Cleaning & Organizing
Dear Community,
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
My H and I just moved into a townhouse that has all of the window blinds up.
It appears that the blinds have NEVER been dusted. The dust is literally caked on to the blinds. Dry dusting does not work and I tried just using water and a damp rag but that just seems to make the dust stick more and leave a gross film.
Any recommendations on how to get rid of it? Our landlord did a basic cleaning when we moved in but said anything beyond that was our job.
Since we are renting we will not replace the blinds.
TIA!
Warning
No formatter is installed for the format bbhtml
Re: Cleaning caked on dust
Thanks for the ideas everyone!
I checked out the blinds and they appear to be really screwed in to the windows. I asked my H about taking them off and cleaning them in the tub and he doesn't think that they could come off easily.
Plus, I'm nervous about blocking up the tub with all of the nastiness.
I think I might just have to scrub each stupid blade independently. Ughhhh.
I closed mine and used a Chlorox wipe up and down them all at once. Made a ridiculous amount of noise and some scrubbing on a few blades, but it did the trick.
(I'm not sure if Chlorox wipes are actually safe for blinds -- I didn't really check, just started using them and didn't see any damage done, so I did all the ones in my house.) I had a ton of contractor dust after replacing flooring in the house and it came off using this method.
Are these plastic blinds? If so, I would try the Magic Eraser on a few blades and see if it makes a dent. You will probably have to use a paper towel to wipe the residue off each blade.
ETA: I meant plastic or metal, i.e., not fabric.
Try brushing off as much of the grime with a stiff brush first and then spray with your regular cleaner and wipe down.
DH and I had the same issue with our apartment.

The blinds are screwed in, too. :-/
A Magic Eraser might work. Or, there's this stuff at Dollar Tree called LA's Totally Awesome. It's yellow and you're supposed to dilute it but...
That stuff works on everything and cleaned up our blinds easily.