Cleaning In Pregnancy | My Mills Baby

So I’m 30 weeks pregnant and three-quarters of the way through! It’s been a fairly eventful week with falls, arguments, deranged cleaning and much more besides.

The nesting instinct has definitely kicked in and I’ve been busy redistributing clutter throughout the house. I’ve also turned into the ultimate slave-driver and am regularly demanding Craig get on his hands and knees with the floor wipes. There’s a snagging list of small jobs to do and a further list of what is still needed for Mini Madam, which are helpfully displayed next to the list of potential names in the downstairs loo. With all three lists on A3 paper blu-tac’ed to the wall, the loo now resembles Cameron’s reputation management team’s office.

Speaking of Craig… well he’s been doing my brain in this week. Irritatingly, his pregnancy app of choice is Bump Watch. Yesterday he came running into the bedroom brandishing his iPhone “Gem, Gem, Gem! Great news. Read this. Explains why you’ve been such a moody cow!” - thrusting it in my hands to read. With a massive grin on his face he watched me read the following:

“… For many women, as your due date approaches, it’s a common and very normal time to feel more emotional than usual. You’ll experience more frequent mood-swings, and very likely some anxiety over the baby and the new responsibilities that lie ahead”

Great. The love of my life now feels he has unbridled justification for getting on my wick, watching my temples pulse, then excusing the whole thing by putting my subsequent outburst ‘down to my hormones’. All this, thanks to the pregnancy app that I insisted he download in the first place.

Honestly. Some men experience ‘Couvade Syndrome’ (sympathy pains) when their partners fall pregnant, but my man seems to have taken on a more ambitious role - he’s regressed to the mental age of a 5-year-old. He’ll sing ridiculous songs, laugh hysterically at his own jokes, and whimper at me constantly. It’s like having two children at home at the moment! I’m seriously repressing the urge to slam his head in the fridge door over and over again.

On a more serious note, I also had a nasty fall this week. Having walked into the lounge and found my little dare-devil dancing on the dining room table, I scooped him up and attempted to deposit him on the comparative safety of the sofa. Tripping over his toy garage, I managed to fling Dexter onto the sofa before landing pretty awkwardly on Bump. It hurt like hell.

For the next hour I did nothing short of panic. I got all the emergency numbers out, crawled into bed and waited for something dramatic to happen. But aside from some strong (but not painful) contractions and lots of kicking, Mini Madam seemed fine. The only strange thing was a tumbling sensation as though the fall had rejigged things in there and given her the freedom to break on through to the other side of my belly. I can’t be sure but I have a strange feeling she might have turned around! Imagine that. If so, we’ll find out in the first week of March and we could be in for the much-wanted natural birth plan after all.

Physically, I’ve also been getting incredibly short of breath this week. Just climbing the stairs leaves me panting like Paula Radcliffe. This is apparently normal as my uterus is pushing upwards into my diaphragm, and in turn into my lungs, but it doesn’t make it any less irritating knowing there’s a reason for it. I can also really feel baby bearing down in-between my legs which is making my waddle ten times more pronounced than it already is. Whoever said that all pregnant women possess a sense of beauty is very wrong, very wrong indeed.

Between parenting, blogging, and tidying, cleaning seems take a backseat in this house. Every weekend Craig and I will do a blitz but it’s not long before Dexter will wee on a freshly mopped floor, or bury the crust from his toast in the sofa. Recently I’ve found it so stressful that we’ve even discussed getting a cleaner in for a few hours a week to keep on top of the bathroom and the vacuuming.

Having said this, Craig is quite OCD about cleanliness and our cleaning cupboard is bulging at the seams. He’s always wanted to try a steam cleaner so we were delighted when we were offered a trial of the Karcher SC 2500C.

The first thing to point out is that the steam cleaner (or ‘Kevin’ as we like to call him) is incredibly easy to set up. You get it out of the box, fill the reservoir with water, and press go. It comes with a variety of different heads and all the accessories you’ll need to get started (de-calcifying sticks, machine washable terry cloth covers, steam gun, detail nozzle, round brush, hand nozzle, extension tubes and floor nozzle).

Kevin’s first job was to tackle a dirty BBQ. This is perhaps the worst job on the planet and usually makes me feel a little sick. With the Karcher however, it was gleaming in less than 5 minutes with no scrubbing and no bending.

We then set it to work on our bathroom. To say I’m impressed is an understatement. It’s perfect for the elderly, disabled and near full-term mums-to-be as the effort required is absolutely minimal and the results are staggering. On ceramic surfaces (such as toilets, baths and sinks) you could physically see the dirt and limescale lift away. For shower enclosures and screens, you just give it a quick blast then follow-up with a brief squirt of Cilit Bang - ours looked brand new in just ten minutes.

Before we adopted Kevin, I can honestly say I could think of a thousand things I’d rather do than stick on my apron and get the sponges out. Now I’m literally on the hunt for new things to steam. It’s quite addictive! We even took it outside and gave our car windows a quick blast. A stubborn bird poo stain on our back window disappeared in seconds (great stuff as I wasn’t looking forward to doing that one!).

Now I’m pregnant again, it’s especially important I take it easy and avoid harsh chemicals. It might seem like overkill but we’ve lost babies before and aren’t taking any chances. The steam cleaner is 100% safe as it’s just pure water. It’s also credited with killing an impressive 99.99% of all common household bacteria on common household hard floor surfaces. Great news for parents with crawling babies everywhere, and an end to smelly mops and buckets!

Further adding to its baby-friendly credentials, the Karcher also won’t wake up napping babies. You can certainly hear the water bubbling as it boils within the machine, but the steam injection itself is virtually soundless. You will want to use the machine whilst your tot is tucked safely in another room though as the sight of Kevin sends Dexter into hysterics. Luckily there is a safety lock on the nozzle for more inquisitive children.

At £219.99, this model isn’t cheap but it’s very difficult to argue with the results. Kevin is now whipped from the cupboard weekly and has helped cut our weekly blitz down from 4 hours, to 30 minutes. We have peace of mind our home is clean enough to Dexter to explore, and baby number 2 is not being subjected to anything harmful. It’s definitely an investment, but I don’t think we could live without it now it’s here.

If I haven’t convinced you, you can see videos of the Karcher working its magic on Youtube, and you’ll then surely want to nip to the website to buy your own.