Furnishing Dignity is all about giving to people in need, and today we want to give you some advice about preparing your home for furnishing. Before you add the furniture, unpack boxes, or start arranging the items in your home, it’s a good idea to have your home properly and thoroughly cleaned.

There is good reason for that, and we’re going to share with you why that is. Many people will receive furniture from our organization and not take some of the few simple steps they ought to in order to prepare their home for that furniture. Cleaning your home ahead of time will make life a lot easier on you, and we will explain how that’s possible in this article.

It’s Easy to Clean When The House Is Empty

Have you tried to clean a room in your house that is packed with furniture? Maybe it’s a bedroom that has a bed, night stands, a chair, and the dresser. How difficult is it to clean that room properly with all the furniture there? It’s not easy to clean under the bed, behind the dresser, and around some of the furniture. You may just give up and do a poor job and not clean completely simply because of all the furniture that’s in the way.

Even if you’re simply refurnishing a single room, cleaning it before the furniture arrives is a great idea. You spend less time cleaning, you’ll have fewer hindrances to your cleaning, and you’ll be more thorough as you clean. Most people are not going to lift up and move a lot of the furniture in each of their rooms as they clean. They might move chairs that might clean under some furniture where it’s easy to do so, but who cleans their entire floor in a room that has several large items of furniture? Most people don’t, and that leaves the home poorly cleaned week after week.

There may be stains, dirt, and debris on your floors that you’re not seeing simply because you don’t clean with the floor free of furniture. This is why we recommend cleaning your home thoroughly before any furniture arrives.

Help Your Floors Last Longer

Did you know that cleaning under the place where your furniture rests will allow your floor to last longer? This is true of carpet and hardwood floors in particular.

What happens when you don’t clean under the furniture is that little bits of grit and debris accumulate at the base of the furniture. These rub against the floor and cause friction and create wear and tear on your floor. Anytime you move the furniture when there are pieces of dirt and debris under it, that will cause damage to your floor. The damage may be minor, but over years, these parts of your floor will wear down faster than the parts that don’t have furniture on them.

When you’re trying to clean under furniture, you want to make sure that you’re lifting the furniture up rather than sliding it along the floor. It would be better to clean your floor with the furniture completely removed from the room so that you’re not causing friction and further damage to your floor.

Prepare Your Home for Furniture

We recommend cleaning before the furniture arrives in the home or before it’s settled into the room where it’s going to stay. We have given you some reasons why that is, but it is worth telling you one more.

Once the furniture is in place in a single room or throughout your house, you’re not likely to clean under the furniture very well or very often. That is why you want to clean your floor very thoroughly before the furniture is added. This gives your floor a detailed once over that could last for a while.

Do this cleaning now, before any furniture is in the room, and you won’t have to clean the floor as often. You won’t have to stress and strain and move the furniture just because it has been a while since you cleaned the floor in that area.

What Else to Do?

So, we’ve talked about preparing your floor to receive furniture and why it is so important that you tidy up the floor before any furniture is brought in. But what else should you do to prepare your home for new furnishings?

Would you recommend that you clean all around the room, specifically the parts of the room where new furniture will be placed. This includes the walls and the ceiling and not just the floor, because these parts of the room may become less easily accessible once furniture is in place.

You may also want to buy some furniture pads to place under the feet of the furniture so it doesn’t scratch the floor, specifically with tiled, carpeted, or hardwood floors.

Another good idea is to clear a path from the doorway to the room where the furniture is going to be placed. This gets any hindrances out of the way and makes it easier to put the furniture where it belongs right away. If you planned well, the furniture should be able to come off the truck and directly to its final destination with ease. That is especially important when you have some help with the furniture initially, but you may not have help later on.

Try to figure out exactly where you want the furniture placed and which direction you would like it to be facing before it even comes into your home. This will save you some time later on and help you to make good use of any assistance you have when the furniture arrives.

We hope you enjoy your new furnishing and that they last a long time and that they look beautiful in your home. If you’ve made proper preparations ahead of time, getting the furniture in place should be easy. We hope this article has been helpful in getting you ready for moving in new home furnishings.

