friday favorite :: floor cleaning

I forgot to schedule a post this past week, but I don’t have time for a big post, so here’s my Friday Favorite a couple of days late.

Our whole first floor is either hardwood, laminate flooring or linoleum. We have one room that’s still carpet – my office / Emma’s playroom – but we’re hoping to put laminate down in there very soon. Emma and I both have allergies, so eliminating carpet is something I want to do in every single room one of these days. I just cringe thinking about how much crap is in our carpet – especially since we’ve had three dogs living in this house at one time.

In the meantime, I love having the hardwood/laminate flooring, and the linoleum is just fine for our needs. I’m not a “must have tile” kind of person – especially when you have kids that constantly throw or drop things. Breakable things.

One of the perks of having flooring like this is the ease of cleaning. That’s where today’s favorites come in to play.

#1. Rubbermaid Microfiber Dust ‘n Mop – the easiest mop I’ve ever used! I can’t find an exact price online, but I think I paid around $14 for mine.

I’ve never used this to dust the floor, because I always have to use my trusty Dirt Devil Direct Power Stick Vac to vacuum beforehand. We have two dogs who shed and a toddler. A dust mop just ain’t gonna cut it.

It has a removable elasticized microfiber cloth over the head, so I just either take it off and wet it down or I let Emma spray it with a water bottle to mop. Since the cloth is removable, I just throw it in with towels and sheets after I’m done mopping.

#2. Pine-Sol – it’s cheap, it works great, and it smells SO good. Reminds of my childhood because mom always mopped with Pine-Sol and water.

I don’t use any of the fancy scents – the original is my favorite. Mmmm … I can smell it now.

Oh wait, that’s because I just mopped. Yeah. Smells good.

I’m all about easy, so I have a large spray bottle that I filled with a 1:3 Pine-Sol:water ratio, and I just squirt the floor and mop with the dampened Rubbermaid Dust ‘n Mop.

Y’all, it is easy and SO easy and also … EASY. Seriously.

Easy.

If I did a series on Friday Unfavorites, I would have to put the Orange Glo Everyday Cleaner on my list. It smells great and works good at getting shoe marks or dripped juice cleaned off of our floors (not that my kid drips juice on the floor or anything) but it makes the floor sticky. Even Ken noticed that it was sticky, and he’s the guy who could get slapped in the face by mold before he noticed it.

And since we don’t live in a movie theater or a baseball park, I’m not a fan of sticky floors. Sorry, Orange Glo.

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