to think laminate floor is not naff?

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This snobbery about laminate floor and leather sofas gets on my nerves.

They are not naff, they are PRACTICAL. You can keep the floor clean, really clean.

Carpets are filthy and they smell.

We had a lovely -and clean- decade when laminate floor was 'trendy'. Now someone has decided that it is 'naf' and i fear we are going back to smelly carpets.

AIBU to think they are ok and should stay?

But they are always dirtier than you imagine. One of the carpets we took up had puddle stains on it's underside and on the underlay from the days DS was potty trained 3 years ago - each time, we had wheeled out the steam cleaner and used all the necessary cleaning products to get rid of the puddle - but I now know that you never can get carpets really clean, only so clean

No peeing babies here i suppose ! I am a cleaning nazi though I have white sofas too so must be mad!

Oh i missed a lot last night

In my opinion there is visible dirt and non-visible dirt/odours. Even if you don't have pets and you don't potty train the carpet still suffers. You tell visitors to take the shoes off but what about sweaty socks? Carpets just absorb dirt and odour. They do. They absorb odours. No matter how clean you are you cook in the house. Even if you open the kitchen door the smell of chilli, garlic, onion, curry does cover the ground floor. It goes on the carpet and it stays there. Hoovering doesn't remove odours it just removes the cheerios and toast crumps.

Best feeling in the world is when you open all the windows and mop the floor. Lovely freshness in the house....'Tacky'?

Ah well, everyone has their own opinion.

I can certainly say that my carpets don't smell though.

I HATE sweeping and mopping but love hoovering and steam cleaning so carpets are fine for me. No pets and a no outdoor shoes policy, toddler not being potty trained until summer where he can run around outside naked.

I'm still going to have stone/slate flooring in kitchen, bathroom and hallway though.

And I still don't like laminate!

But Pixie - my DS potty trained in Summer too and was mainly outside all day long. He cracked it in less than a week BUT he still came inside loads during that time, I was plying him with drinks and there were some major outpourings during that week (especially in the evenings when he was tired out from all that playing in the fresh air). It was almost as though he chose to have his accidents indoors on the cosy carpet (at other times he simply fail to reach the potty). I cannot imagine what state the carpet would have been in if he had taken longer to train. I don't like laminate either though I would not recommend training a child in a garden belonging to a carpeted house.

I agree our carpets certainly don't smell and nor do any of my friends! Although about 80% of our ground floor is tiled and that is where we live most of the time but you can switch on an extractor and open the windows.Our living room is a child free and pet free room so maybe thats why it still looks and smells good.I don't think anyone is saying laminate isn't clean just that the cheap ones are not very attractive.

We have reclaimed floorboards in our living room, courtesy of the previous owner. They looked lovely when we moved in, but have been systematically scratched to death by our children/ dogs/ toys. They also have gaps which catch your socks at times, and in some areas the wood is actually splintering. Cold air seems to come up through the gaps. It does look nice, but not as practical as the laminate we have in the playroom! There was a carpet there when we first moved in, which I had intended to keep, but after a month and several hours of scrubbing, I gave up. The children spill juice all over it all the time. I am on my 3rd rug in 5 years, but the laminate is a godsend.

And don't get me started on the carpet that was in the toilet when we moved in- that was whipped out before I'd even unpacked the first box- bleurgh!

I think a lot of this is about lifestyle. We eat and drink in tne kitchen with a slate floor. We also have a formal dining room with giant rug under the table over carpet.

We have no problem with food and spills all over the house. We have carpet and stripped floorboards. Carpet in bedrooms, landing and stairs mostly. We are about to have encaustic tiles laid in the hall and hardwood flooring in the lunge and dining room. Bathrooms are all tiled (they were hideous laminate when we moved in) Having had hardwood installed the the last 2 houses we have never had a scratching issue. It is all about lifestyle. We have different lifestyles and so different needs.

btw my children never peed on the floor! I am not sure that potty training equates to peeing everywhere. Wait until they are ready - it's not a race to get it done 1st. Spend time- know your child.

I agree with all of your post gotta! I have only one child though but all his mates aswell and just never had that level of spillage and mess!

