Since 2 years in a row I’ve ended up with wax covered linens I thought I’d take the chance this year to do a little video tutorial for how to get wax off fabric to show you just how easy it really is! Here’s the original blog post from last year.

See, it’s really quite simple, so next time you have a wax disaster don’t freak out, just pull up this video and I’ll help you get it out! This same trick also works on clothes, carpet and hard surface flooring. Those are all the places I can think of right now but honestly every time we’ve used this trick it has worked.

If you are already following me on YouTube, that’s awesome, but if you didn’t know I had a YouTube channel, with lots of great tips, then CLICK HERE to subscribe!

The post How to get Wax off Fabric and Everything Else (Video Tutorial) appeared first on Ask Anna.

Here’s a question I received from a reader after writing my post, The Many Benefits of Vacuuming.

“HOW do you vacuum to make those PERFECT vacuum lines?  Probably seems like a no-brainer to you, but I can never make LONG vacuum lines as I always end up messing it up. Thanks!!”

It has taken me awhile to put this post together because I really had to think about how I do it.  For me it’s second nature to vacuum this way, because perfect vacuum lines are important to me.  I’ve never really thought about how I do it, I just know that when others vacuum my house it doesn’t look as good {I know that sounds terrible but it’s true}.

So after thinking long and hard about it (and letting a couple years go by), I decided to do a video tutorial because I thought that would be easier for you to understand.  First let me note that it’s important is to have a good vacuum.  I love my Oreck Magnesium but I’ve also had a Dyson in the past and loved it, both make great lines! Watch the video and then read on, hopefully the video will help answer your questions, not confuse you more!

Obviously that is not our house in the video, our current home has mostly wood floors and the little carpet we do have doesn’t show good vacuum lines, so my mother-in-law was gracious enough to let me film this tutorial at her house.

Here’s the one thing I still have that shows good vacuum lines, I just LOVE this rug!

Here are a few additional tips –

• Plug the vacuum in, where you plan to end up.

• The best way to get perfect lines is to face what you are vacuuming.  For example, the fireplace in our old house (pictured above) was at an angle in the corner of the room, so when I vacuumed it I would face it and run the front of the vacuum right up to the stone. (Similar to what I showed in the video with the couches).
• Vacuum yourself out of a room. Make long lines in rows until you get to the doorway then vacuum in a fan shape out of the doorway.

• Split up large rooms into sections. In my MIL’s house I vacuumed her living room in 3 sections because it’s so large.
• When you push the vacuum forward you will make a straight line, then bring it back and a slight angle, repeat over and over for each row/section that I mentioned in the video.
• Move any furniture you can, don’t just vacuum around it. I always move the coffee table, chairs, etc.

With a little practice you’ll be making perfect vacuum lines in your house and get lots of “oooo’s” and “ahhh’s” from your friends and family members!

I know this is kind of a hard thing to explain so please feel free to leave any additional questions in a comment below. Also I’d love to have you share pictures of YOUR perfect vacuum lines with me, on Facebook, Instagram or Twitter, just make sure to tag me so I can see them!

The post How to make Perfect Vacuum Lines appeared first on Ask Anna.

A couple weeks ago my friend called me and asked if I had any ideas for cleaning really dirty tile grout. They were getting ready to move into a new-to-them house and the floors were so gross, like greasy, sticky, grimy gross, you wouldn’t even believe it! I thought about my bleach pen method but on a large scale, like over 1000 sq.ft., I thought that would be more work than it was worth. I told her I’d bring over my HomeRight SteamMachine Plus because it is an awesome cleaner and can clean all sorts of things! I’d never used it on grout before but I was sure it would work fabulously, and boy oh boy it did!!!

The easiest way to clean grout without chemicals

Materials needed:

• HomeRight SteamMachine
• Cleaning rags

I want to show you this little video of it “in action” and then I’ll break it down for you in pictures.

The giddy excitement in the video is my friend Beckie, she’s like me and loves to clean, and she was beyond excited when she saw how well the SteamMachine Plus was blowing the black grime right out of the grout.

Here are some before and after pictures that will blow your mind, especially if you have extremely dirty grout in your home!

This is in the kitchen dining room area.

This is the master bathroom. She said she could tell it was deep cleaning because there were all kinds of awful smells coming up from the grout. Gross!!

This is the transition from the kitchen to the hallway. Isn’t that amazing!?

This is the range hood. The entire thing was covered with grease and food particles, it only took me a few minutes to make it look new again!

If your jaw is on the floor and you’re wondering where you can get a SteamMachine Plus, don’t worry, you can get one on Amazon and have it shipped right to your door! Just a few more things we wanted to tell you –

• “This thing is amazing and everyone needs one!” (Beckie’s mother-in-law and sister-in-law went home and bought one after she showed them how well it worked)
• For cleaning grout this is the fastest method and it saves you from having to get down on your hands and knees to scrub.
• It not only cleans the grout but it sanitizes it too. The 205 degree temperature kills 99.9 percent of germs and bacteria including e-coli, salmonella, and staph.
• The tube that sucks the water up, has a metal ball on the end of it, so whether your cleaning the floor, or holding it upright to clean the range hood, you get the same amount of steam and pressure! (Those guys at HomeRight are so smart).
• Make sure once the grout is clean that you seal it so that it stays clean. You should reseal the grout at least once a year.
• Here’s a tip she wanted to share for how to hold the SteamMachine Plus, when you’re cleaning grout. At first she was using it like this (as you saw in the video), because it was a very natural way to hold it.

