A Resource of Helpful Cleaning Tips
Sodium Bicarbonate and Lemon Juice or Vinegar
Baking soda also makes a great stain remover when used in tandem with other substances, such as lemon juice and vinegar. Simply mix the liquids with the powder until they become a paste, and apply to the surface using a scrub brush.
Sodium bicarbonate, commonly known as baking soda, is a chemical used in medicines, foods, soaps, fire extinguishers, pesticides and manufacturing processes. Other names for sodium bicarbonate are bicarbonate of soda; carbonic acid, monosodium salt; monosodium carbonate; monosodium hydrogen carbonate and sodium hydrogen carbonate.
Clothes and baking soda
If an article of your clothing is stained with an acid of some sort, then treating the stain with sodium bicarbonate before washing should help to remove the stain. Spread the sodium bicarbonate over the affected area and then get it wet. Put it in the wash and make sure it rinses in warm water.
Baking soda on Other Surfaces
If you have a particularly stubborn stain on a surface made of laminate, marble or plastic, use a brush and a paste made from baking soda and water to scour the surface.
Baking soda can also be used on a wide variety of other materials and surfaces. You can use it to clean stainless steel, to remove tannin stains caused by tea and coffee from crockery and to remove crayon stains from wallpaper. Just sprinkle it onto a wet sponge and apply to the surface.
The number one rule for speed cleaning is to have quick and easy access to your tools and supplies. When it’s time to clean, it zaps all of your motivation when you have to hunt for needed supplies. Consider creating a cleaning caddy for different areas of your home. You’ll always have your supplies right where you need them.
I place a mini cleaning kit under each sink so I can touch up washrooms if I have a last minute guest. The mini cleaning kit in the kitchen I have what I need to touch up kitchen counters, tables, doors, walls if I need to do an emergency clean up or if last minute guests show up. I keep a mini dust mop/doodle bug in the closet so I can touch up spills or do a quick spray and wipe of the dirty spots on the floors.
ActiveIon’s Ionator HOM is a battery operated cleaning machine that is a green alternative to the everyday chemicals people use in cleaning. It ionizes the water by giving it a slight electrical charge. Intended as a replacement for endless bottles of spray cleaner, the device converts regular tap water into an ionized mist that lifts dirt off of surfaces and kills bacteria. There are no chemicals involved. It is really an excellent way to completely make you’re cleaning chemical free… if it works.
For two months we’ve been putting it through its paces in both a home and commercial environment to see how it stands up. Can regular tap water clean what normally you use Windex, or any other general purpose cleaner around the house.
The ionater has a refillable reservoir which you fill with normal tap water. The receptacle holds about a cup and a half, or 350mL, of water; you fill it up with regular tap water, pop it back into the spray bottle and you’re good to go. There’s no instructions necessary and the shape of the receptacle means it only fits into the gun one way. I found the spray bottle to be designed well; it’s more sturdy and stable than any standard spray bottle.
I have found the charge lasts a very long time, hours and hours of cleaning in fact. There is an LED light that glows green when it is being used, letting you know it is working properly, and it glows red when it needs a charge or it is not working properly. It says that if you put anything in the reservoir other than water it will not work.
Once it’s charged and filled, you just hit the trigger button and spray the watery mist over whatever you need to clean. It raises dirt, grease, fingerprints etc. up off the surface, and then you simply wipe it away.
I used it on all the surfaces where I would use glass cleaner or general purpose cleaner. Glass, mirrors, counters, stove top, tables, switch plates, door jams, doors, toilet seats and edges. It pretty much did the job that every cleaner I had in the house did except inside the toilet bowl. Since the bowl is already full of water it could not clean the bowl, so I still used the standard bowl cleaner and brush. But I have to say I was impressed that it pretty much has the ability to reduce the amount of chemicals in the house to just one, my toilet bowl cleaner.
What I liked about it as well since we are just talking ionized water, I also used it as a hand sanitizer. So after cleaning I would just spray my hands and rub around for several seconds and dry. Also by keeping it under the sink it was a back up hand sanitizer for the kids as well if they didn’t clean up before a quick lunch break etc.
To me, the complete lack of chemicals is the best thing about the Ionator. I can spray it all over my cooking surface, cutting boards and knives without having to worry about dousing them in chemicals I’ll later ingest. The Ionator leaves behind no residue or chemical scent. With the added bonus of never running out of cleaner, as long your battery is charged.
The base is stable and the design is solid, the only issue I had was a couple of times the unit was not upright went stored and I noticed the water from the reservoir leaked out of the reservoir and in between the plastic the protects the computer control panel. So water was inside the actual unit and my perception is that if I operated the unit that the computer panel might have shorted out. So I drained the water out as best as I could and let it dry out completely before using (a few days). The plastic housing is clear which is cool because you see the computer control panel so you know you are using a high tech devise, which was good otherwise I would have never seen the water inside. It might be better if this computer control panel was water tight in future designs.
It does spray a lot of ionized water, so you have to have lots of good cotton or microfiber cleaning cloths on hand to effective clean and polish.
Every time you hit the button to spray, the water receptacle glows green with an “okay” light. If it glows red, something is wrong with the ionizing mechanism concealed in the body. The company says the device will effectively ionize for about three years. Since we only tested it out for two months, we have no way of confirming this. So I am not sure if you have to replace it every three years or you just use it until it always glows red when you use it.
