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Give Mom the gift of a clean house It’s easy enough to dust and vacuum and make visible surfaces in the home sparkle and shine. But a surface-cleaned home isn’t a truly clean home. Look up and look underneath, and you’ll find plenty of built-up dirt, dust and grime. This Mother’s Day, give Mom a gift that she’ll really appreciate. Offer to clean the hard-to-reach areas in her home. Take your mop and sponges to these neglected areas of the home: Ceilings. Use a step ladder to get as close to the ceiling as possible, and check every corner and crevice for cob webs. If you have a long enough vacuum cleaner attachment, use it to suck the dust and cob webs away. Ceiling fan blades. The dust up there is probably thick enough to write your name in with your finger. Vacuum your blades with a brush attachment on an extended arm. Don’t use water; fans are electric. Cabinet tops. Nobody sees the tops of Mom’s cabinets or the surface of her highest shelves—and so nobody remembers to clean them. Stand on a stool or step ladder and peer downward. You’ll see plenty of dust. Molding. Mom probably dusts the chair rails because they’re at a height that makes them easy to see. But the molding around the top of the walls or over the doorways collects dust that rarely gets removed. Stand on a stool and dust them off for her. Behind the toilet. Everyone scrubs the bowl and the seat, but does Mom really get on her hands and knees to clean the back of the base and the floor behind it? If not, she could be inviting mold and mildew. Use a stiff broom to sweep behind the toilet and then wipe it down with an antibacterial cleaner. Under the couch. If you can, recruit someone to help you move the couch so you can vacuum under and behind it. If you’re on your own, use a broom handle to fish out anything that’s hiding under there and then reach your longest vacuum cleaner attachment underneath to pull away the dust. Around wires and cables. That tangled mess behind Mom’s entertainment center or computer desk is a dust magnet. Unplug everything and clean the cords with a dry dusting cloth every couple of weeks. Use the same cloth to wipe down the computers, stereos and TV sets while you’re at it. Under the kitchen sink. That’s home to cleaning supplies—but few people ever clean it. Take it all out, wipe it down with a damp sponge and put everything back.
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