For many people, regularly getting a good night of sleep is a luxury. It’s simply not something that everyone can do because of their work schedule. For others, they may not see that sleep is very important. It may be something they do when they’re bored or simply because their body makes them sleep but they fight against it.

We want to share with you some reasons why it is so important to not just sleep but to get adequate, restful sleep. At Furnishing Dignity, we provide beds and other furniture to needy families. Many of them struggle to get decent sleep simply because they don’t have a decent place to sleep. Let’s talk about the value of a good night’s sleep.

Sleep Improves the Immune System

Sleep is so important to your body that it protects and strengthens your immune system. If you are constantly becoming ill and it’s easy for you to catch a sickness, you may have a weak immune system. Taking vitamins can help, as can trying to protect yourself from germs around you. However, you need to get adequate sleep so that your immune system has the strength it needs to protect you.

Your immune system does a lot to keep germs and infections from harming you very much. Many times, you will get a little sick because your immune system is preventing you from becoming very sick. If you get over an illness quickly, you can thank your immune system for that. But, if you’re not getting enough sleep, your immune system will be very weakened. Your body will be trying to fight off all the germs and bacteria it deals with regularly as well as a lack of energy and resources due to a lack of sleep.

Make sure you’re getting plenty of sleep and that this is good quality sleep so that your immune system can be strong. You need more than vitamins to keep your immune system healthy.

Sleep Helps You Think Clearly

Getting decent sleep also helps you to focus better and think more clearly. If you’re fighting brain fog, confusion, disorientation, and dealing with memory lapses, then you may not be getting enough sleep. When your brain is tired, it simply cannot function the way it is supposed to. You need adequate sleep in order for your brain to be rejuvenated and refreshed.

There have probably been days where you slept less than you should have and you struggled throughout the day to do your work, to remain focused, and to think clearly. You might be easily distracted when you’re not getting enough sleep because your brain is fighting against its tiredness and the distractions around you.

Sleep Improves Your Mood

We have all had days where we were irritable and grumpy because we couldn’t sleep as much as we needed to. When your sleep is cut short, sometimes your temper is short as well. Something as simple as getting enough sleep can help you to have a good attitude throughout the day. But if you’re tired, you may have trouble staying in a good mood. It may not take much to make you depressed, angry, or emotional.

That’s because your body is struggling to stay awake and feels burdened by your tiredness. It takes very little outside influence to make your body suddenly feel overwhelmed and your emotional state to break down. Getting enough sleep helps you to feel better and makes it easy to have a great mood all the time. If you are someone who has trouble having a positive attitude while getting along with other people, try to get enough sleep to help with that. It may not fix the problem, but it will make it easier to deal with.

Sleep Helps You Live Longer

Did you know that getting enough sleep helps you have a longer lifespan? It’s true, because a lack of sleep will affect your entire body, and it hurts your heart. Your heart takes on more stress and has more work to do and will experience a more strenuous life if you’re not getting enough sleep. Constantly missing sleep and not getting adequate rest will tax your heart so that it gives out earlier.

People who routinely get too little sleep tend to have heart problems sooner in life, and those heart problems tend to be more severe than their counterparts who get enough sleep. So, if you want to live a longer life, one way you can help yourself out is to get more sleep

How to Get Better Quality Sleep

We’ve talked about why sleep is so important and some of the benefits it gives to you, and now let’s talk about what you can do to help improve your sleep schedule.

One of the big factors that will contribute to a good night’s sleep is a comfortable bed. If you don’t have a very good bed, you can reach out to Furnishing Dignity and see what we have available. A bed that is too hard or too small may make it difficult for you to get a good night’s sleep.

Another factor that’s really important is the cleanliness of your home. You have to hire professional cleaners if you’re having trouble keeping your home clean. We suggest cleaning your bedroom at least once a week to cut down on the dust and dirt and to prevent nasal blockages that keep you from getting enough sleep.

You also want to make sure you’re cutting out distractions, noises, and lights in your bedroom when you try to sleep. Try to turn off digital devices well ahead of when you go to sleep. Make sure there are no lights or noises around you in the room where you’re sleeping. You can use a sleep mask and ear plugs to block out these stimuli and help yourself get a better night’s sleep.

