Today we are talking about getting our blinds clean. There are two types of blinds that tend to be in homes: wood and plastic. We’ll take a look at cleaning each type separately.
Cleaning Wood Blinds
Wood blinds tend to have large, smooth slats that are fairly easy to clean.
What You Need to Dust Wood Blinds
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- Microfiber Dusting Glove– I have seen people use a sock placed over their hand, however, I’m a big fan of microfiber as it picks up dust better than cotton.
How to Clean Wood Blinds
The directions for cleaning wood blinds could not be easier.
Simply slip on the dusting glove and grasp one slat at a time between your thumb and fingers (this way you’re dusting the top and bottom of the slat at the same time). Run your hand along each slat working from top to bottom.
How disgusting is that dust? (Please dust your blinds more often than I do to avoid that much grossness.)
Cleaning Plastic Blinds
While I wish I could grab the same dusting glove as above, plastic blinds tend to have small slats that are quite flimsy. This would make for a very tedious task, dusting one slat at a time. So here’s what I did.
What You Need to Clean Mini-Blinds
How to Clean Mini-Blinds
Start by taking down your blinds. This should be fairly easy as there is typically a latch to to release the blinds. Place the blinds into your bathtub filled with warm soapy water. Swish the blinds around in the tub to loosen the grime, then allow them to soak for 15-30 minutes. After they have soaked, use a sponge and run it along the slats to really get them clean.
Once thoroughly washed, bring the blinds outside to dry. I did this by placing towels over our deck railing and then draping the blinds over them.
Once dry, hang them back up in the room. Here’s the before and after… always nice to see results!
That’s all there is to it.
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If you have dust buildup on your blinds you can always use old Bounce sheets from the dryer to wipe the dust off first before using a wet cleaner. Otherwise you just smear the gunk in & around & it takes longer to clean your blinds. I always save all my used fabric sheets from the dryer to dust everything around the house & you’ll be amazed how well they clean up your dust!
Using new ones you can clean stains in your bathtub …
I have metal mini blinds. I lay them out on the patio and hose them off and clean with a soapy bucket of Dawn then rinse off with the hose. Hang them on the fence to dry!
Next time try Murphy’s oil soap to wash blinds in the bathtub, especially for ones that are in the kitchen – it removes any grease easily.
There sure is a difference! BUT….my blinds are wood….and have NOT been cleaned in YEARS…!!! This is because I can NOT find a way to clean them. I am pretty sure the previous owners did NOT clean them. When I tried..all I did was make a bigger mess of things. There is SO much grime on the blinds…it does NOT just wipe off. Then I tried a solution of such; that just ‘smeared’ the grime. I am at a loss as to “How to tackle them now?”. Any suggestions? I thank you in advance.
Your before blinds look really gross. I wonder if that is how my blinds look if I was to look at them compared to clean ones. I think the only time I have cleaned my blinds is when I moved in.
Seriously. They were SO gross! We moved into our house about 6 years ago and I had never done anything with those plastic blinds, so it was at least 6 years worth of grime built up on there… and who knows if the previous owners ever dusted either. The bathtub worked wonders and they look SO much better now.
Great tips, Erin! Cleaning the blinds is on my spring cleaning to-do list. We have 500 windows in our house (so maybe not 500, but it’s a LOT) and I always put off cleaning the blinds. I’m intrigued by that dusting glove and might have to get one. I bet I could even get my kids to help if I got them a glove too :).
I hate cleaning blinds and always put it off. The dusting glove really does make it easier, and if you can get your kids to do it… even better!
My blinds are plastic, they are just over nine ft in width and almost the same in length. I used baby wipes and what a great job they did.I also managed to get them cleaned a lot quicker using this method.