Cleaning your house may not be fun, but it’s a necessary thing we must all do. To make your cleaning go a quickly as possible, you need to follow some basic rules. One of these rules is being prepared by having all of your supplies on hand and having them where you can easily get to them.

What Supplies Do You Really Need?

According to TV commercials, we need everything. Of course, we know this isn’t true, but sometimes we get suckered into believing that whatever they’re selling will speed up our cleaning efforts. Try to resist any impulse buys and stick to the supplies that you really need. What supplies do you really need? Here’s a basic list to get you started.

• Plastic bucket – Even if you think you aren’t going to need one, go ahead and get one. These are very cheap. You can even get one in the paint supply section for $1.00.

• Mop – I personally like the mops with cloth strips. I find that you can get these into all of the corners and even use it on the baseboards to clean them at the same time you’re busy mopping.

Many people like the "Swiffer Wet Mop" type products these days. These are okay for a quick clean on a smooth surface. However, if you have tile floors, they don’t work. It just gets a lot of extra water on the grout but doesn’t actually clean the grout. Nothing beats one of the cloth strip mops for cleaning tile.

• Broom – I used to think that a broom is a broom is a broom – wrong. Don’t get a bargain broom at the dollar store. Invest a little money and get a good broom with good bristles.

• Dustpan – You will always need a dustpan for sweeping up some type of mess or another.

• Squeegee – This is what professionals use on windows and to keep shower walls and doors spotless. Again, you don’t have to spend a lot of money on one, but do try to get a decent quality or it will be a waste of your time.

• Knee pads – You can get these in the gardening section or in the hardware section. Sometimes you will have to get down on your hands and knees to get some cleaning done. When this happens, you will save your knees a lot of stress and bruising.

• Dustcloths – The new dusters are good for hard to reach places, but you always need a stash of good old dust cloths.

• Furniture polish – Most of the time, I give my furniture a quick dusting with the feather duster, there are many times that you will need polish to get up unidentified sticky messes off your furniture and to just give it an occasional polishing to make it look really great.

• Carryall tray – This is a plastic bin that has a handle on it. It looks like a tray out of a toolbox. You can get these in the tool section at your local store. This is a vital piece of equipment. It is essential that you have all of your supplies in one place. With one of these, you can carry all of your supplies with you from room to room. This saves you a lot of time running back and forth and saves your legs.

• Ostrich feather duster – I highly recommend a good ostrich feather duster. It traps dust like no synthetic duster can.

• Pumice stone – If your toilets and sinks are old and worn out and there’s no hope in sight of getting new ones, keep a pumice stone in your carryall. It will remove even the worst rings from your toilets.

• Toothbrush – Keep your old family toothbrushes to scrub small areas. They are great for cleaning the crud around sinks and sometimes grout.

• Vacuum cleaner – Essential. Get a good vacuum cleaner and be sure to get one that has tools with it so you can get to hard-to-reach places.

• Ammonia – This is a great all-purpose cleaner. Be sure and get the non-sudsing kind.

• Powder cleanser – Periodically, you will need an abrasive cleanser for stubborn dirt.

• Rubber gloves – Keep a pair in your carryall. Even if you don’t use them all the time, they can save your hands from getting rough from using chemicals while cleaning.

• Paper towels – Keep a roll for wiping up messes and cleaning windows and mirrors.

With these supplies, you’ll always be ready to tackle any cleaning job that you have to do. It’s also a lot easier to delegate the cleaning when you can hand a spouse or child the carryall and tell them to "go at it!"

Jason Ladock

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