These are just a few methods you can use, and there are many more, and we hope that our advice helps you to sleep more soundly.

Do you know a family that has a financial need or that could use some assistance in one area or another? There are lots of ways to help out, and at Furnishing Dignity, we deal directly with families who have many different kinds of needs. We know the kinds of problems they face and what it takes to help them in a way that is meaningful.

While we focus on providing furnishings for their home as they transition into a new phase of their life, there are many other ways that you can be of assistance to a family in need.

Provide Groceries

We understand that many people are reluctant to simply give another family or person money in their hand. They may feel that this is an impersonal gift, and they want to be more involved in giving them something useful. Or, they may be concerned about how the money will be spent, and they want to provide something other than money to those in need.

So, one of the best gifts you can give is grocery items. You don’t want to be indiscriminate with your grocery buying, though. There are a few things to keep in mind to ensure that your gift is appreciated and useful.

First of all, don’t assume that the family has a refrigerator or freezer. Buy only goods that can be stored in a dry pantry area and will not perish if left out at room temperature. If you buy any kind of perishable goods like fruits or vegetables, don’t buy more than the family can eat in a short amount of time. Secondly, you should buy foods that most people tend to like. Avoid foods that are spicy or not very popular. Thirdly, try to buy foods that can be prepared without a stove, just in case the family does not have one.

Provide Services from Your Business

What kind of business do you do that could be a help to someone else? You may be able to provide services or goods from your business that will be a blessing to them. This may cost you very little and may just require some of your time.

If you are an expert in some area of business, you can provide that service to the family in need, helping them with taxes, woodcutting, gardening, transportation, or whatever it is you do for a living. Think about what you have to offer as a business person and determine if that can be helpful to the family you are concerned about.

Use Your Contacts and Prestige

Do you know people who could help the family in need get a job? Maybe you could help them get work if they are struggling to get hired. You can use your contacts to help them get through with some paperwork they need completed or to assist them in finding work.

Maybe they just need someone to recommend them for a job. You could write a letter of recommendation for them or offer to be one of their references on a resume. That could be a huge help, giving them a hand up where they would otherwise be searching for help. You can be the difference maker in someone’s life by offering just this little bit of assistance.

Hire Cleaning Services

What a gift it would be to have someone come to their house and clean for them! Imagine having your entire home cleaned professionally and quickly. That saves a lot of work and makes the home feel fresh and beautiful. You can be a blessing to someone by having their home professionally cleaned by Imagine Maids of Seattle, and  they won’t have to lift a finger and do any of the work themselves. That is an ideal gift for a family that is working hard and has very little time to do any cleaning for themselves.

Make sure you choose a time that will work for the family and approve this gift through them. You don’t want them to feel uncomfortable, and you want to make sure the cleaners come when it is most convenient for the family.

Cut Their Grass

Trimming a lawn or doing landscaping for a family can be a big help as well. You can assist them when they don’t have grass cutting tools of their own. If they only have a weed whacker and they have a large lawn, you can help them out by cutting their grass on your own if you have a mower. Or you can hire someone to do the cutting for them.

This can save them a lot of time and effort and make their life easier for them. They might have wanted to cut their grass but been unable to, and that can be embarrassing to have the only lawn around that isn’t trimmed. This is the kind of gift that you could surprise them with, if you know they will be happy to have it. Just show up one day and cut the grass without saying a word and enjoy the looks of surprise on their faces.

Do Home Repairs

Do you know how to do some plumbing, electrical, construction or woodworking? You can put these skills to good use by doing some repair work in the family’s home. That could be a massive help if they need some assistance with their roof, their sink, their porch, or other items in the house. You can save them hundreds of dollars on repair costs and materials, even if all you do is offer some of the extra materials you have lying around.

There may be jobs that the family could do if they just had a willing hand, and you can pitch in and help in that area to make life easier on them.

There are so many different ways that you can help out families in need, and these are just a few ideas. If you want to help, there are endless ways that you can, and we hope this list inspires you.

How do you make sure that your bedding stays clean so that it is safe to sleep on? You might be concerned about germs and bacteria getting onto your bedding, and you might be hesitant to sleep in your bed knowing that the bedding hasn’t been washed in a while. How do you keep it clean? Here are some things you can do.

