Reducing Allergens in Your Home

The month of May brings many things:  sun shining, flowers blooming, green grass, windows open, and lastly, those pesky allergies.  May is National Asthma and Allergy Awareness Month, and a clean, dust free home is the first step to enjoying clean, fresh air. In the United States alone, 70 million people suffer from asthma or allergies.

Cleaned to Perfection has some helpful hints to keep the air your family breathes as clean as possible.  Dust in your household contains common allergens such as dust mites and animal dander. When these are disturbed from furniture, carpet, or a hard surface they become airborne and pollute the air you breathe.   Most common cleanings just recirculate the dust in the air, but with these simple cleaning tips, you can dramatically decrease the level of allergens in your home.

     

• While cleaning wear a mask to protect yourself from the recirculated dust.  After, it is recommended that you leave your home for a few hours to avoid the allergens. 
• When dusting hard surfaces, use a moist cloth or a special duster designed to trap and lock dust. 
• It is recommended in place of wall to wall carpeting,  using hardwood or linoleum floors, with just small, washable area rugs. 
• If not a viable option for your home, vacuum once or twice a week with a vacuum that has a high-efficiency air filter. As well as periodically, deep cleaning the carpet to remove stains, spills, and dust. 
• Instead of cloth, consider switching to leather furniture. 
• Wash bedding, linens, and curtains in hot water at least once a week. 
• Use double paned window if in colder climates, and inspect and clean the pollen and mold from window sills and frames. 
• Remove items that collect dust such as : knickknacks, ornaments, old magazines and books. 
• Store childrens toys in plastic bins. 
• To reduce pet dander, if you have an allergy, don't keep pets with feathers or fur.  If you are unable to find a home for your pet, make the bedrooms a no-go zone.
• Wash dishes frequently, do a deep cleaning of the sink, remember to wash the faucet, to remove any old debris and mold.  
• Store all food in a sealed plastic container (including pet food).  Wash pantry with soap and water, picking up any debris that may have fallen.
• At least twice a month, wash your fridge, wipe out any drippings, get rid of any old, expired food.
• Mop the kitchen floor at least once a week.
• In the bathroom, get rid of any wallpaper, using a mold resistant paint or tile in place. 
• Use a towel to dry the shower after every use.  Scrub to remove mold, and remove any mats or rugs that may have collected dust and mold.  
• Keep your entire house between 68 and 72 degrees, and the humidity no higher than 50 percent. 
• Don't allow smoking in your home. 
• Do a regular cleaning at least once a week, and a thorough deep cleaning in the home at least twice a month.

All of us at Cleaned to Perfection realize the amount of work that goes into a maintaining a clean, healthy, happy home. Hopefully, with these helpful hints this allergy season will be easier on you and your family. And as always, we are available to help you with your cleaning needs for this season, and those to come.  Call us for an estimate at 631-941-4607, or visit our website Cleaned to Perfection and fill out an estimate form and we will get back to you.

We're Taking the Cleaning out of Your Spring!

LET US TAKE THE CLEANING OUT OF YOUR SPRING!

      With the first chirp of the birds outside your window, you open your eyes to a new season.  Spring has finally sprung!  

      The jump-off to spring also means that it's time for spring cleaning.

Cleaned to Perfection is proud to offer a complete set of "extras" 

that meet your spring cleaning needs.

      

      We want you to wake up on the weekend knowing that your home is cleaned from top to bottom, and more importantly, that your family is breathing fresh, clean air. The extras that we've added have all come from our client's requests in the past.

Give us a call with your spring cleaning requests 631•941•4607
You can find our "extra" recommendations here! 
Let spring begin !

Storing Summer Belongings

The final days of summer are upon us. Take the time to enjoy the warm air and light evenings. For those of you counting down the days until school starts, take a moment to enjoy your kids before the pressure of the school year settles upon you both.

Objects of summer are plentiful and can be dirty. Think beach chairs, coolers, tote bags, sand toys, and more. When the time comes to put these away for the cooler months, take a few extra minutes to prepare them for storage. A little bit of time and effort now can save a lot of time and effort later.

• If it can get wet, hose it down! Get all of the sand and dirt off and out of creases. Do this early on a sunny day and leave it to fully dry in the sun. 

• Carefully inspect the items. If it is broken or worn, throw it out. It won't magically fix itself over the winter.

• Straighten out the shed or garage and make a place for summer items. Rotate the shovels and sleds to the front and place the sand toys and beach chairs in the back. 

• Store items in like groups so you can easily find what you are looking for. For example, items that you take to the beach can be placed together or items you take to the soccer fields can be placed together.

