Cleaning and Polishing Wood Floors

by Mary Ann Romans | More from this Blogger

06 Feb 2009 02:14 PM

One of the things that have stumped me the most is caring for our wood floors. We love hardwood floors because of their beauty and the fact that they don't promote allergies or asthma, the way traditional carpeting does. We had hardwood floors in our last home, and we have them in this one (with the exception of the the family room, the kitchen and the bathrooms).

Over the years, I have tried a few different things to get the hardwood floors clean and looking beautiful. When we were showing our home, potential buyers commented on how lovely our floors were, even though they were quite a few years old and had never been refinished.

The floors in this house are more of a challenge. Some of them have been waxed, some have been seriously neglected, some were covered by carpets, some are so dry that they are splintering in places, and some have large mysterious stains.

We would like to redo all of the hardwood floors eventually, but it just isn't the the budget or the priority list at the moment. Still, I have been really wanting to make some sort of improvement. I tried all of my old techniques on the dining room floor, one of the worse floors in the house. While I was able to keep them clean, they still remained dull and scratched.

I finally found something that worked well. While it couldn't take the large stains out (only sanding and refinishing could do that) I was really surprised by how well they now look. The floor has a sheen to it, and both scuff marks and scratches have disappeared.

For this project, I used an Orange Glow floor kit. it contained the cleaner in a spray bottle, a refinisher solution, an applicator mop and two applicator pads, one for the cleaner and one for the refinisher. I mopped the floor twice with the cleaner and then put one coat of the refinisher. It took 24 hours to cure enough before we could move the furniture back into the room.

Mary Ann Romans writes about everything related to saving money in the Frugal Blog, creating a home in the Home Blog, caring for little ones in the Baby Blog and now relationships in the Marriage Blog. You can read more of her articles by clicking here or subscribe to the blog using the subscription box on the right.

Related Articles:

Basement Floor Savings (And Garage Floor, Too)

Vinegar Your Floors

Mop Your Floor and Save

Redoing the Kitchen: Flooring Choices

Learn more about Mary Ann Romans

Mary Ann Romans is a freelance writer, wife and mother of three children. She lives in Pennsylvania with her husband, the kids and a 16-pound cat.

View Full Profile | More from this Blogger