Tag: home

Today’s vinyl floors are a far cry from the shiny, plastic-looking sheet or tile floors your grandmother might have installed in her home. Although yesterday’s were prone to tears, scratching and scuffing and looked so artificial, today’s feature more durable matte finishes and more realistic, natural designs that get installed as click-together planks. They’re the newest members of a category called “resilient flooring,” and because they come as individual planks, replacing damaged sections is easier too.

For these reasons, modern vinyl plank flooring has become a popular alternative to wood floors in homes across the globe, especially in areas like kitchens, bathrooms and laundry rooms. These floors are not only easier to maintain than traditional hardwood floors, but they’re more moisture-resistant too, so they’re better equipped to withstand heavy traffic — ideal for families with kids and pets.

But that doesn’t mean vinyl floors don’t need routine TLC. Even these fuss-free, wear-resistant floors need a proper cleaning once in a while, so it’s a good idea to incorporate the task into your regular cleaning schedule. We checked in with Carolyn Forté, executive director of the Good Housekeeping Institute Home Care & Cleaning Lab, for the best cleaning tips and advice.

How to clean vinyl plank flooring after installation

First things first: If your vinyl flooring product was installed with glue, you may notice excess glue seeping to the surface. Avoid cleaning this mess or walking on the flooring for at least 24 hours to give the adhesive time to set properly. Once set, you can safely remove the excess product without damaging your brand-new floors by following these steps:

1. Gather the proper tools: You’ll need a scraper, a spray bottle and a floor stripper or an acetone-based nail polish remover to help loosen the excess glue.
2. Spray the

Sherry’s post a few months ago about what furniture & decor we still own after downsizing was the first time I’d looked back at photos of our previous house in a while. It was a fun walk down memory lane (how has it been 2.5 years since we moved?!). It also jogged my memory about how much “extra house” we used to have. As in, full rooms that were so under-utilized that I’d almost forgotten about them!

Don’t get me wrong: we loved that house. But, as you know, it was a much bigger house than we realized we needed (spending an entire summer in our smaller pink beach house really clarified that for us – more on that here), and we were excited & relieved to downsize to our current home in Florida. We went from 3,150 square feet in Virginia to 1,400 square feet here – which is less than half the space, for the math nerds out there.

Some rooms here are just smaller than their Virginia counterparts, but we also have full rooms that are just totally missing (we went from 3 bathrooms to 1, and no longer have things like a garage, a home office, a dining room, etc). And over the past 2.5 years of living here in our smaller home (through a global pandemic, which resulted in an entire year of at-home learning in our smaller space!) we’ve definitely put having fewer rooms to the test. And since it has been a few years, and we’ve gotten along so well without them, I thought it’d be interesting to see which ones we don’t miss (and the ones that we do miss).

6 Rooms Versus 14 Rooms

Simply put, our current home has six rooms. A multifunctional room downstairs that has a

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Dry indoor air, especially in the winter months, can lead to dry skin and sinuses — and even dry furniture and wood floors. Maintaining a proper level of humidity in your home is important for healthy living, and the easiest way to put moisture back into your home’s dry air is with a good cool- or warm-mist humidifier. But it’s important to disassemble and clean it regularly. Water is a breeding ground for mold and microbes. Wait too long in between cleanings, and you may end up breathing in some of that bacteria.

We consulted with experts here at the Good Housekeeping Institute for ways to help keep your humidifier clean during the winter months (and beyond). When you clean your humidifier, how you do it will depend on the type you have. “It’s always best to follow the cleaning directions of your model,” says Carolyn Forté, executive director of the GH Institute Home Care & Cleaning Lab.

For specific maintenance instructions, Forté recommends holding on to the owner’s manual — or keeping it available until you get the hang of it. If you can’t seem to find your owner’s manual, contact the manufacturer or check its website. But if neither is at your disposal, here are the basics steps to cleaning any humidifier.

Note: Don’t wash a wick filter, as it can damage the paper-like material and potentially remove an antimicrobial coating. You’re better off replacing the filter with a new one. Remove any filter before cleaning your humidifier’s tank, base and parts.

How often should you clean a humidifier?

The answer might surprise you. At least once a week, turn off your humidifier and get cleaning — but you can certainly do it more frequently if you or anyone in your family has respiratory problems and