Taking Care of Your Home: Tips to Keep Safe and Healthy

At this point, everybody is aware that the pandemic has challenged and changed the way we conduct our everyday lives. Personal hygiene is more important than ever, and the practice of social distancing is bound to be the norm for a while. On the flip side, by spending time at home with our families and loved ones, we strengthened those core values that our previously fast-paced lifestyles managed to erode. With numerous cleaning and maintenance businesses unable to effectively operate, the responsibility to maintain a clean household has fallen squarely on the individual.

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Touch Me Not: Clean These First

It is highly important for us to keep our homes clean, not just now, but in general, but we don’t have to get obsessed about it. Some of the priority surfaces for cleaning are the ones that have high traffic: toilet bowls, countertops, door handles, light switches, electronics, etc. Wiping them once or twice a day is enough, just make sure you wait several minutes after you’ve applied the cleaning solution since they need that time to be effective. 

Why is it important to clean these surfaces frequently? Well, one of the first things we’ve heard about the virus is that it lingers on different surfaces, ranging in duration from hours to days. That is enough to make all hell break loose in our home cleaning routine. However, people seem to forget that you can’t get sick simply by touching the infected surface unless you touch your face immediately afterwards. Even then the infection is not guaranteed. This virus spreads mostly from person to person when the drops of mucus or saliva enter the air and get inside our mouth or nose. 

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In Sickness and Health: Use Separate Bathrooms

If a family member should become sick, you may panic and feel the need for a ritual exorcism and consider bleaching the entire house. However, such a situation should be approached with some basic precautions. First of all, the affected person needs to be isolated and other family members should keep a distance of about 6 feet. The most important thing is not to share things or to cross-contaminate. Use disposable cutlery and dishes to serve their food. They should use a separate bathroom. If you only have one, then you should clean it more thoroughly. The cleaning practices for the rest of the house remains the same as long as you respect these isolation practices.

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Isolation Oasis: Your Outdoor Spaces

Hunkered down inside, the only way to spend time outdoors while still maintaining social distancing is to stay in proximity to our homes. For those fortunate enough to have some turf, their front and backyards can become personal oases. However, if you’ve neglected your garden you will need to roll up your sleeves to bring things back in order. 

Don’t be daunted by this if you’ve only had professionals do it before, the steps you need to take are fairly easy to follow and implement. First, you need to provide your lawn with about an inch of water per week. After that, it all comes down to fertilizing and mowing. You should mow consistently and frequently since it will increase the thickness and density of the foliar canopy. Remember not to cut more than a third of the length of the blades and avoid mowing damp grass as this can ultimately do damage to your mower and the turf. Use the remaining clippings as much to provide the lawn with additional natural nutrients. 

When it comes to maintaining your grass, you’ll need to be aware of fertilizers and weeding. You can still purchase the necessary products (organic, if possible) from local retailers and there are many with an online presence that can get them delivered to your doorstep. 

With more free time on your hands why not take a shovel and extract the weeds by yourself? You’ll find that quite often you can even hand-pull them. It’s an activity in which you can also include your kids as it’s an excellent form of mental relaxation and stress relief from the home-bound life. 

Additionally, you shouldn’t restrict your outdoor activities only to lawn care. Why not plant a garden if you don’t already have one? It is a great way to keep the kids busy, stay away from grocery stores, and save money. 

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The Disinfectant Craze

In the end, it’s time to debunk the disinfectant myth. Right at the start of this pandemic, there was a widespread disinfectant craze that quickly led to hoarding and then to a shortage of sprays, wipes, gloves, and masks. This may seem like a reason to panic, but the fact is that you can make a DIY disinfectant at home that’ll be equally efficient. Mask and latex gloves are also not mandatory at home. You can use standard dishwashing gloves while cleaning if you prefer, but that’s also not a requirement. Be aware that disinfectant, while extremely useful, is not a be-all and end-all to combat the virus. Being constantly vigilant about your personal hygiene and washing your hands diligently will bring about the best results. 

(Image by United Nations COVID-19 Response, hosted on Unsplash)

Taking care of your home and surroundings at a time of crisis can work wonders to improve your mood, raise your spirits, and keep your mind busy. Going forward, you might have a few additional mundane tasks to contend with, but these routines are easy to incorporate and won’t significantly affect the course of your life, other than, for the better.

(Top featured image is by cottonbro, hosted on Pexels)

Author Bio

Sofia Lockhart is a passionate writer from Sydney. She also enjoys decorating houses and engaging in home renovation projects. That is why she loves sharing her experience and advice with other people through her writing. Besides this, she loves technology and gadgets which can help us get through a busy workday.