Cleaning

also i have hired someone to clean the apartment i just moved out of because fuck it

I didn't grow up with blinds, I didn't really even know what they were? In 1997 I visited NY for the first time in my adult life, and somewhere in Hoboken we passed a sign that said "Blind Cleaners" and I spent days wondering whether they were offering to clean your blind people or offering the cleaning services OF blind people and finally dismissed it as a weird error. It took me YEARS to realize.

I grew up with roller blinds and miniblinds took on this aura of being smart and lovely.

every few months I go through this whole process of 'I'm going to get rid of these blinds' and then I look into ooh yes curtains and then it's just, every window in the house is a different width - 3 windows in the living room all look the same to the naked eye but they're all slightly off...and then ooh what color curtains and oh are they thick enough and do I need lining and maybe I need sheers and even doing it cheaply the process becomes a LOT more expensive than I bank on every time

I would love plain old roller blinds and sheers but again, it's just kind of a nightmare trying to put my arms around getting it done.

which is what led me to just cleaning the blinds I have. I figure even if I hate them, at least if they look presentable it'll bring up the rooms a little. and it has. so far.

I am not defending them now, only explaining how I came to think of them as quite all right.

xp

I just can't spend a whole lot of money right now, so I'm going with "make the best of what I have" at the moment.

Totally. carl won't mock you when we come visit.

i blame the USA network's 1980s late night dramas that made us think that peering through miniblinds was sexy and dangerous

You guys have got me side eyeing my (blue!) kitchen blinds now but I don't know if I can be bothered. Also the cord is frayed and the things don't work 100% correctly anymore. If I break them then the neighbours will see right in and then I won't feel free to prance around in underpants.

nail up a sheet over the window, it's worth it

I don't have any fabric that matches and is thick enough to hide us from the neighbours. Our windows are about three feet apart with the sinks underneath, it gets awkward. One day I'll go and buy some fabric just for this task.

Get some textured clear window clings then, if u want light with privacy. Possibly even just put them on the bottom half of the window?

I would love plain old roller blinds and sheers but again, it's just kind of a nightmare trying to put my arms around getting it done.

this was me for the last 10 years. meanwhile, my blinds were getting grosser and grosser. to carl and io's credit, neither of them mocked me when they came over to my home. i just don't want to feel like this anymore!

textured clear window clings
some what?

oh, those are great! they are indispensible for 1st floor apartment dwellers

Removable plastic films with an embossed texture that you smooth onto windows to make them not transparent.

i understand what the words mean, but what are they called? where do you get them?

window clings, or window film -- you can get them at hardware stores, I think ikea even sells some

LL, like this kind of thing:
http://www.notmartha.org/images/other/designsponge/windowfilm/strossel_geranium.jpg

not as twee obv

http://www.lighteffects.com/

ok see i have never seen such a thing! ty

those are pretty!!

we just had plain frosted vinyl ones on the lower panes of our windows and they were really just indispensable especially since our apartment didn't get barely any light. we never had a bathroom curtain, on the 1st floor even! so i will vouch for their privacy.

Ftr I barely even noticed the blinds at your house, you crazy person, I was totally focused on hanging out with you. I was super jealous of all your sunlight though.

Uh that's to Lechera.

I hadn't thought of window clings! that would be a better solution for the bathroom come to think of it

xp - but they were really gross, and i knew it :(

i'm totally gonna look into those -- do you cut to size? are they really totally removable? do they look chintzy? i swear people keep coming up with stuff that looks like 1000x better than i expect it to.

i grew up with curtains and had some ridiculous lacey ones in my childhood bedroom so i have this silly longstanding affection for lace curtains. i even made some when i first moved into my own apt long ago. i washed them and they were easy to care for.

we also don't have the peeper issue in our new place that we had in our old place. strangers on the train could look directly into my bedroom window if i hadn't had complete opacity. it's sad that i never knew about those clings before now -- could have saved lots of time and energy feeling shitzoid about my nasty blinds.

they are cut to size, yes. and they come right off with no film or residue. i can't speak for any of the patterened ones as i just had the frosted ones -- personally i would be suspect of the ones that have stained-glass affectations

yeah that's why i asked if they were chintzy -- no offense to chintz, of course!

i've becomed so accustomed to having them i think i should put them in the new bathroom, lest i become careless and give the neighbors an eyeful

LL just make sure you get non-adhesive ones, like the kind in Orbit's link

there are adhesive ones also but def def not advised for renters as removal can be tricky

yeah i mean the last time i bought contact paper, it was hella sticky
(it was also like 20 yrs ago)

in other news, i decided to line my fridge with plastic (like this little roll of thin plastic sheeting?) so that i could just clean that instead of stressing about getting stuff on my fridge.

i saw some one direction duct tape
maybe i'll just cover the windows with that

If I were doing a room with a sort of gypsy/romantic feel I would buy a 2nd hand table cloth with the deepest crocheted lace edge I could find, fold it in half diagonally, and drape it over an iron rod as a drapery with the crochet hanging all along the edge in deep folds. And then pin or baste it into position at the backs of the folds where it was hidden.

That is for the dept of interior design thread tho.

i think part of my prob with all of this is that i need pictures
words aren't really helping me

ilx is the best place for these discussions! i'm already inspired!

This is not what I had in mind but I don't hate it:
https://pinterest.com/pin/19984792068131459/

Actually I'm going to go a little drape crazy in the dept int thread, if that's okay? And get it out of Cleaning.

I didn't know about window clings either! Cool suggestion, thanks L. We are lucky in that we have a screen at the base of the widow so the bottom is at least a little private.

That's good for dusting, but there's a point when they get beyond dusty into straight up grimy. I don't think that thing would take care of that.

― carl agatha, Monday, May 6, 2013 2:22 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

These are Grimy as hell. They're . . . they're grey. :( I don't think any sort of duster thing would work. Maybe I will just wait a month until I have more $ and put up some curtains. The ones in my bedroom are new and totally fine but there are four huge windows in the living room and those are all really gross. I tried cleaning them with like windex and a rag and after it took me 10 mins to clean two individual little rows I was like FUCK THIS.

Don't clean them if you don't want to, but if you do want to, I repeat: Put to soak in hot water and ammonia. The greasy black stuff will wipe off.

OK. I might try it out next weekend with one of them just to see how much of a production it is. Will use your tips. :)

Why does no one understand that that gadget is NOT a duster? It's a scrubber. You soak it with hot soapy (ammonia-y) water and scrub several slats at a time.

I just think a duster like that won't work well for scrubbing, sorry.

I can't see hosted images at work so I just saw someone else say it was a duster and went with that. :( I'll look later from home.

lol carl

I can't tell if you're joking.

1. I own a similar gadget
2. My apartment has miniblinds
3. I am a filthy, filthy slob
4. The miniblinds have, at times, become filthy, filthy, and greasy
5. I used the gadget to scrub the filthy, filthy, greasy miniblinds
6. The blinds ceased to be filthy, and became clean

Wherefore, I entreaty you to GFY

go filth yourself

ENBB I think what you really need is a scrubber, maybe one that you can use to clean three or four of the individual blinds at once, not a duster like Jesse has.

Like this one:

http://img64.imageshack.us/img64/5104/cleaningblinds.jpg