Housekeeping in the Living Room

"The living room is the room that gets the hardest use. Keeping it straight is a family project. Each person should be responsible for picking up such things as books, glasses, and ashtrays after himself and his guests. Otherwise to prevent the place from looking untidy and cluttered, a long-suffering homemaker must pick up after everyone. Such lack of consideration is not only inconsiderate, it also works against the relaxing atmosphere which is one of the goals of family living.

Daily Care. Even though each family member clears away his own debris, there are still things to be done daily to keep the living room fresh and inviting. These things are suggested for daily care:

1. Open the windows top and bottom to clear the air in the room. In cold weather, you will have to work fast to keep warm while the windows are open, and that is all to the good.
2. Take out faded flowers, empty wastepaper baskets, and collect small objects such as ashtrays that need attention or that belong in other rooms.
3. Dust systematically, working from left to right around the walls of the room (if you are right-handed). Dust higher surfaces before you dust lower ones; for instance, the shade and bulb of a lamp before its base. Whisk crumbs or ashes off furniture.
4. Remove any spots on woodwork or furniture.
5. Mop the floor, if the carpeting is not wall to wall. This is not just to pick up dust, but also to polish the floor between waxings.
6. Use a carpet sweeper to pick up crumbs and dust.
7. Put all the furniture in place, plump pillos, close the windows, and adjust the blinds. Return to their places things collected in Step. 2.

Weekly care. The weekly cleaning is more thorough than the daily pick-up. These are the tasks that many homemakers think should be done once a week in the living room. You may do the whole room at once or spread the tasks throughout the week, doing the furniture polishing for all rooms on one day, the vacuuming another, and so forth. The order of cleaning will vary somewhat, according to the equipment you use. With a vacuum cleaner or carpet sweeper, you do the floors and rugs last. If you use other implements for such jobs--dust-raising equipment such as brooms, for instance--you dust the flat surfaces last. The usual weekly jobs are these.

1. Clean the fireplace, if it has been used.
2. Dust mirrors, pictures, and lighting fixtures. Even a light coating of soil on globes or bulbs reduces the amount of light.
3. Clean radiators or registers.
4. Dust books and bookcases--or at least a shelf or two each week.
5. Use vacuum cleaner attachment on pillows, upholstery, draperies, and Venetian blinds.
6. Clean and wax window sills and wipe off finger marks on areas around door knobs and light switches if necessary.
7. Clean and polish wood furniture.
8. Clean and polish wood floors.
9. Use vacuum cleaner on rugs and carpet.
10. Make fresh flower arrangements.

Occasional tasks. Occasional tasks can be worked into the weekly cleaning whenever they are need to be done--or a special day in the week may be saved to do these jobs.

1. Brush walls.
2. Clean walls.
3. Wax floors. Use extra coats of wax in front of the fireplace and entrances where there is more than usual wear.
4. Give rugs special care; wash them or have them cleaned, turn them, have them moth-proofed if they are to be put away.
5. Wash curtains and slipcovers.
6. Shampoo upholstered furniture and lampshades.
7. Thoroughly clean window shades or wash and wax Venetian blinds.
8. Thoroughly clean radiators.
9. Thoroughly clean fireplace.
10. Wash windows, mirrors, and picture glass."

From Housing and Home Management, a vintage Home Economics textbook published by The Macmillan Company of New York, written by Dora S. Lewis, Jean O. Burns, and Esther F. Segner, and with copyright dates of 1953 and 1961.