Works for Me - Swiffer

To understand this post, you need to know that as a child & teenager I heard a certain phrase many Saturday mornings as we cleaned the whole house top to bottom. I would hear "If you're not going to do it right, you may as well not do it at all", and then I had to re-clean whatever wasn't done "right". Believing this has impeded my progress in several ways, but my psychology will have to wait for another post. When, or if, I clean, I am pretty anal about it. When, or if, I clean, it is done thoroughly and usually takes a while. However, after therapy and re-training my thoughts, I have found something that does a "good enough" job for me when, or if, I clean the tile floors. Sorry, it must be a bad day.

Do you have one of these? This is the cheap Swiffer. They sell refill cloths for them that are dry or wet. I don't think the dry ones hold onto crumbs on tile well, and when I use the wet ones, the solution makes my tile look dull and I think it just attracts dirt. Save your money--don't buy them.

When I clean my kitchen and entry tile floors, I prefer to vacuum up the crumbs and dirt. When I don't feel like mopping by hand, I get my cheap swiffer. I wet and ring out a sturdy, fluffy kitchen wash cloth, hook it onto the swiffer, and then mop the floor with it. I have my favorite cleaner in a spray bottle that I spray on some sticky areas, but clean water usually does the job. I take off and rinse out the cloth whenever it needs it, and when I'm finished, it goes in the washer. It is vital that the cloth is fluffy both for scrubbing and soaking power.

By the way, I wouldn't do this in the bathrooms unless you wear rubber gloves, spray disinfectant, and use bleach in the washer.