Friday, August 12, 2011

It's a Cultural Thing

August 12 2011,

Shoes in the house has been a debate in our house. I grew up having to take off our shoes when we come into the house. Hubby on the other hand always wore shoes in the house while growing up.

Taking off one's shoes before coming into the house keeps the house cleaner, minimizes the scratches on the hardwood floors and allows the hardwood floors to look shiny longer.

When I go into someone's house, even in the winter, I take off my shoes / boots before entering as a sign of respect.

We had my in-laws for a couple of days, and they wore their shoes around the house the whole time. What can I say, they were use to wearing shoes in the house. They would have been more than happy to take them off, but since hubby wears his shoes around the house, I really can't have them take their's off.

You know how long it takes to clean floors? First you have to sweep up all the dirt, and then you have to mop it. No, I don't have one of those steam mops, I use a bucket of water and get on my hands and knees and mop.

How do you feel about taking off your shoes at someone else's home? Do you wear your shoes in your own home?

Quilt & Bitch

11 comments:

p00lriah. said...

honestly, shoes off makes so much more sense. if people ever look at the ground & see how dirty it is, no one would ever wear shoes inside the house to bring in all that gunk.

Quilt+Bitch said...

Imagine public rest rooms?

Kiki said...

I grew up taking my shoes off at home and when visiting friends and family. We always had slippers to change into when we got home. This is what I still do with my own family.

Quilt+Bitch said...

Kiki, Do you have your guest take off their shoes? If so, do you provide slippers for them? I wonder if I should start enforcing a mandate. Interestingly I had a friend who came over and brought her own slippers! I thought that was clever.

p00lriah. said...

you should get a bunch of cheapo $2 slippers & make shoes off mandatory. your house your rules!

Quilt+Bitch said...

p00lriah, I could mandate, but how do you tell guests that they cannot wear shoes in the house while hubby is walking around in shoes in the house. He won't wear slippers... we are trying to buy him in door shoes, but he has not found one to his liking yet... um.

p00lriah. said...

socks or barefoot. as long as the floor is clean you can go barefoot in the house. :) you can also do sandals for hubby as long as you leave them inside--easy on, easy off.

or give hubby floor cleaning duty. :D i'm sure the slippers will go on very quickly. (hehe)

Quilt+Bitch said...

floor cleaning duty - never! He'll just hire somebody, we've had that conversation already.

p00lriah. said...

i got nothing.

omgwtf said...

I'm Asian so I do the take the shoes off thing. My aunt provides slippers for her guests. That seems to work well.

omgwtf said...

Also, it's more comfortable with shoes off or with slippers on.