Tell Cif about the most annoying mess you've ever had to clean – you could win a £250 voucher! NOW CLOSED

[MichelleMumsnet]

Cif has asked us to find out what Mumsnetters think about cleaning up their LO's mess. In particular, Cif want to find out what the hardest or least fun to clean mess your DCs create are.

Here's what Cif have to say, "We all know that children see the home as a playground, and playgrounds get dirty. But we also understand how difficult it can be to clean up after your child, so we want to help make that process as easy as possible."

So, what do you find the most painstaking cleaning task when it comes to cleaning up after your DCs? Is it the crayon drawings they leave on the table or on the wall? Or is it the jam they accidentally splatter over the kitchen counter?

Maybe you refuse to clean up after your family? Or is it your family that has to clean up after you ?

Whatever it is, we would love to hear about the worst mess you/your family have ever had to clean.

Everyone who adds their comments to this thread will be entered into a prize draw to win a £250 Love2Shop voucher.

Thanks and good luck,

MNHQ

[dahville]

I can't say that wiping/scrubbing chocolate milk off the wall was very fun, especially since I missed some of it when it first happened and had to put a lot of elbow grease to get the stains out.

[janeyjampot]

My worst mess was made by DD's rabbit. He was running around in the garden and managed to get rather damp on the wet grass. He then ran into a flower bed and dug a large hole. Rabbits flick the discarded soil under their bodies as they dig, which resulted in him becoming extremely muddy - in fact, covered in soil and compost - on his tummy. This seemed to be very exciting and he started to roll and jump around in the hole. By the time we caught him he was almost covered in soil and was unrecognisable as a predominantly white rabbit.

Realising that he was unlikely to be able clean himself up effectively, DD suggested we bring him inside and wash him in the washing-up bowl on the kitchen floor. Then we could keep him in until he was completely clean and dry.

We put a small amount of warm water in a bowl on the kitchen floor, popped the rabbit in it, whereupon he leapt out of the bowl, shaking vigorously, and proceeded to run around the house, shaking mud, soil and dirty water all over the floor and the walls. By the time we caught him my (white) kitchen and hall had mud spattered all the way up to the ceiling, and the curtains had to be dry-cleaned. All in all it took more than 4 hours to clean up and return the downstairs of the house to normal!

[yegodsandlittlefishes]

I think it must be the dents/holes in the top of one end of kitchen table. I see it every day and the only way to clean that off would be to sand the table right down and revarnish it.

[MaryBS]

My aspie son decided our conservatory wall was too plain and boring, so he wrote a number of maths equations on the wall, in black permanent marker! Or it could be the time he was fed up of waiting for us to paint his bedroom, so decided to paint it himself, with dark green acrylic paint!

[mindingalongtime]

Jumbo pot of sudocrem off three under three, in their hair, on the carpet, the walls, toys, chairs, sofa, you name it! I only went to sig for a parcel!

[AGnu]

Playdough trodden into a textured carpet... It just has to be left to dry & then carefully flaked off with a knife. Drives me mad!

The previous owners left... something... trodden into the hall carpet too. We think it was probably chewing gum. It's now black & the only way we've found of removing it is to carefully cut the carpet underneath. DH did this to one patch & hasn't bothered since! Luckily it's a navy carpet so it doesn't show too much.

By far the most dramatic mess I've ever witnessed was when the pressure cooker broke. It was like a soup volcano! There were bits of onion plastered to the ceiling. DM leapt towards it to make it stop, DB tried to stop her & I legged it out the room! Thankfully DM cleaned it up once it had cooled... Their ceiling needed painting anyway!

[AGnu]

Oh, cottage cheese in a child's hair isn't much fun to get rid of either!

[Littlecherublegs]

Porridge!! It's like wallpaper paste!! It's hard enough to clean off my DS's face never mind his clothes, highchair, the floor, the ceiling....

Also, none DC related (yes it was all my fault!) - put a satsuma on the bedroom floor (I was emptying my bag obviosuly!) ...nice new cream carpet.... then stepped back and stood on it! Squished it into the carpet good & proper!!!! Big orange stain. Did not want to tell DH that one!!!!!

[ouryve]

Nothing can beat puke, launched straight off a top bunk [boak]

DS1 is prone to abdominal migraines, and we've taken to putting his mattress on the floor when he's showing the signs. Cleaning the walls, both beds, the ladders, the carpet and anything in splattering distance, usually at midnight, is far from fun.

[catsoup]

For me it was when DD aged 3 threw her cup of milk all over her room including the walls and carpet. Didn't find it till the next morning by which time the milk had stained the walls and I couldn't get it off.

It had gone hard and I've tried everything to get the wall clean. Painted over it in the end. Plus it stinks gonna have to get a carpet cleaner as well.

[supermariossister]

glitter, copious amounts of glitter. that just spread further and further about the house no matter what you do with it.


oh and moonsand. wet moonsand may possibly be the work of the devil

[peronel]

Cleaning food off a wooden highchair. Whilst not as aesthetically pleasing, plastic is so much easier to clean...

