I am in the midst of doing some serious dusting and cleaning. I have the dustiest home known to man. I have posted before in regards to this issue.
I am looking for ideas on how to PREVENT dust from accumulating to begin with. I do have pets, and I am sure they contribute to the problem.
The dust in my house is absolutely horrible. Any ideas?
Cindy :)
Get rid of your carpeting and replace it with hard flooring like wood, laminate, tile, or vinyl. You will be surprised how much easier it is to keep things clean once the carpet is gone. You can also use a Swiffer mop or equivalent brand of electrostatic cloths to clean the dust from smooth, flat surfaces like walls, ceilings, doors, furniture. Make sure you have a good filter in your furnace. The cheap filters are nearly worthless at removing dust. Get a reusable electrostatic filter or a 3M Filtreat filter for the furnace and leave the fan on all the time.
Replace carpet with vinyl florr covering. Remove sofas, pillows, pads; use wooden chairs/benches. Remove draperies and fabrics, use anti-static vertical blinds. Use a waterbed rather than a mattress set. Use passive washable electrostatic filters in your furnace air return. If you have more than one furry/feathered pet, consider narrowing that down to a single pet and/or having a fish tank instead. Keep windows/exterior doors closed. Dust everything at least twice a month. Some room air filters can help, check CR for details.
I keep seeing this advice, but I live in an apartment without carpet. All I do is dust dust dust. If I don't 'dust' the floors through out the apartment everyday, then the dust builds up so bad it blows around like tumble weeds. When I say I dust the floor that consists of sweeping, mopping then sweeping again when the floors are dry to get up the rest. Swiffers? forget it they stop picking up dust after about 4 square feet. I mop with a regular cotton mop and have to rinse it every 4 or 5 square feet. Thank god I have a small apartment or I'd be going nuts.
I can't wait for carpet at least you can vacuum it and be done.
I have a couple of good air purifiers. Go to "Consumers' Reports" magazine at your library and do some research on the best. There is also a site online that you will get consumers opinions:
I once lived on a dirt road and the dust was horrible but the air purifiers really made a difference!
Sijka
^_^ I had a chenille robe one time that produced that effect. I washed & (dryer) dried it twice before wearing the first time, and fairly frequently thereafter, but it continued to release *drifts* of fuzz for as long as I had it.
Which leads me to one possible hint: if the dust/fuzz is identifiable, one may be able to discover an offending material -- carpet, clothing, furniture -- that is contributing a major amount.
I got a new wool area rug and for weeks it put out a lot of fuzz. It got much better after daily vacuuming. I agree that there must be a source for the dust.
New rugs/carpeting will shed quite a bit. Turn your vacuum upside down and clean off all the loose fibers and your vacuum will operate more effeciently.
You can vacuum it and go away knowing you have done all you can but you will still have dust and a home for dust mites. When you live in an apartment you also have all the dirt and contamination that has soaked into the pad that the previous tenants have left behind unless you are fortunate to get new carpet and pad from the landlord.
How often do you dust, and what do you use to dust?
jen
A good vacuum cleaner. I vacuum everything with mine before I polish, wash or clean.
Don't use pledge (or liquid polish) that often. It leaves a coat on that dust sticks to! That's problem number one. I use a small feather duster that can get in and out of small places and just dust weekly.
...fwiw, Ostrich-down feather dusters, in my experience, are the only way to go. Seem like they almost act like a magnet for dust.
One of my clients swears by lambs-wool dusters, but I found them too hard to shake clean.
- Michael
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Your other spam was looking for distributors, and here you claim you're not looking for them? Both spams have been forwarded to snipped-for-privacy@rr.com
Funny, I've heard elsewhere that dust static-clings specifically to ostrich feather dusters, and it certainly does to the one I picked up at Walmart or Target for $5 or less.
Not so. Professional cleaning personnel use ostrich feather dusters all the time. If you are spreading dust, then you are not using the tool properly.
I greatly reduced the dust in my house by replacing the disposable furnace filters with passive electrostatic filters that I clean monthly. They make a big difference, and save $ on buying filters too. This time of year is particularly dusty due to all the tree pollen in the air (my car windshield is covered with yellow pollen), but that's to be expected in east Tennessee.
Exactly -- if you just wave the duster around willy-nilly then you're gonna throw dust everywhere. There's a little bit of technique involved. It's pretty darn simple too. If you check out the book Speed Cleaning by Jeff Campbell you'll learn how to properly use a feather duster. There's an instructional DVD/VHS also available too - it's pretty informative. Their website is thecleanteam.com. Great tools there, too.
When I'm polishing I always use the feather duster first to rid the surface of dust, then use one of my home-made concotions to polish away.
I can't imagine cleaning houses without an ostrich-down feather duster!
And for the record -- my mother got a duster for her car that looks very much like the "texas duster," and the thing absolutely reeks! Which means it's got to be treated with some sort of chemical (wouldn't be surprised if it's another toxic chemical). I can't sit in her car if she's just used it. On the positive side, it does do a nice job getting all the dust off her black dashboard, but the smell is just atrocious. I don't know whether it's the same brand, and can't say whether the texas dusters reek like this one did, but if it does - boy, I'd stay away from 'em. FAR away. Or just bring a respirator. ;)
- Michael
I agree, you can't beat a good commercial quality Ostrich Feather Duster.
The natural oils in the feathers attract dust like a magnet, and a simple shake cleans them.
If they lose their pickup power, giving them a light steaming restores them back to like new!
The very best duster I have ever had was made from Ostrich feathers that were dropped naturally and collected as the bird moulted them.
I think the reason some folks have trouble using feather dusters is that they 'shake' them during useage, which is how you clean the dust from the duster. Thus they are putting back the dust they are collecting, just moving it from one place to another.
If you use them gently, they pick up dust like a magnet and hold it until you shake them out.
TTUL Gary
What abt the new Swiffer disposable duster?
Is the idea of a disposable one a good idea?
snipped-for-privacy@privacy.net verbositized:
I guess it depends upon which chemicals they are using to make it work. Although I'm not against disposable single use products, often the cost for the disposable does not warrant it being disposable.
EG: If you pay 20 bucks for a disposable item or pay 20 bucks for a non-disposable, refillable, etc. item, that only costs 1 buck to refill, is it really disposable.
I can give you a whole list of similar items, that have functional components that don't wear out and last a lifetime, yet are considered disposable.
Basically, anything made from a non-renewable resource, or from hazardous chemicals, should not be considered disposable except after it has performed a good service and just wore out.
Cotton is a renewable resource, but folks will hold on to old clothes for decades, never wanting to part with a single article that will never come back into style in their lifetime.
Glass is a renewable resource, but some folks store almost every glass jar they get their hands on, sometimes even until the lids rust away.
But everything they buy made of plastic, a non-renewable resource, they quickly discard as a disposable, with the exception of Tupperware, which they will hold on to for decades after it has turned yellow, the lids mangled by microwaves and with so many scratches they look fuzzy. But anything else made of plastic is quickly discarded as disposable.
Advertising and media has gotten people accustomed to things made from non-renewable resources as being disposable, and things made from easily renewable resources as keepsake items. Go Figure!
TTUL Gary
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