In my comments the other day, Maggie asked:
Since you won’t be having any babies in the house for a while, can I ask a question? You may have answered this in another post, but after searching, I couldn’t find it. How do you deal with all of the cat hair in your house? I swear, I’ll spend an hour in my tiny house cleaning up after my two cats, and then a tumbleweed of cat fur goes rolling by me. I can’t even imagine how much cat hair all your kitties leave around! And in all of your pictures, your house looks so clean! What dark magic do you do???
I wish I had some wonderful secrets to impart (I’m a witch! All I have to do is wiggle my nose, and the cat hair is GONE to parts unknown!). Really, I’m lucky that we have a fairly big house, the cats mostly spread out so the cat hair is spread out as well, and also about half the cat population spends at least part of the day outside (our back yard is fenced in, and they can’t get out of the yard).
In a perfect world, I’d vacuum at least every other day, but in this world I usually manage about twice a week, and that keeps it mostly under control.
(I LOVE my Dyson vacuum, by the way!)
I have Roomba that I run in the kitchen (the place where the cat hair really accumulates) and occasionally in the bedrooms (mostly to get the cat hair and dust that’s collected under the beds).
You’d think, as many cats as I have, I’d always be covered in cat hair, but somehow that doesn’t really happen, and I can’t explain why, ’cause I don’t know! I do a quick check if I’m going out in public, and I might run one of those sticky-tape pet-hair-collector thingies over my clothes if need be (AND I avoid wearing black!).
Have you heard about the Pledge Fabric Sweeper? I use those to get the cat hair off the couches, and they do a great job. (Note: the Fabric Sweeper is meant to be used once, then tossed, but that is utterly ridiculous and wasteful. You can pop the container off when it’s full, empty it, and reuse it. It eventually stops picking up hair as well, but I usually fill up the container three times before I get to that point.)
So, yeah, no great cleaning tips from me. Someone did say in the comments that it’s really a matter of keeping on top of it, which is true, but it probably also helps to develop a little selective blindness. If it’s only been a day since I vacuumed, I’m not in the vacuuming mood, and there’s a dust bunny herd stampeding across the living room, I’ve been known to somehow NOT see it.
Also, my house is not nearly as spotless as it appears in photos, believe me!
When it comes to the foster room, I try a little harder to keep on top of the cleaning because with multiple cats in one room (even when they’re tiny – actually, ESPECIALLY when they’re tiny!) it can get pretty bad quickly. I almost always vacuum the foster room every other day (the fosters go into a carrier in the bathroom while I’m vacuuming so as not to terrify them), and on the in-between days, I have this ancient Shark Handheld Cordless Sweeper that I bought way back when I had my very first set of fosters. I crawl around the room on my hands and knees with that thing and get up any stray litter or fur. It’s nothing fancy, but it’s quiet enough to not scare the babies, it’s easy to empty, and it does a decent job of picking stuff up.
Wow, I can just go on and on for ages about anything at all, can’t I? 🙂
Got a favorite cleaning tip? Feel free to share in the comments!
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LOOK who I found on my memory stick!
That’s Ouiser in the front, M’Lynn and Clairee in the back.
Drum and M’Lynn.
I forgot they were so little!
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“What’s this ‘recovering from surgery’ bull? When Spanky wants his Snackin’! Time!, Spanky WANTS his Snackin’! Time!, and I recommend you hop to it, lady!”
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Previously
2009: And they’re such sweet girls, they deserve to find their forever homes fast!
2008: Poor girlies.
2007: No entry.
2006: No entry.
2005: No entry.