Living room: End tables and coffee tables

The end tables and coffee tables in your living room are a collection spot for all types of things. Magazines, books, cd’s, papers, and soda bottles among other things are known to collect on the tables in your living areas.  To keep your home gleaming clean you are first going to have to make it a habit to be sure that anything that is put on the tables daily are put where they belong at the end of the day. Garbage gets thrown away, books get put away, and magazines get thrown away of stacked inside of end tables if you are not finished with them.

To keep your home gleaming you are going to have to fix marks or stains on your coffee tables and on end tables as they happen

If you have a piece of unstained furniture that you want to add a touch of color to - all you have to do is brew a few tea bags in a quart of water and wipe down your piece with a soft cloth soaked in this tea water.  If will color your furniture without any great expense!

A simple recipe for a very effective wood floor cleaner is:

• 1 teaspoon of vinegar
• 1teaspoon of vegetable oil
• quart of water

Wet your clean cloth and wipe down corners - lifting dust quickly while protecting your wood!

Have you ever placed a hot serving bowl or pan onto your dining table or a hot cup onto your tables. You probably know what I mean. You invariably will be left with a large white mark. Well here is a tip you can try to help remove the mark.

When hot dishes or plates leave a white stain on the dining room table (or any furniture), take a wet sponge and generously rub dry baking soda (bicarbonate of Soda) in circular motions on the mark. The stain will disappear.

Another way of dealing with white scotch marks on your dark wood tables is as follows. Dampen a cloth with rubbing alcohol and dab it onto the white scorch. Allow it to dry and wipe clean. You may have to repeat this several times to completely remove the scorch.

To keep scratches to a minimum, you can rub coffee or tea over a scratch in wood. The tea of coffee is going to darken the scratched area so it is not as noticeable.

If you have a watermark that was not taken care of right away, you are often left with a large ring that is different in color from the rest of the table. If the table is unfinished, you can lightly sand the area to take out that stain. If the table is finished, you can sand the entire table, then restain, and varnish the table.

A good trick in preventing watermarks and rings is that you are constantly polishing your wood so it has a bit of a build up on the wood and the wax helps to protect the wood from watermarks.

Place coasters and mats in areas that are most used for drinking cups or hot plates. Prevention is a major part of keeping water stains and marks from starting on your end table.

In your daily cleaning, removing the newspapers, wiping up the spills and quickly dusting off the pet hair from your end tables and coffee tables will keep your house gleaming all the time.

During your weekly or monthly cleaning, make extra time to deep clean your wood tables so you are always left with a high shine on your wood tables which will prevent stains and marks. Buy many coasters, and if you need a coaster but do not have one, a book or paper will do better than without anything!