• But what she found was that it was easier and more efficient to hold it like this. See how much more of the brush is in the grout line? It’s way faster to do it this way.

When you’re done cleaning and sanitizing the grout the handheld part of the SteamMachine Plus pops back into the upright frame and you can steam clean the rest of the floors quickly and easily! This is what I use to clean the floors in our house and I love it. The mop is easy to maneuver and because of the shape of the mop head, it gets into corners and around furniture really easily.

Here are some other uses for the SteamMachine Plus from my fellow HomeRight ambassadors –

• Steam cleaning your windows for the best results
• Steam clean your clothes (forget ironing anymore!)
• Clean your mattress
• Remove pet stains
• How to clean your home for flu season
• Chemical-free cleaning ideas

This post contains some affiliate links, for your convenience. Click here to read my full disclosure policy.

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The post How to Clean Tile Grout without Chemicals appeared first on Ask Anna.

Didn’t you just love the process of picking out all the fun baby room items for your kid’s nursery?  Didn’t you just love looking at all the pretty set ups in the stores exhibiting the cutest rooms ever?  And didn’t you think your child’s nursery was going to be just as beautiful as those set-ups everyday? 

Your hopes and dreams were likely dashed after you got all that stuff home and had to put it together.  And then they were likely dashed again the first time you had to change the crib sheet.  The struggle to make everything just right in your child’s room pales in comparison to the workout you get each time you need to change the bedding. 

I used to spend about 15 minutes changing the sheets on our cribs.  I often broke nails and a sweat in the process.  It wasn’t taking off the soiled sheet that was the problem.  It was putting on a fresh sheet that was maddening! 

And then I had an epiphany!  I love solving household problems!  And this solution made it no big deal to change the sheets on my sweet ones’ little beds.  It now takes less than 60 seconds to switch-out the bedding.  Yes!  60 seconds!

Here is a tutorial of my quick and easy way to change a crib sheet:

Remove the soiled sheet, then:

1. Pick up the crib mattress and turn it on it’s short side and set it down in the crib.  It will be tall.

1. Pull the sheet down to the bottom of the mattress (now lengthwise) and pull the bottom short sides of the mattress up off of the crib.                                                
2. Stretch the fitted short sides of the sheet over the bottom of the crib mattress.
3. Turn the mattress back to it’s long side and place back in the crib.

There wasn’t that easy?!  And SO quick. 

The only thing that will make this process difficult is a crib bumper.  I recommend that you take the crib bumper out of the crib to wash before you change the sheet.  If you are not planning on washing the bumper when you wash your other linens, untie all the ties on three sides of the crib and lay the bumper over the remaining side of the crib for easy access to the mattress.

If you need a little bit more of a visual, I created a video tutorial that shows just how to do it:

I hope this simplifies and shortens your sheet-changing adventures!  If you are in need of a little encouragement to get and keep your kid’s room clean, will you please consider joining our Kids Clean Room Challenge over at Simple.Home.Blessings.?  Each day includes a task to do and a challenge to consider.  And each chore and each challenge is easily modified to your child’s abilities.  Hope to see you participating with us!

The post Quick and Easy Way to Change a Crib Sheet appeared first on Ask Anna.

Hi, I am Leah from Simple.Home.Blessings. and I am one of the new amazing contributors here at Ask Anna.  And no, I am not the aforementioned genius, but I do have a genius tip for you today, one that will hopefully make laundry time a lot easier.  I write about all sorts of things related to homemaking over on my blog.  I am all about attempting to solve the problems of everyday life around the home with simple tips.  Sometimes the homemaking is more difficult with little ones running around underfoot, causing us to have to think on our toes to stay sane.  So, Anna has asked me to write about keeping home with kids.  Today’s tip is not necessarily kid specific, but will work for kids and their clothes. Let’s get to it!

Laundry. Laundry. Laundry!  It is the bane of many a homemaker’s existence and only gets worse with each child you add to the household.  And I hear it all the time (and think to myself most days): “I don’t mind doing the laundry, it is the putting away that I don’t want to do!”  I hear ya, sisters! 

So I have a simple tip to teach you how to hang clothes and make putting away your laundry a breeze.  You could even teach your children to do it and encourage them race to see who can get their laundry hung the fastest.  It really is that simple!

I learned this trick a long time ago when I worked at a retail store notorious for delivering product to the sales floor thirty minutes before shift change and expecting the staff to have it put away before they left for the day.  The girl who trained me taught me this trick and I don’t know where she learned it, but it is GENIUS (thanks Jackie, where ever you are)!

Here is what you do:

Take your shirts (polo, t-shirt, dress, etc.) and put your arm through the neck of the shirt and extend your hand down to the bottom of the shirt (like you are threading a needle, and your arm is the needle).  Repeat until you have an armload of shirts. Take your hanger (helps to have all hangers facing the same way) in the free arm/hand and place the top of the hanger (the loop part) into the hand of the arm with all the shirts on it.  Pull the first shirt over the hanger all the way to the neck of the shirt.

If you have a sleeveless top, you will want to thread it over your arm through the arm holes (like you are carrying a purse), and then take the side of the hanger and pull it through the arm holes, pulling one shoulder over the loop of the hanger.  Just make sure you follow my mom’s advice and “hold your mouth right.” 

I know we all have different learning styles, so I made a video for the visual learners! 

Don’t you just love this simple tip?  Happy laundry days with clothes hung in the closet instead of crumpled in the laundry basket sound good to me!

Leah

The post How to Hang Clothes like a GENIUS! appeared first on Ask Anna.