My hope is it last longer than three years, my guess is that it would save about $50 per year clean cleaning chemical for an average family living in an average three bedroom home. So it would have to last at least three years to get your investment back. Although it seems like there is a large benefit to cleaning your home with no chemicals that you can’t put a price tag on.
In my case my wife was diagnosed with cancer early in the year, and while I am certain she didn’t get cancer as a result of our cleaning chemicals that fact that she is a 40 year old woman getting cancer just makes you realize that we sort of life in a toxic world. I think that if you can do even a very small thing to reduce the amount of toxic residue when we live our day to day life, it is hard to imagine that not helping.
From a practical point of view having someone in the house going through Chemotherapy the Ionater has been excellent as well since keeping the house clean is very important since her immune system is compromised as well as she has sensitivity to smells and the unit produces no smells when cleaning.
The Ionator’s hefty price tag may dissuade some; but we hope people won’t be swayed into not buying one out of sheer scepticism at its tap water fuel source. The device cleans fantastically, as well as or better than household cleaners in our opinion, and we find the chemical-free nature of it to be a huge plus. I highly recommend this product.
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You can refresh your black clothes by adding bluing, or strong coffee, or tea (2 cups) to the rinse water. Although I prefer the bluing (found in the laundry section of most stores) to Grandmas old fashioned method of coffee or tea…I prefer to drink my coffee. Actually with two young kids and a full-time job I NEED to drink my coffee!
They should return to their original dark black state. To prevent future fading, wash them in cold water, with Ivory Flakes plus only a small amount of detergent.
The cause of stiffness in laundry is usually that too much detergent has been left in the clothing. To make your towels softer, use less detergent than normal, and add white vinegar to the first rinse cycle. You may also want to add an extra rinse cyle when washing towels. Line dried towels do not get as fluffy (although they may smell more fresh being dried outdoors) and soft as ones dried in the dryer.
Cleaning Kids Toys
Lets face it kids are not really clean or neat. They put their hands in all kinds of creative places and then play with their toys and or put their hands all over your face to share the love (and or germs). Here are some ideas for cleaning kids toys. Bath toys or wash plastic toys with warm soap and water, or even the top rack of the dishwasher if they don’t have movable parts.
I usually wash soft toys in the washing machine (double check instruction label) on the delicate cycle. You can place them in a pillowcase and tie off the top for extra protection. For toys with electronics or ones that cant be washed use a cloth with worm water and soap and wipe the surface. For the parts with harder surfaces I use a magic eraser and rinse or wipe off residue with a cloth and plain water.
To be fair there should be some kind of warning system before you have kids saying you will be scrubbing and cleaning endlessly after them until the day they move out (and sometimes after), at least with prior knowledge maybe it would be slightly more bearable. Instead we have to wait until the kids have children before they appreciate the extent of the labour required to raise them.
Nail Polish remover normally contains the solvent acetone or amyl acetate. It is useful in removing nail polish (obviously…) from your finger nails and also fabric. Use a blotting action and test for color fastness. It will damage certain fabrics, but is usually safe on bedsheets etc. It is also effective at removing glues including crazy glue I don’t know about you but I usually stick my fingers together in addition to the object I am trying to repair, no matter how careful I am when using crazy glue.
There is something so delightful about sliding into crisp clean cotton bed sheets on a fresh spring evening or snuggling down into cozy soft flannel sheets on a cold snowy winter night. The scent of sheets that have been air dried on the outdoor clothesline in the sunshine brings back memories for me of sleeping over at Gramma’s house. A comfortable bed with clean linens is truly one of life’s little pleasures. So what is the best way to clean and care for bed sheets?
Firstly, sort your sheets by color. Even though you are only sleeping on them, it is nicer to have clean white sheets, not dull gray ones. Using warm or hot water, wash white cotton sheets separately with regular detergent. Do not use too much detergent. Less is better for sheets. Wash dark colored sheets together in warm water. If you wish to bleach your white sheets, use an oxygen-based bleach or natural whitening alternatives like vinegar or lemon juice mixed with water.
In the spring and summer, let your sheets and pillowcases air dry outside. Either hang them on a clothesline if you have one, or you may even lay your sheets on the grass. Be sure the grass is clean! Did you know that sunshine naturally sanitizes and brightens white sheets?
In the winter, tumble dry your sheets on warm in the dryer with a sheet of fabric softener. (If you are drying only a couple of sheets, you may want to toss in a few clean tennis balls which will help keep your sheets from twisting up together.)
The best way to store your bed linens is to keep them in a dry, airy closet on shelves that allow air through, or on shelves with scented paper. Try not to cram too many bed sheets and linens together so that no air can circulate around them. Don’t leave linens folded up in a closet or packed away for extended periods of time because the fabric will deteriorate along the creases.
Follow these simple hints on linen care to make your bed a wonderful place to be.
General Information:
Blotting is the act of absorbing a stain with a dry absorbant towel such as a terry towel or even a paper towel (best using white towels so no colors from the the towel will run into the carpet or fabric you are blotting.) Blotting immediately after a spill or stain has occurred is the best way to combat stains. Blot by placing the towel over the stain. First fold your towel in quarters so you can flip over the towel a few times to get the maximum absorbancy of your towel.
