Clean Your Couch – Tidy Tuesday
I don’t know about you, but between we tend to spend more time on the couch this time of the year than during summer, spring and fall. As I was sitting in front of the TV this morning waiting for the inauguration ceremonies to start, I noticed that all this extra time and attention left its marks on my couches. Both of them had way too many blankets and pillows piled on them and inbetween were hidden toys, and a remote. Add to that various magazines and books scattered around and on the coffee table and you get a pretty good picture of the bad shape my living room was in.
I spent a little time here and there throughout the morning straightening out the couches. Here ate the little baby steps I took while keeping an eye on the happenings on TV and of course spending time with my family. All in all it probably took me about 45 minutes.
- Fold blankets and putting most of them away, keeping just one decorative throw
- Returning lost toys etc. to their “homes”
- Take out seat cushions and give them a good “beating” outside
- Dig out change and small toys from in and under the couch
- Vaccume couch
- Clean surface of couch depending on material
We have microfiber couches in the living room and the best way to clean them, get the dust off and really get them looking better again is to take a soft clean cloth and just barely dampen it with a little water. I then use it to lightly wipe down the couches.
I’m sitting on one of the couches right now and it feels even more comfortable than before. Definitely well worth the effort.
For more cleaning tips, take a look at the following Hillbilly Housewife Ebook
Tags: couch cleaning, uphostery cleaning
January 21st, 2009 at 12:28 pm
This may encourage someone to keep the couch clean because it did me.
I had some friends over one day for dinner. We finished off the evening by sitting in the living room for a nice visit. Their oldest daughter was about 6 or 7 years old and had some costume jewelry on that she had brought from home. Well, lo and behold the ring slipped off her finger and down into the couch. I was terrified that my dear friends were going to have to stick their hands deep down into the crevices of my couch to find that ring. I panicked, needless to say, trying to take over the area where we thought the ring had been dropped. Thankfully, my friends didn’t have to recover something unexpected like broken crackers or whatever else could’ve sifted down there. My kids were really young then, so the chances were high that it could’ve been scary.
I now am scarred by that incident and try to make that a part of my cleaning routing, especially if I’m expecting friends over. Lesson learned the hard way!
January 21st, 2009 at 12:55 pm
Since I only have two kids and they both have a chore of vacuuming the couches (one does the living room the other the family room) and cleaning underneath. It’s only to be done once a month and I must say that I don’t think either of them have done it in quite awhile……hmmmmm, thanks for the reminder!
January 21st, 2009 at 2:34 pm
My couch yielded 3 unmatched socks, a cloth napkin, some gum wrappers, and $.58 along with dust bunnies and assorted crumbs. I’m glad you reminded me of this chore.
January 22nd, 2009 at 1:02 am
So glad I’m not the only one with hidden toys in the sofa! Thanks for always having great tips and advice. I think your blog is fabulous, so I gave you a double award. You can see the details at http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/skeen/648679/
February 10th, 2009 at 10:57 pm
I saw a note from Lynn D in the newsletter about smelly work clothes. I have had good success adding a cup or more of borax to a load of clothes that was stinky. I got the odor out completely. I don’t know specifically about grease odors but it works on mold, mildew and urine and they’re all pretty bad. Borax is a dry powder sold in the detergent aisle at the grocery and I think I paid less than $3 for a 2 lb. box.