Where Does That Annoying Dust Come From?

Although the need for tidiness is innate for some, there is still no ‘magic wand’ that cleans, tidies, and rearranges living spaces with a single sweep. It is true that robots for small tasks like vacuuming can be purchased, and we have had washing machines and other ‘dedicated’ household appliances for a long time, but the remaining tasks related to home maintenance are left to the hands, resourcefulness, free time, will, and capabilities of the owner. Today, however, it is much simpler to maintain hygiene in general because the market offers numerous products, both aggressive and non-aggressive, that remove years of accumulated dirt, whiten bathtubs and sinks, and effortlessly eliminate stains and similar issues. They are helpful, but they do not work alone; they need someone’s hands, yours or…

For working women, cleaning, tidying, ironing, and everything that needs to be done to keep the house clean and tidy may be one of the biggest ‘household’ burdens. Help is therefore inevitable, especially for women in more responsible positions who truly do not have time to do these tasks, no matter how much other family members assist them. Most solve this by hiring a permanent or occasional cleaner, but also through service offerings such as carpet and curtain cleaning, window washing, ironing laundry… Today, the use of new technologies significantly saves time for homemakers and facilitates the planning of household chores. There are ‘smart’ washing machines that you can program hours before they automatically turn on and start washing laundry or dishes, ovens that bake and clean and ventilate themselves, refrigerators that alert you to what food you are running low on…

Less ‘Aggressors’

In the USA, at Simmons College in Boston, they established the Center for Home and Environmental Hygiene, which is not only a national but also an international reference center. The founder of the Center, biologist Dr. Elizabeth Scot, did this to raise awareness about the importance of home hygiene, which significantly affects health. The Center promotes cleanliness and a healthy lifestyle through various educational activities, but it is not necessary to be ‘trained’ as a cleaner for a house to shine. Our grandmothers, although they did not have nearly the resources we do today, knew a lot about cleaning; they used various types of vinegar, salt, baking soda, alcohol, and cleaning agents that are now recommended for cleaning to protect the environment and our health. Environmental pollution, not only in industrial zones and large cities but also on agricultural lands due to pesticide use, is so significant that scientists have ‘diagnosed’ over four million chemicals that we breathe, drink in water, or eat in food containing more than three thousand harmful ingredients, and we introduce them into our living space in other ways. Some of these ingredients accumulate permanently in the body. Therefore, it is of utmost importance, regardless of who cleans your home, to use as few aggressive agents as possible.

Careful Planning

For a clean home, you need to create a daily, weekly, monthly, seasonal, and annual plan. Daily tasks include taking out the trash, washing dishes, tidying beds, cleaning sanitary facilities (especially the pet’s toilet), airing out… For weekly tasks, leave thorough vacuuming of the apartment, dusting, and wiping all surfaces with a cloth soaked in detergent, and you can also use various types of excellent wet wipes. Weekly tidying of the apartment includes washing and ironing laundry, cleaning the refrigerator and oven, for which aggressive chemicals do not always need to be used – a solution of baking soda can suffice. Curtains, windows, and carpets do not need to be washed every week, but if you smoke in the apartment, wash them more often to eliminate the toxic and stale smell of smoke. Monthly, defrost the refrigerator, clean plumbing drains, and seasonally tidy closets, storage… Once a year, perform a thorough tidying, which includes cleaning surfaces under large pieces of furniture and cleaning ventilation systems and chimneys if you live in a house.

Bye, Bye Ironing

However, there is a household chore that, like cooking, cannot always be strictly planned, and that is washing and ironing laundry. Cleaners charge between 30 to 40 kuna per hour for such work, but if you do not want unknown people ‘wandering’ around your house, take your laundry to a laundromat. However, if it is a hassle to carry laundry to the laundromat and go pick it up, you can ‘order’ ironing. In Zagreb, for example, there is Vešeraj d.o.o., a company that picks up, washes, irons, and delivers laundry to clients. Each client’s laundry is washed separately, and it is picked up and delivered at a time that suits the client. Washing, ironing, and picking up laundry can also be ordered online, and the price of the service depends on the amount of laundry and is determined by weight or piece. For example, washing and ironing just one jacket costs 30 kuna, a simply tailored shirt 13 kuna, a complicatedly tailored skirt 15 kuna, and washing a down jacket costs 60 kuna, which is the most expensive service. Assess for yourself whether it is more worthwhile to hire a cleaner or a laundromat.