How to Clean a Broom

I'm getting ready to share with you, once again, another embarrassing household secret of mine: my dirty, dirty broom.

Eww!


Ewwww! Ewwww! Ewww!


There are no excuses, but I will say that we have a dark kitchen floor... which shows EVERYTHING! So this broom gets used probably daily. On top of that, we have a very hairy black cat that sheds hairball tumble weeds on a daily basis as well. With that said, this broom is almost 2 years old and has never been properly cleaned. Eww again.


I found this tutorial online courtesy ehow.com, Cleaning a Plastic Broom, which I followed, sort of.

Step #1: Beat the s@*#& out of it on the side of the front porch to knock off furballs.

Step #2: Vacuum

Step #3: Rinse under hot water

Step #4: Soak in a bath of soap, bleach and water. Ehow said to use dish soap but I dropped in a couple dishwasher detergent packets. I thought the bubbling effect might help break up the dirty particles. I also didn't follow the ratios they gave. I filled up the tube I had with hot water until the broom was covered, added 2 cups of bleach and 2 dish soap packets.

I soaked it for about 20 minutes. Now, I'm not exactly sure that I didn't create some sort of toxic fumage in my bathroom with this mixture so I opened all the windows in the house and turned on the exhaust fan. Let that be a warning/disclaimer to all. I don't want to be held accountable for lost brain cells. 

Step #5: Rinse out all the soap with hot water.

Step #6: Second soak in hot water and 2 cups bleach.

Step #7: Sit out to dry in the sun. Because my mother said so. 

I know, something looks a little off. As it turns out, the bristles on the broom have split at the ends. Just like my hair in middle school. I was going to cut them off so it looks nicer (because I feel like it is clean now but still looks dirty) but my husband said that it probably picks up better like that so I kept that as is.