Everyone and their brother is out to sell the good, better, BEST do it all, kill it all, clean it all product. While those two imaginary maids are scrubbing your shower for you what exactly are they doing to the environment? Do you REALLY know what's in there? Are all those chemicals really safe? Sure they WORK, but at what cost to the environment, your body, not to mention your wallet?
There are many many people out there who can tell you exactly which chemicals are harmful and which are safe and what products to avoid and how it's all affecting our water and air and body; I am not one of them. I do know that my family (meaning mostly me) is sensitive to petro-chemicals and artificial fragrances. I have allergic asthma and tend to get migraines so I am really careful about what I bring into our home.
I need simplicity in my life as much as possible and using the same products all over the house is much simpler than trying to figure out what to buy for which application, etc. When I can keep things simple, safe, AND cheap then you've got one happy mommy! Here is what I use to clean my entire house:
1. Vinegar (about $2.00/gallon)
2. Baking Soda (about $3.50 for a 4 lb box)
3. Borax (about $4.00/box)
4. Salt ($0.50 the cheapest you can find is fine)
5. Lemons (or lemon juice) (about $1.75 for lemon juice)
oh and one more ingredient - a little elbow grease.
So for less than $12.00 I have all my basic cleaning needs covered AND I'm not going to die from mixing bleach and ammonia ie: comet and windex (yes you really will die if you do that. Chlorine gas IS fatal) or have chemical soup in my home. I also don't have to buy some marketing genius' (really true marketing genius) "green" cleaners @ $5.00 a bottle.
For natural home cleaning "recipes" and methods look here, here, here, and here.
small confession: I do use those clorox throw-away toilet cleaners because the thought of a germy toilet brush sitting in my bathroom is more than I can stomach eeeeeewwww!
I'll keep you posted! AmyDe
1 comment:
I've used vinegar and baking soda before to clean but what do you do with the borax? And what exactly is it? I think I've used it for goop.
Thanks for the links - I'll check them out as we're a family with asthma as well.
Cheers!
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