GREEN HOUSE CLEANERS

The best Christmas present ever is causing me problems! Researching green house cleaners (actually house cleaning services not the products) has now been added to my VERY long "to do" list. I'm ashamed to say that I knuckled and bumped it to the top. I did so out of selfishness and more than a healthy dose of the need for assistance in digging through the after holiday clutter and confusion.

Before my awakening to the dangers of household cleaning products I might have called the first commercial cleaning service with an impressive ad in the yellow pages. But now I want to know more about what will be left behind after my merry little helpers leave my home.

Here are some questions that I plan to ask all of the green house cleaners that I call.

1. Does your company use commercial chemical free products or do you make your own out of baking soda, vinegar, lemon juice and the like? If you buy your green cleaning
   products can you give me the name of the company?
   
   
2. Are you bonded? I don't have a lot of valuable stuff but I like to know I'm covered because once upon a time (pre-babies) I had a decorator that dropped a hammer on my brand new Kohler toilet while hanging pictures and found out the hard way that she was not insured.
   
   
3. Do you hire workers or are your cleaning professionals co-owners of the company? I like the idea of the owner polishing my furniture.
   
   
4. Will the green house cleaners who visit my home have GREEN cards and speak English? I would prefer that there be no illegals in my house and I want to be able to communicate my needs as we go, if you please.
   
   
5. What kind of vacuum cleaners and vacuum cleaner filters do you use? If it's not HEPA, it's not happening in my house.
   
   
6. What do you charge and do you do windows? Even though I won't be paying the green house cleaning crew for several visits, I want to know that once I'm fully and completely addicted to having help that I can afford to keep it coming.
   
   

I'm just starting the process of interviewing green house cleaners and I have to make my phonecalls during naptime so it could take awhile but right off the bat I'm pleased to report that there are quite a few household and commercial cleaning services that advertise that their cleaning products are environmentally safe and chemical free.

That's encouraging, but we all know that talk's cheap and they are going to have to prove their claims to me before I let them in the door. If you have questions about who gets the job of becoming my environmentally friendly house cleaners, I'll probably be posting about them on Family Recipes, Babies and Green Parenting Issues in the next few weeks.