• Make a list of discarded items that you want to replace before next summer. This way you can throw items out and not worry that you will be caught unprepared next summer.

Cleaned To Perfection is just full of simple tips to help simplify your life and give you more quality time. Want more tips? Call us at 631-941-4607!

Keep the Beach Out of Your Home!

Does it seem like it is more difficult to keep you home neat and tidy during the summer months? Do you find your home filled with neighborhood kids leaving their mess behind? If so, you may think that an outing to the beach will keep the mess out of your home, but sadly you will find that the mess typically travels home and enters the house right along with you.

At Cleaned To Perfection we pride ourselves on making life easier for our clients. While we may not  be able to follow behind all the mess makers in your life to clean up as they move through your home, we like to offer tips to help keep things as neat and clean as possible for your comfort between your cleanings. So here are some tips to keep the beach out of your home!

• Removing all the sand from your family members is one of the biggest challenges you face. Accept that they will in fact bring sand home with them, but there are steps you can take to limit the amount. Of course, if a shower is available at the beach, have each person rinse as best they can. Shake out hair and put long hair up in a ponytail or bun. 
• Before entering the car, use the baby powder trick. Sprinkle baby powder on your body and watch the sand fall off like magic! Have everyone sit the car and stick their feet out so they can remove the sand and not have to step on the sandy ground again.
• Mesh bags are a fabulous tool! Hopefully, your family will wear waterproof shoes to the beach like flip flops. Place them in a mesh bag and rinse them off at a water spigot. Sand will be removed while the water is able to drip right out. This works great with sand toys as well!
• Give each person a fresh towel to sit on in the car. Once home, have them place the towel on the floor of the shower, then stand on the towel while they remove their sandy suit. The towel will collect the sand that inevitably collects in the suit. Carefully wrap the suit in the towel, bring outside, and shake the sand free from the towel and the suit.
• Place all dirty beach towels in a plastic bag or a washable bag before placing in the car. 
• Place a sheet in the trunk of the car to catch all of the sand from chairs, coolers, etc.
• Make sure everyone knows the rules! Have a spot where all items returning from the beach are placed to minimize the mess. Have a spot where people returning from the beach can wait until their turn to shower. 

The best way to keep things neat and clean is to plan and organize. You know your family best. Think about their habits and do what you can to limit their messy impact on your clean home (without sucking all of the fun out of the day of course)! Remember, mess happens. Enjoying life typically means there will be something to clean up. So go ahead and enjoy life. Your Cleaned To Perfection team will be along soon!

YOU Can Enjoy Your Pool Too!

Summertime! Long, hot days lounging by the pool.  Listening to music and sipping cool drinks. Wait a moment. That doesn't sound like your days? Oh, that's right. While others swim and relax, you are the one fetching drinks, towels, sunscreen, pool toys, etc. Well, Cleaned To Perfection has some suggestions to help you enjoy the pool too!


Keep things simple. Think about the time spent at the pool and the things most often needed. Is there anyway to keep these items handy and accessible to everyone? For example, towels are used in abundance. Keep a bin near your dryer. As the the towels come out of the wash, place them in the bin rather than putting away in the linen closet. Rotate with a bin kept poolside for wet towels.

Keep a covered bin with cups, plates, and napkins handy. Bottled water and single serving packets of lemonade, punch, and iced tea mix allow for drinks to be made fresh and on the spot. If you wish, just bring a bucket of ice out so they can be served chilled. Add some bags of chips, pretzels, ect. to the bin as well. Once snacks and towels become self served, there is so much less for you to do!

Place hooks around the pool area people can easily hang their wet towels, coverups, t-shirts and more. You can even designate one or two hooks per family member so that everyone should know where their stuff is without having to ask you!

Make a first aid kit to keep poolside too. It can contain sunscreen, band aids, tissues, hand sanitizer.

The idea is to think ahead and keep as much poolside as possible. Not only will you cut down on the number of times you need to get up and retrieve something, but you will also limit the number of times wet people track throughout your home!

We hope this gives you some good ideas and you can finally relax and enjoy your pool!

Showcase A Special Spot In Your Home

We are fortunate to go into many beautiful homes each week and we enjoy the unique character each home has. Cleaned To Perfection would like to showcase the special space in our client's homes.

If you would like to share a photo of your home, we would be honored to upload it to our social pages. Tell us why the space is special to you or why it is unique. It can be a room, a wall, an accessory .... anything that is special to you and you would like to share. Email the photo and information to info@wecleantoperfection.com.   

