Parents (of children or pets!) know more than anyone that accidents happen. And by accidents, I mean messes. The bane of my mom's existence was dirt, spills, smears, and germs. As a stay-at-home mom, she spent most of her time on the upkeep of our house, trying in vain to keep up with two kids and a dog (who admittedly didn't get bathed but once a year, due to her feisty resistance of water). It was a constant battle – one that she didn't always win. Especially when it came to our furniture and flooring!
It was while I was at an early age that she decided she'd had enough of carpet (and only partially due to developing an allergy to it, though I'm sure its deterioration and unkempt state had something to do with that). I still remember my dad pulling the stuff up, leaving rows upon rows of teeth-like nails standing proud against the perimeter of the room as he fought the stubborn floor-beast. It was a pain to get up, but it would've been even more of a pain to keep clean! My mom greatly preferred the hardwoods, and often bragged about how much better they were for our health, how much more thoroughly we could clean them. As kids, we were given the brunt of the dirty work, having to sweep, dust mop, and then vacuum the entire house each Sunday. Yes, it did make spills and dirt easier to get up, but that wasn't to say it was without a price; we soon had another problem – scratches.
Whether it was by furniture, a toy, or some horrible freak accident, the scratches started appearing. The once beautiful honey-color of the hardwood faded to a pale, sickly version of itself, sad and worn out thanks to constant abuse of kids' feet and unclipped doggie claws. By the time we sold our once home, the floors were beat-up and dingy, a shell of their former glory. Maybe it would've been better to have kept them covered – if we could've found a way to keep the flooring clean without leaking money trails out of our pockets every time we walked on it. For a time, we'd used rugs in the bedrooms but those, too, were unacceptable. Beating them out was a pain and the latex base smelled funny. I can still remember burying my face against the plush loops of fabric and breathing in the distinct odor. It didn't help that my mom was still allergic to those, and my dog only wanted to lie on them – again leading us to the same reason we rid of them in the first place!
I'm sure many of you can recall such a time in your own lives and your own struggle with carpeting, whether it was in the past or the present – an echo or a deja vu of times before. Either way, it feels like you can't win; you keep the carpet and deal with the allergies and expense of upkeep or rip it all up and risk damage to your precious hardwoods. I'm sure my mom would've loved to have had access to machine washable rugs when we were younger; I bet it would've changed a lot of things (including replacing that smelly yellow bathroom rug that became my dog's bed!).
But those were the 90's, and this is the present. And today we do have access to machine washable solutions! So when I become a pet-parent and the tradition is passed on to me, I'll certainly be using rugs to keep my hardwoods clean and unmarred. I'm sure it'll help the value of my home considerably!
About FlexiRuggz
FlexiRuggz are awesome customizable rugs that you can design yourself! Pick out the color, fabric, and pattern of your squares – then have fun mixing and matching. And it's completely machine washable too!
Check us out at www.flexiruggz.com. It's hip to use squares!
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