When you live with small children at home, we pay close attention to disinfecting pacifiers, thoroughly cleaning and sanitizing dishes and cutlery, washing hands before administering medication, disinfecting the bottle … but how many of you have actually cleaned your children’s toys? In reality, our children spend a lot of time with their favorite toys by carrying them everywhere and even putting them in their mouths after they have fallen to the ground.
Helpling, the leading platform for booking cleaning services in Singapore, has some useful advice that will keep the toys of your children cleaned and disinfected, so that they can have fun while you rest easy.
1. Stuffed animals / Fabric Toys
To disinfect stuffed toys, place them in a plastic bag and freeze for 24 hours to kill the mites.
Most of fabric toys can be cleaned using washing machine if the material is cotton or polyester blends. For toys that are heavily stained, sprinkle baking soda over stained spots then put them into the washing machine. Then, add in 3 caps of white vinegar together with detergent into the washing machine.
2. Plastic Toys
Plastic toys or blocks can be sterilized easily. Here are a few ways of cleaning them:
- Prepare a bucket filled with water and place all the plastic toys together with a couple spoonfuls of baby bottle cleaning agent in it. Let them soak for 3 hours.
- Another method is to combine equal cups of water to equal cups of distilled white vinegar into a spray bottle. This comes in handy when you are out and your child has dropped his favorite toy to the ground. Spray on the dirty spots and leave it for 15 minutes before wiping off the remaining vinegar.
- If the plastic toys are durable against heat, the dishwasher is a good way to clean them. Place the toys in the top rack, and set the washer to dry setting.
3. Teething toys
For teething toys, place them into a pot of boiling water for approximately 10 minutes and let them cool off afterwards. For those that can’t be boiled, you can clean them with liquid dish washing soap and very hot water.
We hope you have found these tips useful! For more cleaning tips, visit us here.