Here is a submission from a long time client. This wall is special to her for many reasons. It has showcased her children's art work for many years, the chalkboard has been used for fun games, but also to announce all celebrations such as birthdays and anniversaries. The wall itself was a gift designed and created in secret by a close friend. Unaware that her friend was doing this, she arrived home one day and found that the ugly wall she hated and been replaced by this beautiful one. Our Cleaned To Perfection staff enjoy looking at the wall each week to see what has been added! 

We would love to hear your special story and share it with our Cleaned To Perfection family. We look forward to your submissions!

 

Happy Holidays!

Preparing for Thanksgiving

With all of the crazy weather we have been having lately, it's hard to know just what season we are in. Believe it or not, Thanksgiving is next week!  Are you ready? 

We have noticed the lines in the supermarket have been a little longer, carts a bit fuller, and let's face it, customers a bit more harried. So we decided to take a look at the master of holiday entertaining and see how Martha Stewart organizes beginning with the day before Thanksgiving.

1 Day Before Thanksgiving

• Defrost pie dough; assemble and bake pies.
• Make the giblet stock for the gravy.
• Make the vegetables and side dishes that require baking. Reheat tomorrow or assemble today and cook tomorrow.
• Peel potatoes and refrigerate in a pot of cold water.
• Prepare the stiffing, but leave out the raw eggs until you stiff the bird.
• Set the table tonight or first thing in the morning.

 Thanksgiving Day

• 9:30 a.m.  Remove the turkey from the refrigerator, and allow it to sit for 1 hour at room temperature.
• 11:15 a.m.  Preheat the oven, and stuff the turkey.
• 11:30 a.m. Put the turkey in the oven, basting it every half hour.
• Noon  Chill the white wine
• 1:00 p.m.  Make the mashed potatoes. Reheat closer to dinner time.
• 3:00 p.m.  Whip the cream or the pie and prepare (but do not brew) the coffee.
• 4:00 p.m.  Check the temperature of the turkey and if it is done, remove it from the oven. If not done, check every 15 minutes until it is.
• 4:15 p.m. While turkey sits for 30 minutes prior to carving, make the gravy and any last minute vegetables. Remove stuffing from the bird and transfer to a baking pan. Bake stuffing until it reaches 165 degrees.
• 4:30 - 5:00 p.m. Call everyone to the table. Start the coffee maker just before sitting down.

  The moral of this planner seems to be "do as much before Thanksgiving Day as possible." Your day may look different than Martha's, but by adding a few extra tasks to your already busy days leading up to the holiday you can have more time to relax and enjoy the day. 

Remember, you don't have to do it all alone. Everyone will enjoy the fruits of your labor, so ask for everyone to pitch in a bit. Make a list of tasks for each family member that you feel comfortable having them do. Look for areas where you can outsource as well. For example, if you cook the whole meal from scratch, maybe you wouldn't mind buying desserts from a bakery. Of course, our favorite outsourcing is hiring Cleaned To Perfection to make your home sparkle for you and your guests!

Pace yourself and remember to take time to enjoy the holidays.  From our families to yours, Happy Thanksgiving!

Get Creative With These Organization Ideas!

Most of us want our homes to be organized, but find it a challenge for a number of reasons. Organizational products can be pricey and unattractive. Sometimes we just don't want to make the effort of removing an item from a storage container when we can just leave it out and readily available to us. Then of course, there are those other people we live with. No one else seems to understand how to put things away.

Sigh. It can be overwhelming and a thankless job to keep your home organized. Cleaned To Perfection is here to help! We have compiled a few creative storage ideas that are inexpensive, easy (and dare we say fun) to use and add some personality to the room. Feel free to duplicate these ideas in your home and be inspired to create your own! Share your photos and ideas with us in the comment section of the blog or on our facebook page!






Kitchens! So many items, so little easy to reach space! Here is a clever idea to stay organized and help with the dinnertime rush. Place all the ingredients needed for one meal in a translucent bin. When it's time to cook, grab the bin. No more searching for ingredients!

Genius! Measuring cups and spoons each have their own labeled hook on the inside of a cupboard door! Add a handy measurement conversion chart and adding the right amount of ingredients is simple!

Bathrooms with small spaces can be an extra challenge. Create a bit of extra space with decorative flowerpots to hold frequently used items.

Plugs! Always tangled. Never the one you're looking for. Try placing large binder clips in the edge of your desk an slipping one cord through each!

Crafty? Place all those spools of ribbon on a pants hanger! The ribbon is easy to find and easy to use. Works well for present wrapping ribbon too!







Don't forget to share your ideas with us! We'll share them as we get them!