My Grandmother’s Best Cleaning Advice Still Works Like Magic

My grandparents’ home has always felt like one of the happiest places on Earth, and I’ve been lucky enough to spend quite a bit of time with them throughout my childhood and adult years. My entire summers were spent in their home, leaving me with cozy memories of reading books in bed together (the same ones over and over again, naturally), plucking raspberries off the vine in their garden, riding around on old bicycles down their street, trying new-to-me foods (that we adventurously chose together from the grocery aisle!), and playing dress-up in thrifted gowns and costume jewelry. 

There were, of course, some chores to do, and I watched my grandmother keep a meticulously clean home (but not in a sterile museum sort of way). My own home was tidy enough, but I remember wondering: Why does it always smell so good here? Feel so clean? Make me want to stay forever?

My Grandmother’s Simple Cleaning Advice

Part of it was my grandma’s consistent cleaning routine and the storage solutions she implemented, but there was one piece of advice that stuck with me all these years later: She always paid attention to the tiny “unseen” details. She regularly wiped down the baseboards, cleaned light switch plates, dusted ceiling fan blades, wiped down the stair railings, and freshened up the insides of drawers. 

It’s simple enough and even sounds obvious, but these tiny spots are often overlooked when we clean surfaces, and yet they still accumulate dust, grime, oil, and dirt on a daily basis. Under-cleaned areas can easily become “white noise”—scuff marks and dust along the baseboards and grimy doorknobs quickly become invisible since we see them all the time. But you can still feel that the house is collectively dirtier when they aren’t tended to. 

How I Apply My Grandma’s Advice

The way I implement this advice in my own home—all these years later—is by specifically scanning a room for areas that get a lot of use but are easily overlooked. In the kitchen, that means wiping down the microwave (inside and out), along with all my appliance handles and surfaces. It means moving things around on the counter to capture stray crumbs and oil splatter. 

In the bedroom, I take time to move my bed from the wall to clean behind the headboard (and I’ll even vacuum and wipe down the headboard), wipe down door knobs, and clean every nook and cranny of the windowsills. Tiny details in the bathroom include the faucet and handles, the drawers and cabinets, and the hooks that hold the towels. 

These are just a few examples, but there are plenty of overlooked areas in every room. Ultimately, taking the time to address them truly does make a difference in the way my home smells and feels, and I challenge you to give it a go yourself the next time you tidy a room.