Cleaning Tips With Essential Oils

Essential Oils
Extracted from plants, some essential oils can kill bacteria and mold. They’re very strong, so don’t go overboard: One drop of peppermint oil is as potent as 30 cups of peppermint tea.
Price: $14 for 5 milliliters at health-food stores.


Use Them to Clean Your…
Combs and brushes: Fill a container with 1 1/2 cups water, 1/2 cup distilled white vinegar, and 20 drops tea-tree, lavender, or eucalyptus oil. Soak combs and brushes for 20 minutes. Rinse and air-dry.

Scuffed floors: Apply two to four drops of tea-tree oil to the spots. Wipe excess oil with a cloth and rub in distilled white vinegar.

Gum-encrusted items: Orange oil is great at removing this sticky offender from various materials. (Don’t worry: It shouldn’t stain fabrics. But do launder immediately.) Apply with a cotton ball.

Shower doors: Wipe scum-covered glass doors with a few drops of lemon oil twice a month. It will protect them from grime buildup.

Toilets: Add 2 teaspoons tea-tree oil and 2 cups water to a spray bottle. Shake, then spritz along the toilet’s inside rim. Let sit for 30 minutes; scrub. You can also place a few drops of your favorite oil on the inside of the toilet-paper tube.

Windows: Mix 2 ounces water and 10 drops lavender or lemongrass oil to wipe grime off windows. Bonus: These oils may repel flies.

Cleaning Solutions with Lemons

Lemons

The acid in lemon juice removes dirt and rust stains. It's especially effective when mixed with salt, which makes an excellent scouring paste

Use Them to Clean Your…

Countertops: Dip the cut side of a lemon half in baking soda to tackle countertops; wipe with a wet sponge and dry. Don't use on delicate stone, like marble, or stainless steel (it may discolor).

Cutting boards: To remove tough food stains from light wood and plastic cutting boards, slice a lemon in half, squeeze onto the soiled surface, rub, and let sit for 20 minutes before rinsing.

Dishes: To increase the grease-cutting power of your dishwashing detergent, add a teaspoon of lemon juice.

Faucets: Combat lime scale by rubbing lemon juice onto the taps and letting it sit overnight. Wipe with a damp cloth.

Garbage disposal: Cut a lemon in half, then run both pieces through the disposal.

Grout: Spilled morning coffee on your tile countertop or backsplash? Here's how to tackle grout stains: Add lemon juice to 1 or 2 teaspoons cream of tartar (an acidic salt that acts as a natural bleaching agent) to make a paste. Apply with a toothbrush, then rinse.

Hands: When you touch raw fish, the smell can linger on your fingers. Rub your hands with lemon juice, which will neutralize the odor.

Laundry: To brighten whites, add 1/2 cup lemon juice to the rinse cycle for a normal-size load.

Plastic food-storage containers: To bleach stains from tomato soup and other acidic foods on dishwasher-safe items, rub lemon juice on the spots, let dry in a sunny place, then wash as usual.

Top Five Household Cleaners

•Ammonia: This works as a good disinfectant, but when mixed with water makes an excellent glass cleaner and surface polisher. And I have used it to strip the wax off my kitchen floors.

•White vinegar: It is extremely practical in taking out stains when used properly.

•Baking soda: Use this mixed with a little water on your hard surfaces to clean them up. It works great in the refrigerator both to wipe it down, and, if you keep an open box inside, to remove odors.

•Bleach: This chemical is important because it will clean anything off and kill almost any bacteria. If you have some growing mold, bleach it. If you want to make sure something is really clean, bleach it. Just be careful with it, since it can burn your hands and permanently ruin furniture and clothing.

•Liquid dish detergent: This little item is obviously useful when cleaning dishes, but mix it with some water and rub it on almost any surface, including carpet, to wipe spots clean and disinfect at the same time.

Cleaning Tips and Tricks

Counteract Kitchen Stains with Bleach:
Sometimes stains can penetrate the surface of a counter. In this case, you can use bleach-soaked paper towels to penetrate the counter's surface and counteract the stain. Bleach is dangerous, so use protective gloves and special care while using it.

Kill Germs with Borax:
To avoid using expensive sanitizers to kill the germs in your home, you can make your own germ killer. Simply mix one cup of borax into one gallon of water. Use the solution as a sanitizer on any surface in your home.

Make Steel Wool Go Further:
Steel wool, a combination of fine steel and soap, is a great tool for scrubbing stubborn messes off of dishes and other surfaces in your home. Each time you use steel wool, you probably only use a portion of the surface. To make the steel wool last longer, cut it in half or in quarters.

Make Your Own Window-Washing Liquid:
You can make your own window washing liquid with ammonia and water. An even better alternative to Windex� is to mix ammonia, alcohol, dishwashing liquid, and water, a mixture that will not freeze. Make sure to label your homemade cleaning fluid bottles.

Clean Up Spills with Diapers:
Diapers are extremely soft and very absorbent. You can use diapers as the final drying stage to keep water spots or hard water stains from appearing. Diapers are great for cleaning up spills before they set into carpets or fabrics. Diapers also make excellent dusting and buffing cloths

Use Fabric Softener Sheets as Dust Cloths:
The same fabric softener sheets that you use in your dryer to reduce static and generate a fresh smell can also be used on your furniture. The anti-static property of dryer sheets will actually keep your furniture from attracting dust and making you have to clean them so often. As a bonus, your furniture will smell fresh and clean.