarket ebook right now. I'm excited.
FYI......I see a lot of you have mentioned not wearing shoes in the house which is excellent, but a friend of mine who owns a carpet cleaning business said if you run around barefoot (no socks) it's actually better to wear your shoes. The oils from your feet stick to the carpet and attract dirt and stains. If you take your shoes off, make sure you have your socks on!
Terri
when we had carpet...i would second the daily vacuuming....
I went through 3 expensive vacuums in one year (only paid for one--took it back for a free replacement...took it back for a free replacement again---)
We already had rules like never any food or drink on the carpet...but i made new rules like No shoes on the carpet.
I hate carpet actually and think with many children carpet is a bad idea. I will not have carpet in a house again...not only is it difficult to keep, but it harbors way too many allergies and is impossible to get clean like a solid floor. I was constantly trying to get mysterious out of no where stains out of carpet. In my opinion...carpet wasted a lot of our time....
SO...We now have a house of entirely wood floors and it is GLORIOUS! I LOVE IT!!! We sweep many times each day in certain areas and use a dry swiffer type mop thing several times a week but you can see the dirt and can get it completely clean.
I have 2 small children (ages 3 and 15 mos) and we have alot of tile/hardwood in our home. I sweep this everyday! However, I do not allow food, juice or shoes on the carpet, so I only have to vacuum it once a week. Makes housekeeping much easier!
Jennifer R.
3 kids under 4 and i NEED to do it everyday but agree with you - would rather crumbs than stress! probably 3-5 times a week :)
Every single day! I've been doing that since baby #4. Back when it was just DH and 1 child I could go as long as twice or once a week. Those days are long gone...lol!
Two career family here, with household consisting of 2 adults and a dog who likes to shed:
If I had my druthers, we would vacuum every day or every other day. But I don't want to spend my life at the office and then vacumming, so one of us vacuums each Friday night or Saturday morning. Allowing some accumulation of fur and dirt is the price we pay for the lives we have chosen.
I only have one carpeted room. I only vacuum it maybe twice a month since its not a high traffic area. All my other rooms are floating floors or tile, I sweep those with a broom almost everyday.
There are 5 people in our house. Myself, my husband, a 7 year old, 8 year old and a 2 year old. We have all hardwood and no carpet but we have a large area rug in the living room that I vaccum daily sometimes 2, 3, or 4 times daily. LOL! I can't stand to see anything crumbs etc. on my rug. I sweep the main living areas 1-2 times a day and mop once a week unless something gets spilled then I will go over everything again.
With dark blue carpeting (no stains show, but every speck of dirt or dust shows!), a son, and a dog -- vacuuming is needed daily! Several times a day would keep it spotless, but living life - not just vacuuming is a priority for me.
8 Kids and we vacuum daily. Sometimes twice a day.
Usually, the second time around is rotated between Ron and I. The older kids cover the morning routine.
Oh sure, the carpet NEEDS vacuuming at least once a week, but with two little ones under the age of two, I'm lucky to get it done every two weeks.
~Jennifer
Wendy,
I have the same tendancies :) I have to fight off the urge to clean more due to lack of time.
It just makes the whole house feel more orderly when the floors are mopped and the carpet is clean.
Post a Comment
<< Home