Cooper and Cason taking a break from their version of "King of the Hill!"
I recently bought a load of sand to spread around our yard (and three weekends later, I’m still spreading it!). We have three dogs at our house who immediately discovered the sand pile in the driveway. What started out as a five foot high pile on Wednesday when it was delivered was down to three feet tall by Saturday when I started moving it to the yard. You can see why the pile flattened out so quickly:
Cooper and Chloe on the sand pile. Guess which one likes posing for the camera?
As the dogs played in the sand (and yes, they’re inside dogs, too), it became obvious that we were in for some additional cleaning of our floors. Sand and dirt come in your house every time you (or your dog) come in from outside. What a lot of folks don’t realize is that sand (just a smaller piece of gravel) is a very hard substance with numerous cutting edges. When you walk on sand on your floor, it is like walking with sandpaper on the floor, simply minus the paper. With wood floors, this leads to scratches. In carpet, the appearance doesn’t change so quickly but the sand gets down into the fiber and the back and forth motion of walking across your carpet causes the sand grains to cut at the base of the carpet fiber, thereby shortening its life.
What can you do? Simple: clean the floor! Our philosophy has always been to enjoy your home and your floors. Don’t be afraid to use and enjoy them, but do be prepared to clean as you go. My wife, Barbara, and I debate between sweeping and vacuuming on hard surfaces such as wood and tile. I like to vacuum because I believe it gets up more of the grit like sand. If you vacuum like I do, be sure to turn the beater bar OFF to avoid scratches on hard surfaces. Of course, on carpet, turn the beater bar ON to get the proper agitation of the carpet so that the vacuum can lift out the dirt. And once a year or so, be sure to engage the services of a professional carpet cleaner like Steamatic (706-324-2224 or www.SteamaticOfColumbus.com) to thoroughly clean your carpet and preserve your manufacturer’s warranty.
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