This will probably seem like a silly question. There, fair warning. I'm a totally random type of person.
Brandon comes from a "shoes in the house" family. I come from a "shoes left at the door" family. What a predicament! I have gotten lazier as the years go by... But I recently made a very friendly sign to hang on our garage door that states: "DON'T BE LAZY! Take your shoes OFF!" to remind us to do so! Usually, I find that I just forget because I'm so used to waltzing into the house and straight into my closet to change my clothes! Our house was brand new, two years ago when we bought it. TWO YEARS! Wow, that snuck up on me... Anyway, the carpet definitely looks older than that! We walk through our laundry room which leads to a hallway to the main part of the house on one side and then our master bedroom on the other side. Well, the majority of our house is carpet, which isn't favored by most these days, but I actually prefer. However, our carpet is builder grade carpet and is not wearing so well. We are not going to replace the carpet any time soon... so we need to preserve it! So, I have two questions...
What kind of storage system do you use (if you do) in your laundry room/mud room/garage to store shoes? Right now I just use a wicker basket but it really isn't the best solution.
How do you politely ask guests to remove their shoes? I can't help but notice when people don't take their shoes off... they may as well be wearing big glowing green alien shoes because they stand out so much to me!!! I don't want to be rude, I just want to keep my carpets nice! Our weather out here tends to be wet... which equals mud... ick! Even if its not muddy, I just don't want people's dirty shoes on my carpets OR my furniture!!!
So... that was random. But any advice would be welcome!!! :0)
A Letter for My Mom
1 month ago
5 comments:
We are a "shoes-off" family! If you can believe this, we don't even have carpet downstairs (it's tile)and it's still "shoes-off"!! The reason being is that we live in Vegas and since we're in the desert, it's VERY dusty and dirty. My family and I all have bad allergies from all the dust-- and I do not want to be tracking all that crud in on the floor. Also, I don't want to have to mop every other day!
A friend of mine has a "Please Remove Shoes" sign right at her front door, and so I copied that idea for our house. Plus we keep a few pairs of shoes by the door. When people see those, if they missed the sign, they usually just figure it out.
Also--we keep shoe racks in our garage. I bought them at Target, and they work great. No messy shoe piles in the house, etc.
Even though we don't wear shoes, our carpet on the stairs and all upstairs still gets dirty! So I can only imagine what it would be like if we did wear shoes!
We got our carpets cleaned and it looked a lot better!
PS--the only time we wear shoes downstairs though, is if we have a big party, then it's "shoes-on" for that night (but only on the tile) not on the carpet. (But usually everyone is downstairs anyways).
I know my "shoe rules" might sound totally ridiculous to some people, but it works for us :)
Have a great day!
We are shoes off. We have shelving and a shoe rack in the garage. It creeps me a bit because I get nervous about spiders and such crawling in, but I just shake them before putting them on! To me, it is the best way to keep shoes out of the house.
When I have people over, they see me in either socks and slippers (hint one). If there is a large group coming over, I'll either leave a pair or two at the door (hint two) or usually the first arrivals are family so the dumped off shoes set the statement. I do NOT ask people to remove them when they don't unless they are dirty and it is someone I feel comfortable saying something to.
It works pretty well!
I don't have a sign because I just don't want to make people uncomfortable and our attempts generally work!
We are shoes off. We have a giant wicker basket at the front door. If guests notice and take their shoes off, we're glad. If they don't, we don't make a big deal out of it. We don't have a sign, or extra socks/slippers for guests, either. We just let them wear their shoes and, for a few hours, the carpet can take the shoes. We don't have a garage or mud room, though. If we did, I bet I'd still use baskets as they are easier to rummage through than using racks.
Hope that helps!
Thanks for the tips!
Jen, I don't blame you. I've lived in the desert and that dust is
yucky! I like the idea of a sign too!
Courtney, I agree if they can't take the hints I do NOT feel comfortable asking people to take them off! I need to look for a good storage solution at Target.
Chelle, I think the only thing I hate about the basket is rummaging through to find my shoes. Maybe if I put them away more often I wouldn't have that issue! :)
I LOVE our "Brookwood Storage Bench" from Costco. we bought it online. Its out of stock now but goes in and out of stock alot... it stores shoes plus doubles as a sitting bench on top with a nice little pad, it's lovely and pretty to look at and comes with an optional top part with hooks for coats etc. If you're interested i'll send a picture :)
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