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Springtime scour: Professional tips from eagle-eyed cleaning pros for making cleaning less of a hassle
Properly outfitted
Here’s what Two Maids & A Mop local Operations Manager Alyssa Meyer says her cleaning teams take to a job site:› Plastic scrapers: For caked on food on surfaces such as counter tops, backsplashes, ovens, heavy soap scum in showers and gum off of tile floors.› Toothbrushes: For small, hard-to-reach areas such as drains, sink fixtures, corners and toilet-bowl hinges.› Scrub brushes: For cleaning grout in the showers and tile floors.› Magic Erasers: For counters, trim work … virtually anything that does not have a wood finish, which it can harm.› Terrycloths: For general cleaning and disinfecting surfaces.› Microfiber cloths: For dusting, polishing, and cleaning glass.› Poles (broom, mop, duster, high duster): For floors and hard-to-reach areas where dust accumulates.
Watching the professional house cleaners of Two Maids & A Mop work their way through a kitchen is a bit like walking through a crime scene with Sherlock Holmes. They notice the kind of unsightly details most eyes slide over like stained Teflon.
For many homeowners, “cleaning” involves a half-hearted swipe here or there before calling it a day. Professional cleaner April McClure, 33, however, spends more than half an hour scouring just a few feet of countertop in Jacob and Chryssy McDonald’s 3,100-square-foot home in Harrison.
She dusts the blinds over the sink, polishes the window panes and cabinet pulls before wrangling errant crumbs from behind the toaster.
“[Cleaning] is an eye-level thing [for most people],” she says. “Where they see, they wipe and ignore the rest of it.”