[SleeplessInBedfordshire]

The most annoying one to try and clean was the food that someone dropped down the side of the passenger seat in my car. God knows how long these unidentified lumps had been there when I noticed the smell and mould! It was in that little narrow bit down the side of the seat that's almost impossible to reach.

[NeatFreak]

Most frustrating ocean was when someone jumped on a new beanbag and the balls went everywhere. You can't Hoover or sweep them so I had to pick them all up by hand (sob)

Hardest clean was dropping a pan of tomato soup from a high stool. It bounced everywhere and sprayed red liquid all the way down. We had recently painted cream walls and new White Lino (sobs even louder)

[scripsi]

This week I have a hacking tickly cough, I took some cough medicine then started coughing, knocked the medicine which flew across the room, smashed on the stone floor covering the inside of my favourite shoes and exploding over the sofa. It was quite magnificent and slow motion. The DCs watched open-mouthed.
I am still wiping up stickiness as it just won't go away.

[TheRunawayTrain]

May I volunteer the mess caused when you put a toddler in a room of beanbags.

The mess was...phenomenal. I actually had serious admiration for dd1 because she had put a lot of effort into it. No admiration for my best friend who'd let her!

[NeoMaxiZoomDweebie]

I have two daughters who seem to INGRAIN unidentifiable dirt onto every single surface imaginable. Grey smears and black smudges appear on walls, doors, floors, cups, toys and windows....I do find that only CIF will get these marks out....especially on my walls....but the most annoying is the slime from those pots of slime they love so much. They fling the stuff everywhere and it dries as hard as rock!

[Flossie82]

Not exactly the kids fault, but dog poo or cat poo brought in on pushchair wheels / shoes. Yuk!

[katiewalters]

My 3year old got hold of a pen and drew on the kitchen table with it, that was a nightmare to get off, and in some places you can still see it. I'm constantly having to clean the windows on the French doors out to the garden, as my son loves to cover them in finger marks.
When I was pregnant, I had sickness all the way through and I use to vomit and that was a pain as it would go everywhere even though I was knelt over the toilet.

[CrayolaLola]

Oh, this is an easy one to answer...

When DS was a toddler he drained the toilet with a supersoaker water pistol...and had huge fun spraying the whole bathroom! I heard him giggling from the kitchen and on seeing the carnage I have to admit I sank to my knees and wept. Everyone else found it hysterical. Even though the loo water was 'clean' (thank God!) It took me hours to surgically scrub the bathroom afterwards... and the offending supersoaker was banished to the shed!

[nemno]

When my boys parked the landrover on its side in a 1.5 m deep bombhole of mud. It looked like the Concordia when righted and we still find flakes of mud dropping out of dash/fittings 3 years later.

Good news though was that a) I didn't do the cleaning and b) the car still started and drove home.

[DontmindifIdo]

oh yes, wheetabix, it need to be shifted the instant it drops, not "oh, we'll do the pre-school run and clear it up when I get back" because by then it'll have set like concrete. Occassionally when trying to chip it off the kitchen floor I question what it's doing to my DC's innards...

Anyway, I'll also add the time when DS got D&V. And was sat on my knee when this started, wearing loose fitting clothing. He pooed out the sides, all over me. But that paled into insignificance compared to the vomit. Which went directly into my face. Up my nose, in my eyes, then dripped down my top and pooled in my bra. Someone else's vomit does rather sting when in your eyes. And not the best thing to be shoved up your nose. I'm rather proud that I managed to clean him up and sooth his cried before I started dealing with myself.

[DontmindifIdo]

oh and pre-DCs, when I was in a house share in London, we had mice. Put down poision and traps, and then after a few days of shifting the bodies in the morning, there was an bad smell. Housemate realised it was behind the skirting bit under the kitchen cupboards. Removed it to find 3 dead mice rotting with maggots all over. We fashioned mouth/nose masks out of hte various floaty silk scarves my Aunt sent me (I was too young and too cool to actually wear them back then), and as I was the smallest with the thinnest arms, I had to reach under to try to shift the mice. Couldn't reach as they were at the back, so we got the handles of a broom and a mop and sellotaped the dustpan to one, used the other to try to knock it onto the pan - all while lying on my tummy, looking in and watching maggots wriggling closer and closer. Worst smell ever.

We cracked open the "posh" gin my housemate had been given at christmas after that.

[lancasterkaren]

Ok heaving just finally gotten over a house full of children and hubby with a tummy bug.... Sickness is worst... The smell gets into everything and is a nightmare to clean out of carpets...

[WhyIRayLiotta]

The worst (so far) has been the toddler with a big tub of sudacream. It was on everything. the TV, coffee table, sofa, cushions, curtains, carpet and walls. And of course ALL over toddler herself. And the cat.

It was just the amount of the stuff smeared everywhere... I didnt attempt to clean it until DP came home from work so he could appreciate the magnitude. (and help me clean it.)