Cleaning Solutions: Cleaning with Vinegar and Natural Cleaning Products
You don’t have to dip into your retirement fund to purchase fancy products
to clean your home. In fact, some of the very best cleaning products out there
are probably already sitting in your kitchen!
Nature's Cleaner
Vinegar is a fantastic all-pupose cleaner. Buy a spray bottle
from your local dollar store and fill it up halfway with water. Then top
it up with vinegar to create a solution that will enable you to clean many,
many things. Vinegar is a wonderful natural disinfectant and deodorizer. However,
once you’ve made your wonder solution, test it first on an inconspicuous area—just
in case.
Vinegar is safe to use on just about every surface and is cheap, too! Be careful,
though: incorrectly diluted vinegar is acidic and can eat away at tile grout.
Vinegar is also not safe to use on marble surfaces. Don't worry about your home
smelling like vinegar. The smell is gone as soon as the vinegar dries.
Some great uses for vinegar include:
Bathroom: Vinegar can clean the bathtub, toilet, sink, and countertops.
Pure vinegar gets rid of rings in the toilet bowl. Flush the toilet to make
the water level go down, then pour the undiluted vinegar around the inside
of the rim. Scrub down the bowl. A vinegar/water solution is also a terrific
substance with which to mop the floor. The substance will remove soap scum
and hard water stains on your fixtures and tile.
Kitchen: Use vinegar to clean the stovetop, appliances, countertops,
and floor.
Laundry Room: Vinegar works like a natural fabric softener, a wonderful
alternative to the store-bought stuff if you have sensitive skin. Add a ½ cup
of vinegar to the rinse cycle instead of store bought fabric softener. Vinegar
also breaks down laundry detergent more effectively.
Lemony Fresh
Another wonderful natural cleaning product is lemon juice. It’s great at dissolving
soap scum and hard water deposits, as well as cleaning and shining brass and
copper surfaces. Create a homemade cleaning paste by mixing lemon juice with
vinegar and/or baking soda. Use the paste to scrub dishes, surfaces, and stains.
Lemon juice can also work like a furniture polish. Mix 1 cup olive oil with a
½ cup of lemon juice to polish your hardwood furniture.
A Safer Abrasive
Finally, consider baking soda as an alternative to commercial abrasive cleansers.
Use it to scrub surfaces. Baking soda is also a fantastic deodorizer. Place
a box of it in the refrigerator or freezer to help absorb unpleasant odors.
There you have it: three seemingly ordinary kitchen ingredients that can work
wonders as natural cleaning products!
