Cleaning

This trusty cleaning tool helped me tackle cushions stained with spit up, shower doors littered with hard water marks, and hardwood floors caked with tomato sauce.

Before you spring for a new machine, check through this list of common vacuuming mistakes that could be sabotaging your attempts.

Ina Garten showed us a peek at the her clean dishwasher load, revealing a few "forbidden" items that just took a spin through the machine.

Learning these things will save you frustration, time, and money—and keep your items looking their finest.

How a $2 household staple helped me tackle hard water stains that nothing else would eradicate.

Treat the purchase as a "trigger" to make a thankless cleaning task a little easier.

A laundry hack sweeping social media helped me save an entire load of laundry from indigo dye stains.

The shine of the pot after I cleaned it with ketchup was satisfying in a way I hadn’t expected, considering I felt sure the Italian shop owner was trying to punk me.

You might end up making the chore harder than it needs to be, and in some cases, causing harm to your home.

Whenever I pick up a new bottle, I started doing this one tiny, brilliant thing that has helped me banish unwanted smells from my refrigerator.

Rather than giving tasks short-shrift, you end up going above and beyond with this one small switch.

Its fans include one editor's mom *and* grandma.

I recently started keeping one of these by the sink, and right away it came in handy for even more chores than expected.

To get the yuck out of your towels, you'll need three things (that you probably already have at home).

The kitchen can be such a black hole for storage, because everything in it feels necessary. When it comes to tools and cups and food storage containers, no amount feels like enough. And in your mind, you probably have a use for all of it.

Swap out your store-bought solutions to common organizing, baby-proofing, and plant-parenting woes, and use a pool noodle instead.

There’s a common misconception in interior design that light colors, especially white, are the most impractical choice for furniture and textiles.

When you’re culling through a collection, you should spend your time thinking about what you want to live with, instead of what you can live without.

Here are five different ways I've put this tip into practice around my home.

Good ventilation is a sensible splurge.

It's no wonder you put it off.

We asked the experts about a dishwasher's impact on the environment, and the useful life of your appliance.

It just requires a few small tweaks to your normal laundry routine.

The trick says to shake for at least 45 seconds, but I went for 90 seconds—hoping I’d be shook myself with the end result.

You’ve probably spent plenty of time cleaning every visible space in your house. But the key word here? Visible. Just because you can’t see it (or don’t think about it) doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be cleaning it.

When nothing could soothe me, my therapist suggested I focus on factors in my life that, in this moment, aren’t subject to change.

It not only makes your cleaning time more efficient and thorough, but also makes you feel like you accomplished more.

Simplifying almost always means less. But when it came to solving my laundry problem, it turns out that simplifying means having more of something.

Let us help you make dishwashing less of a chore.

Parenthood is definitely full of surprises, but “Yes, I’d leave my 6-year-old alone with a Sharpie” is truly something I never thought I’d say.

If you're looking to level up your cleaning expertise, we asked for advice from housekeeping pros.

Other cleaning products might not be as efficient as oven cleaner, but the good news is, you can use it to clean lots of other things in your home.

Every now and then, in my nightly TikTok scroll, I find a life hack I absolutely have to try.

Here's a plan for when you didn't clean all week (but want your house to look and feel like you did).

Dusting is one chore that's easy for me to let slip through the cracks. But there's another dusty spot that gets overlooked even more often than tabletops and shelves.

It's bound to get a bit uncomfortable after a while. And the solution is 10 minutes and $2 away.

I've found that it works the very best when I spray the solution on a cloth rather than spraying it on the glass itself.

Even if you take on a thorough washing with a scrub brush, it's challenging to get all the nooks and crannies of a can opener clean.

Rock climbers and avid campers aren’t the only people with a good use for these sturdy clasps.

Check out this list of things that rarely see the touch of a rag or bristle of a broom—and then change that.

For your deeper window cleaning to remove dirt and restore shine, the experts recommend a seasonal cadence of once every three or so months. Here's how you do it.

Recently, the luxury mattress experts over at The Saatva Company took a shameless look at what other people do in bed. As it turns out, surveying couples about their sleeping habits yielded some rather surprising results. We can get to the responses about sex and mattress preferences later, but first things first: Of the 1,500 participants, the 962 who use a duvet actually prefer to clean all the toilets in their home over washing and reassembling the bed covering and its contents.

Because I choose to put my limited energy elsewhere or because I simply just don't do it, these are the tasks that remain unchecked in my house.

Get rid of your clunky iron for good.

Plus here's exactly what you need to know to make that deep clean happen.

Whether it happens at the laundromat, the laundry room, or just a tiny corner of your apartment where you stash the washer/dryer, Tide wants to take laundry day off your plate. This week, the detergent giant launched Tide Cleaners, an on-demand laundry and dry cleaning service “aimed at giving people the option to spend more time on life and less time doing laundry.” Although cleaning the bathroom is America’s most hated chore, doing laundry isn’t exactly loved.

Inspired by the folks who described their own homemade cleansers in our green cleaner comment thread yesterday, we remembered this list of simple and safe homemade metal cleaners in Real Simple Cleaning, and pulled it off the shelf this morning to take a look. Perfect for keeping your kitchen or bath faucets shining bright without chemicals!1. Ketchup brightens copper. According to Real Simple Cleaning, the acetic acid in ketchup dissolves the oxide tarnish that makes copper look cloudy.2.

Kate’s West Village Charm This weekend, in a search of a lost item, I ventured into the no-man’s land of one particular area of my kitchen and was aghast at what I found there. Even though it’s a little-seen area, that doesn’t make it any better in terms of the dust accumulation and the total ick-factor I experienced when I realized what kind of filth I had been harboring. So where was all the grossness hiding?

