Monday, July 8, 2013

The Hardwood Floor Drama

I always wanted hardwood floors.  So much easier to look after than carpets, or so I thought.  They are definitely better for allergy sufferers.  They would be cleaner too because you can actually wash the hardwood not just the top layer of fiber as with carpets.

Well my home now consists of wall to wall hard wood floors.  Yay! This will cut out a lot of housework, a quick vacuum and wipe, all done, or so I thought.  Wrong!

 I washed all the hardwood with a hardwood floor cleaner you squirt into a pail of water.  The floors looked great!  Clean and shiny, until they actually dried.  The clean left a film all over the floors.  I tried several different brands of hardwood floor cleaner and they all left a film of some sort.  Then I bought the steam cleaner for bare floors.  The kind you use only water to steam clean your floors.  I loved that idea because I wasn't using any chemicals.  It seemed to do ok the first time, but the mop gets dirty and you throw it into the washer to clean it.  Well then there's a residue left from laundry soap that ends up on you floors!!  On top of that I was told the extreme heat may damage the finish on hardwood floors.  Back to the drawing board.

I went back to using the hardwood floor cleaner and actually drying the floors as I went.  Awesome!  The floors shone like glass, no marks, no smears, pure perfection.  I could barely walk the next day my back was so sore, and my knees had seen better days.  I was at the end of my rope.

My hubby comes home with a Swiffer Wetjet Spray Wood Floor Cleaner Starter Kit Mop. What you get in the starter kit is one power mop, a small bottle of wood floor cleaner solution, two AA batteries and two disposable cleaning pads.  The kit was purchased for  $19.99 at Walmart.  The mop swivels so you can get into the corners.  Very light to use, approximately 3.5 lbs.  I wasn't really expecting much from this little mop.  I had pretty much tried everything else and nothing was working. 

I vacuumed and got out my new Swiffer Wetjet and started with the dining room floor.  I let it dry before I would even start another floor.  I wasn't spending half the day do all my floors to be disappointed again with the product.  Well, I was so impressed!  The floor was clean and so shiny!  There was absolutely no streaks left behind, no water marks, nothing.  My hardwood gleamed and looked like new floors.  I was so excited to finally find something that really worked on hardwood. 

If you have been dealing with the hardwood floor drama,  I suggest you pick up one of these mops and give it a try.  It is worth every penny.  Yes, you will need to purchase more solution and pads but considering what a great job it does and how much I have spent trying to get my floors to look this great, it's all worth it.

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