Brush ceilings and walls when necessary.
I've been puzzling over this one for awhile now. Standing in the brooms-and-mops aisle of every store I've been into - gazing at all the tools and trying to decide which would do the job. Luckily, The Manual devoted a chapter to "Walls, Ceilings and Woodwork" - so back to the book I went. Time to study...
It is extremely important that walls be dusted regularly and often if more difficult cleaning tasks are to be avoided. Walls that are neglected in this respect soon acquire a film of greasy dust that attracts and holds still more dust and which inevitably becomes embedded and difficult to remove.
The only exception to this rule occurs in the case of papered walls. In soft coal regions or industrial sections dusting papered walls is not advised, because soot will be grimed into the paper no matter what method of dusting is used. An annual cleaning with a dough-type cleaner is recommended.
In other regions where dust and cobwebs are the only problem, papered walls may be dusted with the suction attachment of the vacuum cleaner.
There are three tools for dusting walls:
1. A soft wall brush of hair, nylon, lamb's wool, yarn or sponge rubber, with a long handle.
2. A fiber or corn broom covered with an "apron" of soft clean cloth, such as cotton flannel.
3. The dusting attachment of the vacuum cleaner. If you have this attachment use it, by all means, because it eliminates any scattering of dust.
Work from the top down, giving special attention to high mouldings. There is one exception to this rule: if cobwebs are present, whether they are spider webs or dust cobwebs, remove them with an upward lifting stroke to avoid streaking the walls. Cobwebs of any sort are sticky, and if they are pulled down against the wall they will leave a trail of dirt that is hard to remove.
The hose on my little bag-less vacuum works just fine when I'm using attachments to clean something near or along the floor, but I certainly can't stretch it high enough to reach the upper parts of my walls. There were some lovely extension dusting tools in the stores - complete with pictures of happy people dusting their ceiling fans on the packaging - but I hate bringing home another one of those tools with plastic handles. And that's practically all you can find these days. I didn't mind purchasing a new mop or broom back when they all had wooden handles. You know that's going to break down someday at a dump somewhere and return to the earth. But all those plastic handles... Eek! They'll be here long after the human race has run its course. Alien scientists will spend their summers doing digs on the third planet from the sun and have to presume that Swiffer was the name of some ancient god - and that ancient peoples were performing some sort of religious ritual in waving these brightly colored sticks about.
I've kind of settled on option #2, laying a flannel dusting cloth over the top of my broom and using that to dust the walls. It's not terribly efficient, though, as I keep having to readjust the cloth. (And how to dust "from the top down" when you get down to about the height of your waist? I find myself having to dust from side to side at that point.) What kinds of tools and methods do y'all use when dusting your walls? Should I be using a larger piece of flannel - something big enough that I can literally tie it up around the top of my broom? Maybe that's what the authors of The Manual meant in calling that an "apron." I see this chore popping up on the list for my bathroom as well as my living room, so I want to get it right.
Any ideas for brushing the ceiling? My ceiling has a pebbly kind of finish, so my improvised tool doesn't work at all on this part of the job... And is the tool in the foreground of the photo below the one this Illinois housewife was using in 1941 to dust the ceiling and walls of her living room?
Well, it's time to fly. One more push in cleaning the bathroom and I can have all my drudgiest chores out of the way in time for the Sabbath. (My Saturday hasn't been all work! I spent the afternoon having a lovely picnic in the mountains with my sister and nieces.) Here's my newly revised weekly housekeeping routine for the bathroom:
Open windows top and bottom for free circulation of air.
Pick up and replace small articles belonging in bathroom.
Gather up to take out soiled linen (to hamper, if dry), and articles belonging in other rooms. Collect trash in waste basket. Roll up bath mat or rug.
Wipe mirror.
Wipe tile behind washbowl and tub.
Clean bathtub and metal fixtures (be sure to wipe shower fixtures and clean soap holder).
Clean toilet bowl with brush. Wipe outside of bowl and closet with cloth used for that purpose only.
Clean washbowl (be sure to wipe base as well as top; also clean soap holder).
Straighten towels and wash cloths. Put out fresh linen.
Sweep floor. Gather up dust in pan.
Floor should be washed.
Replace bath mat or rug. Close windows in cold or damp weather.
