Cleaning Mode

Better Half and I cleaned the dining room today.

"Aut, it took you all day to clean one room?"

Oh, I'm sorry - I don't mean clean. I mean clean. Most people would consider a deep clean something as simple as wiping dust off stuff with a Swiffer and sucking the cobwebs off the cheap light fixture with the handy shark vac. Not in this house, Buster.

To clean, to truly clean, one must remove everything from the surfaces of furniture. The furniture is washed (yes, washed, with wood oil soap), wiped dry and buffed, and then polished with wood oil (by hand, with a rag. None of that Pledge junk.) The baseboards and all wooden trim are treated likewise, with careful attention paid to the 80 year-old French doors leading into the dining room (they still have their original glass and hardware. Well, all the doors have their original hardware, thank you.) The rug is cleaned, stains removed, and then vacuumed (no wood floors yet, but that is our second project, followed by removal of the ghastly drop ceiling in the dining room and replastering.) All brick-a-brack is cleaned, thoroughly, including the antique coffee urn, the cherished soup tureen. Everything is put back in place, and the changing of drapery (of course, with my love of textiles, I have drapes for each season... summer, autumn, and spring.) The lights on the wall, by the way, are the remnants of the gas lights that once hung as the only source of light in the room. The "newest" fixtures are a pair of ugly florescent fixtures (seen in the picture above) tucked into the drop ceiling. Yes, must change that out, ASAP.

Better Half kicked ass on the wood trim, although I would not trust him to do the furniture. That painstaking work is reserved for a woman, who knows just how much pressure is needed when buffing in oil (sorry guys, you may rock when you build the stuff, but we rule when it comes to maintaining it.) Nothing in the dining room, with the exception of a few candles, pictures and pottery, is under the age of 50. Most of the furniture is older than my mother. The textiles, of course, are new.

The hard work was worth it, although I have to fix the drapes. I hung them up on the fly, and then tore off to teach a class, so they are a bit shoddy looking. Some careful attention will get them looking proper in no time.

Tomorrow is the living room, and then the kitchen. We'll progress up the stairs, taking it a room at a time, as our bodies allow. It is well worth the effort, and the house will sparkle just in time for the holiday season to blow through. I'm so lucky to have Better Half to help me. He's a patient fellow.

Well, he's also a good hearted fellow. We are watching the new season of Animal Precinct, and he's trying to hide the fact that he's a bit teary-eyed over the condition of some starving dogs. It really is a troubling sight (the dogs, not the good-hearted Husband), and I have to wonder what the hell is wrong with people... why they would bother to own a dog if they can't take the time to maintain it.

Yes - the room is red.