Wash Bedding Regularly

Let’s start off by talking about how often you should be cleaning your sheets, pillowcases, and other bedding items. How often do you think that is?

In most cases, we would recommend you wash your bedding every week or every two weeks. For safety’s sake, we would not recommend you wait longer than two weeks to wash your bedding.

If you wait longer than that, then you may be more prone to pick up bacteria and illnesses from your bedding. You are also more likely to attract bugs to the bed thanks to the buildup of sweat, dirt, oils, and tiny debris.

Washing bedding frequently makes it easier to keep clean and helps with hygiene and health issues. If you haven’t been washing your bedding very often, we suggest you start doing that. It should help the bedding to last longer as well.

Don’t Eat on the Bed

This is an obvious rule for some people, and for others, it is a strange and foreign idea. Eating on the bed just invites bugs in. You are bound to leave crumbs on the bed no matter how careful you are with your eating habits. You can make less of a mess by using a tray as you eat, but you will still run the risk of dropping crumbs on your bedding.

That’s not even talking about the liquid spills that can happen when you eat in bed. If you drop juice or coffee on the bed, that can absorb into the sheets quickly and even into the mattress. You will have a dirty bed very quickly that attracts bugs and that is hard to clean.

It is best to avoid food and drinks on the bed entirely, but if you have to have them, then place a mattress cover on the bed that will keep out liquids. If you do make a mess, clean it up quickly.

Keep Your Bedroom Clean

Dirt always seems to travel, doesn’t it? You may have a clean bed but a dirty floor, and somehow the dirt manages to travel onto the bed. How does that happen? If you want a clean bed, then you need to keep a clean bedroom. You can place a mat by the door or beside the bed to cut down on dust and debris making its way onto the bed, but ultimately, keeping the bedroom clean will help the bed to stay cleaner as well.

You may want to have professional cleaners do a deep cleaning service every so often in our bedroom to keep it in top shape. This cuts down on the work you have to do and gives the room a nice refreshing so that it feels clean and smells lovely.

Regularly cleaning your bedroom gives you a cleaner bed. You also have a more comfortable and restful sleep because there will be fewer allergens and irritants in the room to block your sinuses, create allergy-like symptoms, and make you feel uncomfortable.

Shower before Going into Your Bed

A great way to cut down on the germs, dirt, oil, and bacteria that make their way into your bed is to shower before you go to bed. Get into the habit of taking a shower before using the bed, and this will drastically cut down on how much degrees on the bed and how dirty your bedding becomes.

Throughout the day, your body will build up oils, dead skin cells, dirt, and other debris. Anything you come into contact with will take some of this from you. Your bedding absorbs sweat and oil from your skin and your hair. A lot of dead skin cells and hair follicles will end up on the bed if you’re not showering before you use your bed.

If you are someone who uses your bed throughout the day to rest on, it’s a good idea to wash your face and put on clothes that you have not worn outside the house. This will diminish a lot of the debris that ends up on the bed and help keep the bedding cleaner for longer.

You want to clean yourself off as best you can before you get into bed. That can be something as simple as wiping your feet off on a mat before stepping into your bed. It’s wise to place that right beside the bed for this very purpose. That drastically cuts down on how much dust and dirt some heat and on the bed.

Your home is probably not spotlessly clean all the time, so moving from one room to another doing chores or whatever you are doing around the house and then moving to your bed will bring dirt and the blue from other areas of the house onto your bed.

Make Your Bed Properly

Making up your bed in the morning to help eliminate a lot of dust and dirt from the bedding and to keep your bed feeling fresh and clean. But you have to do things the proper way.

Every morning, take all the pillows, blankets, and sheets off the bed. Then, add them back onto the bed one by one. With this method, you aren’t just moving dust around in the bed when you make your bed; you’re actually removing dust from your bed. This means that you won’t have to wash your bedding as frequently. Your bed will feel more comfortable and less grainy and less full of dirt and dust.

We hope our tips help you have better rest and feel more comfortable in your bed.