Think your home is pretty clean? Maybe you’re doing a good job of dusting the spots you remember to clean on the regular, but we bet there are a few spots that are hiding dust bunnies. Peruse this list, take a quick peek in these spots in your home and tell us if we’re right (or tell us which spots we left off). The purpose of this dust/truth revealing list is not to shame anyone who might in fact have any of these dusty spots (I looked and I had dust in three of these spots myself!

Who wants to spend less time doing the dishes? We do! There’s no need to overthink it. Sometimes the answer is simply to create fewer dishes in the first place. Try this simple tip. One person = one drinking vessel. Period.

Every kid with a piggybank knows that careful saving can add up. If you could find a way to save just $4 a week at the laundromat or in your own laundry room, you’d have over $200 at the end of the year to use however you like! Here are 8 simple steps I feel confident will put those extra dollars in the bank. 1. Wait until you can wash full loads.

There are many reasons to let your neat freak flag fly. For one, your home is probably the most spotless of your friends. And you can likely clean house in record time, too. But your knowledge and enthusiasm for cleaning might also pay off for you in bragging rights, today. (And, even if you aren’t in the sweeping and scrubbing fan club, read on, because we have a really fun quiz for you…) On a scale from Danny Tanner to Homer Simpson, how much do you know about cleaning products?

Lemons are kind of a miracle to me. Their wizardly talents range from saving sailors from untimely scurvy deaths, to working equally as well in savory and sweet dishes. And on top of that, lemons are an ace all-natural cleaning agent to use around the house. Lemon is a cleanser and deodorizer that can work wonders for your skin, wardrobe or dresser drawers. Make a serum to calm your puffy, swollen eyes. Mix lemon juice with sugar or salt to create a deliciously smelling body scrub.

It'll maintain the seal your plumbing needs to do its job, plus it helps prevent stagnant water from sitting in your faucet or showerhead and breeding bacteria.

If open shelving keeps you honest and un-cluttered, junk drawers are the organizational opposite: a hidden spot where random things are stuck and linger until later used, relocated, thrown out, or recycled. It’s your own personal purgatory and a sanity-saving catchall, so don’t resist it entirely. Just hit the reset button periodically and bring it back under control…and accept that it will fill up again.

The spillage is real.

When you don’t have a large kitchen or enough space for all of your appliances, it’s time to get creative. You’ll have to find space where you can salvage it, optimize your kitchen for maximum efficiency, so that it works, looks good, and still doesn’t feel cramped. The placement is also important, since you don’t want the washer and dryer column towering over your dinner table.

What I don’t love about the chore of spring cleaning is that once the weather gets nice I want to run outside, not be cooped up at home with rubber gloves and a duster. This month, though, is sort of that sweet spot when I can still justify a day indoors before I start to blow off my apartment for greener, sunnier pastures. Here, I try to make the process less of a chore with our roundup of best spring-cleaning tips.

Looking for help remembering to clean those “forgotten” areas of the home that have a huge impact on your space looking and feeling clean? Well we’ve got today’s assignment to tackle: Blinds! They’re a common element in many homes that we tend to leave off of our regular cleaning to-do lists. Take an hour (or less!) of time to tackle today.

We’ve shared before our opinion of the top most common cleaning tools you should keep around. Though these handy items help you maintain a healthy home, are you doing the best job you can do to keep your tools clean and working efficiently? We’ve rounded up the best ways to clean the most common cleaning tools you have around the house. It could be the perfect task for any extra time you’ve got this weekend! Here are a few of the tools we use on a daily basis.

You can turn to this list again and again, regaining control and calming the chaos with as little work as possible.

What inspires you to get organized? Maybe it’s a trip to the Container Store, or a favorite magazine or blog, or a visit to a friend’s house. For me, the fire was lit at a tender age by that childhood classic, The Berenstain Bears and the Messy Room.So I decided to go back through this beloved book, as an adult, and see if there were any gems of organizing wisdom that would be applicable to us grown-up, non-bear types. Here’s what I found.1.

This year, we’re on a mission to help you tackle spring cleaning on your time. Each weekday until April 13, we’ll guide you through a plan to clean and organize different areas of your home, but you’ll have the flexibility to choose exactly what to work on and how long you have to dedicate to the job. Five days down, and five days to go. We’re at the halfway point of our spring clean and I hope you’re feeling reset for the home stretch.

Time is short, and cleaning isn’t fun. After a long week of work, and busy days with family, isn’t cleaning one of the last ways you want to spend your free time? If keeping a tidier home is one of your new year’s resolutions, consider hiring a professional cleaner. If you have the means to hire a professional, I definitely recommend it. My household started hiring out this service a few years ago.

Not all furniture we find is attractive. It might be picked up from an online listing or passed on from relatives. Over the years we’ve spent a great deal of time focusing on these shabby pieces in efforts to make them chic once again. Check out these 30 tips, tricks and ideas for your next furniture flip!

Copper pans are loved for being quick to warm and for their extremely even distribution of heat. They are often specifically called for in candy-making and other heat-sensitive recipes, but copper is useful for almost all your cooking, since the increased control and evenness of temperature makes everything easier. Although copper is one of the most expensive materials for pans, for those who love to cook copper pots and pans are worth the investment.

Four DIY fruit fly traps, and one winner! My kitchen is fruit fly-free now.

"Newer" doesn't necessarily mean "better."

If you learn how to clean the toilet properly—and how to keep it that way—you'll be able to enjoy that fresh commode feeling around the clock.

My relationship to my space was forever changed.

Say goodbye to those uninvited guests for good!