There are many people who believe they clean their house well and never use the attachments that come with the vacuum cleaner. Even the most inexpensive vacuum comes with a general assortment of attachments for specific cleaning jobs. While some are for occasional use, others should be considered a critical part of your cleaning routine.

Vacuum Cleaner Attachments

The round brush is probably one of the most misused of all the vacuum attachments. Rather than being an orphan attachment, it should be the one most used. Consider the following housecleaning uses for the much-maligned round brush

1. Removing dust from lampshades. Lampshades are not overly expensive, but usually very delicate. They collect dust in the natural course of use and simply being in the home. The soft bristle round brush is perfect to vacuum not only the outside but the inside of the typical lampshade.
2. Picture frames are another item that seldom gets regularly cleaned. This is especially true of the more ornate picture frames. As the dirt and dust continued to settle on the picture and frame, it makes artwork look dull and lifeless. The round brush can easily keep even the most ornate of picture frames looking their best.
3. Baseboards are found along the perimeter of the walls throughout your home. Many have architectural designs that are perfect to catch dirt and dust. A once a month cleaning with the round brush is a perfect use for this special attachment.
4. Another good use for the round brush is cleaning ceiling fans. If you've ever used those long bristle round brushes to clean fan blades, you know what a mess that can be. A vacuum attachment will limit spreading that dirt and dust to other places of your home.

The next attachment that seems to get more use is limited only by your imagination. That's the long nozzle attachment. Here's a few uses for this handy tool.

1. If you have kids, the cracks between your seats in your car minivan or SUV are probably filled with various pieces of trash and partially eaten food. Use a long nozzle to remove the buildup of Cheerios, chip crumbs in general dirt in your car.
2. Those heating and cooling registers in your home are perfect places for spiders and various other bugs to hide out. Can you think of where the long nozzle attachment may come in handy to take care of this problem? Thought so.
3. Your refrigerator is much more energy efficient when the area is clean. A good idea is to occasionally use the long nozzle to clean out behind and to the side of your refrigerator. The less dirt and dust around the fridge, the less makes its way onto the condenser coils making the unit work much harder.

As you can see, rather than being a nuisance, vacuum cleaner attachments should be an important part of your housecleaning arsenal.