Scuff marks on your floor can take away from the beauty of the hardwood surface. If you haven’t been very careful with your furniture and how you removed it and placed it, then you may end up with hardwood floor scuff marks. How do you get rid of those marks and make your floors look beautiful again?

We have a few methods you can use to repair your hardwood floors. At Furnishing Dignity, we understand how important it is to take care of what you have and to protect your limited resources. Here are our best methods for removing scuff marks caused by furniture and other factors.

Deal with Scuff Marks Fast

Scuff marks get worse over time, becoming more entrenched and harder to remove. You can get rid of them more easily if you attack them as soon as you notice them. Wait too long, and they could become impossible to remove, even by professional home cleaners.

This is why our recommendation is that you check your floors for scuff marks regularly. If you do that, you can catch them early on and deal with them appropriately before they become impossible to get rid of.

What helps is to clean your floors often or have someone else clean them for you, but just make sure that they are cleaned on a regular basis. This will get rid of some scuff marks, as they will come up at least partially through routine cleaning. You can also sight the marks at an early stage with regular cleaning. If you clean infrequently, scuff marks can go undetected for a while.

Water and Sponge Method

The first method we want to share with you for removing scuff marks on your floor is to go at them with some water and a sponge. There is no need to use fancy, expensive cleaning tools or complicated cleaning methods. Most scuff marks can be easily removed or at least partially diminished by using this simplest of cleaning combinations.

This method works best on newer scuff marks, as it gets rid of them pretty easily. It will not work quite as well on older scuff marks or ones that are particularly stubborn. You can use warm water and a sponge that is designed for scrubbing dishes with. Don’t use a steel wool scrubbing pad or something else that is metallic or very abrasive. Just a regular dishwashing sponge will do.

Dip it into warm water and scrub at the scuff marks until they come up. You may only be partially successful with this method, but it can make a difference. Be sure to dry up the water when you are done, since water can damage wooden floors. When scrubbing your floor, only use as much force as necessary. Scrubbing too hard can clear away varnish, paint, and even the surface of the wood.

The Baking Soda Method

Baking soda is good for cleaning up almost any kind of mess in your home, and it works on scuff marks on the floor as well. Whether those are made with shoes or furniture, you can use baking soda to get rid of the scuff marks pretty quickly and simply.

Our method for using baking soda on the floor is to mix warm water with two tablespoons of baking soda. This should make a paste that isn’t dripping wet. Then, apply that onto the floor where the scuff marks are and rub at it with a soft cloth. That should get rid of the scuff marks fast, and you just need to use a dry cloth to wipe the paste away and see the effect your baking soda paste has had on the floor.

Prevent Scuff Marks

We want to leave you with a list of preventive measures that will keep your floors from becoming scuffed. These can be helpful when you are worried about how much scuffing your floor is experiencing and how much work it is to get rid of those marks. Keep in mind that removing scuff marks will still probably leave you with damaged floors, but they won’t look as bad as they did before.

It is better to prevent scuffing on your floors entirely, and our tips can help you to do that.

Start by placing pads on the bottom of your furniture. These will prevent scuffing as your furniture rests on the floor. Even furniture that is never moved can cause scuff marks, particularly couches and chairs. As extra weight is placed on these, they may move slightly and create minor scuff marks.

You also want to clean your floor often so that you get rid of dirt and debris on the floor. Doing that keeps scuff marks from forming as easily and reduces friction on your floor.

It also helps to polish your floor and use a polish that acts as a sealant. This prevents damage to the floor, working like an extra protective layer on top of the wood and helping minimize scuff marks. Be sure to refresh the polish as needed, following the directions on the packaging for the polish. That will protect your floor very well and give you fewer scuff marks to get rid of.

You can also request that family members and guests in your home remove their shoes before coming inside the house. Place a shoe rack by the door for them to place their shoes in and see if that doesn’t cut down on some of the scuffing. Some shoes are much harder on floors than others, particularly boots and high-heeled shoes. These scuff more easily, and you can avoid a lot of problems with scuffing by simply putting a rule in place that all shoes be taken off at the door.

Your floors are worth protecting, and getting rid of scuff marks as well as preventing them will help you keep your floors in great shape for longer. Use the tips we have given you in this article to get more life from your floors.