Adult Toys

For Father's Day this year, we bought a new vacuum. For the last five years, we've been using a Shark Navigator Lift-Away. We bought it on sale and have enjoyed using it. Recently, the brush roll stopped working which has hindered the entire vacuum's efficiency. Something we learned early on in our marriage was good tools make undesirable chores more enjoyable. If you don't enjoy your vacuum, you're not going to want to vacuum. Losing the brush rolling feature on our vacuum greatly hindered our desire to vacuum and clean the house. Therefore, it was time to get a new one. Rather than purchase the part and continue putting money into fixing it (we already paid to have a new motor shipped a few years ago), we decided to purchase a new vacuum. We did some research, watched online review videos, and eventually settled on an LG Cordless stick vacuum. 

Old vacuum.

The two vacuums are not in the same tiers so to compare them side-by-side probably isn't fair. At first, I was really excited. Who doesn't love new toys, even when adulting? And then after the initial hype faded, I started to see some flaws I didn't like. 

Now that it's been a solid month of using it, I've compiled a few thoughts overall.

New vacuum!

1. I love cordless and being able to move from one room to the next. I never thought unplugging and replugging in the vacuum to clean different rooms in the house was that big of a deal. And honestly, it's not. But once you've experienced the freedom of a cordless vacuum and being able to just push it from room to room, it's really hard to go back.

2. Brush rolls which don't trap hair are a must. Some are called self-cleaning. Some are just brush rolls that don't wrap hair. Our old vacuum didn't have this, and cleaning hair off of the brush roll was a nightmare. I think I've pulled one hair off the brush roll in the last month. It's a game changer. All vacuums should have this feature. I don't think they should be allowed to make one that doesn't.

3. This vacuum has three power modes. Most of the time I use the second power mode. The first one isn't very powerful. Will it clean? Yes. But for most of my cleaning needs, I'm in the second power mode. Our old vacuum didn't have modes and was always very powerful. Being that this is a cordless vacuum, your battery run time matters so it can't run on high all the time if you want it to last more than a few minutes.

4. The dust cup is rather small. Keep in mind, this is a cordless stick vacuum. They can only make the dust cup so large. The vacuum itself is already top-heavy. With that, I almost have to empty it after every use. This sometimes means emptying it after I vacuum one room (because I pulled out the vacuum to clean one room.)

5. It's so much more convenient to use. At less than 6 pounds, I grab the vacuum to clean the kitchen after a messy meal with my kids. Or if I feel I'm stepping on a lot of crummies. I would never do this with a broom or even our old vacuum. Mentally, just knowing I'm grabbing a light little vacuum to quickly pick up some things makes a huge difference. And because it's only 6 pounds, you bet I'm going to teach my children to vacuum when they can safely hold it up....age 5? The pole length is also adjustable so I bet at the shortest setting, it will fit them perfectly. 😉 After all, it's never too late to start teaching children how to be competent members of a family. 

In conclusion, I'm happy with our switch to a cordless stick vacuum. If suction power is your top priority, it's probably not the best vacuum for you. When factoring in a lot of other considerations, I definitely think we made the right choice.