Completely agree with the OP, here, here!

+

OP, you are being very reasonable to think that laminate floors and leather sofas are OK!

Ahem, I hope all those with wood/laminate floors have a lakeland steam mop ??

takes petrol and a match to DFS leather sofa, feature wall(s), billy bookcase and numerous IKEA/B&Q items

realises we made the best of our home in the budget we had, it looks lovely and is clean and comfortable

runs for bucket of water

Thank you new2cm I need that!

Apocalypse I don't have steam mop. Got 2 mops from poundland the ones that you remove the head and wash it after use (either by hand or in w/m).

Making. Best post!

its much less naff than carpets encrusted with sludge which need cleaning constantly so they don't stink (can you guess what we've got at the moment? not really compatable with a 14 m/o and a 5yr old.)

Who gives a toss whether you have hard wood floors or laminate? easy to clean, either way, and once you've got kids that's all you need. Plus i always found with real wood that stuff gets stuck between the floorboards and you have to chisel it out at some point...

I am actually ashamed to say I didn't even know these things were out of fashion these days. We are selling our flat and everyone has commented on how nice it is. Likewise, every single house we have viewed at is decorately similarly...!

We do have solid wood flooring dahling but since it is scratched up to frick I don't think we'll bother with that again...

Well I tahnked the lord for my laminate floor when ds dropped a whole bowl of coco pops on it this morning. Luckily my lab was on hand to lick up the mess.

Coco pops, laminate and a dog? I am a chav.

I have a brown leather sofa (AND it's a corner unit AND we searched and searched for what we wanted, and were very averse to getting one from DFS, but in the end the one we bought was virtually indistinguishable from the one we saw in some upmarket Italian furniture shop, an equivalent grade of leather, but much cheaper) - so brown leather corner unit from DFS it is! Have some laminate in DS bedroom - but this was because when we first bought the house pre-children room was DP office and we just wanted to floor it practically. Is Quick-Step tho! Downstairs in carpet and limestone in kitchen/hallway/cloakroom .. would have liked real wood in lounge but we want to move so not worth the expense now. Oh, also have a fairly large flat screen tele on wall .. but room is huge (disproportionately so!) so room can take it! But actually, we live there, we like it, so don't care if anyone else thinks it's naff!

Oh, and as for leather sofas, I scrub mine down every week and am amazed at the dirt that comes off them! They can be as naff as they like, but they are staying for the forseeable future in this house

Oh heck I forgot about our massive flat screens...

looks out petrol can

Further to Billy Bookcases

We have Billy bookcases (the shame). We bought them in 1994, and we are book addicts so they are often double banked between book culls. And we don't really read paperbacks (hope don't sound snobbish) but huge hard backs, like a translation of the Doomsday book, so those bookcases have taken some weight.

They still are doing fine, nice and sturdy and solid. I wouldn't change them for the world.

I would love laminate. Something I could wipe. I am a rubbish housewife and our carpet is foul. It was elderly when we moved in (1994) and is pale grey. It has lived through three cats, one of which had bulimia and another went through a phase of nervous spraying. My little boy is now four, but you can imagine the state of it after he had spilled everything. Also parties. OH won't change it.

Fabric sofa is not much better (although extremely comfy) but after the nightmare I had with OH's irrational attachment to an uncomfortable, rickety brown sofa in fake faux leather I couldn't bear a leather sofa.

"btw my children never peed on the floor! I am not sure that potty training equates to peeing everywhere. Wait until they are ready - it's not a race to get it done 1st. Spend time- know your child."

"Wait until they are ready"... erm did I mention that he did it in THREE days (messy days, yes, but only three ) , NO accidents away from home ever, no bedwetting - in what way was he not ready? Pretty good timing and surely he trained easily by most people's standards - not that it is a race, nor is this a potty training thread.

Btw Weeing three times on the carpet indoors in that time does not "equate to peeing everywhere" as I am sure you will discover

Spend time- know your child

Gosh that hit a nerve. There are lots of mentions about potty training children not just yours!

If you are happy having your DC rolling about on minging, germ and dust mite - infested floor coverings then that is, of course, your choice. It is pretty pointless insisting that it is a healthy choice though