Bring Natural Cleaning into Your Home

11 Ways to Bring Natural Cleaning into Your Home

As more and more chemicals are added to the grocery store shelves, it seems prudent to look for natural cleaning alternatives that are easier on the environment and our pocketbooks. 

Natural Cleaning is a practice that my family has embraced for many years. We use as many natural ingredients as possible to keep the chemicals out of our homes and to reduce the amount of money we spend on cleaning supplies.

Clean homes don’t need to be toxic homes.  You can clean without buying expensive special-purpose cleaners that add toxic fumes and heavy chemicals to your home.  Use these basic, natural cleaning supplies and you can create all the household cleaners that you need.

Beeswax for wood utensils

Beeswax for wood conditioner and polish is a smart idea.  With just a few ingredients you can make a safe, natural cleaning beeswax wood polish that is nut-free, food-safe, that will preserve and condition your wooden utensils.  It’s even effective on cabinet doors.

DIY Food-safe wood finish and conditioner for your cutting boards

Dry indoor air can create problems with wooden kitchen tools like kraut pounders, wooden spoons, cutting boards, spurtles, and other wooden tools.  Those that get heavy use go from the sink to the cupboard several times a month.  The rapid change in the humidity can dry out the wood, weakening wood tissues and causing cracking and breaking.  This DIY wood conditioner, made with ingredients you can find at the grocery store, is easy to apply, clean your tools naturally, while it preserves and helps them stay beautiful and strong.

Herbs for natural cleaning

Using herbs for house cleaning, whether as essential oils or using dried herbs from your kitchen is easy to do. Even fresh herbs from the garden allow you to clean naturally, and effectively without using toxic chemicals.

Consider drying fresh herbs from your garden when they are in season, and then you can keep them for use in your homemade, natural cleaning products. This is a good way to use up older herbs and spices when you are bringing in the new harvest for culinary purposes.  If the older herbs still have a strong scent they are perfectly adequate to use in this way.

DIY Lemon vinegar cleaner

This is the best all-purpose, natural cleaning product.  It is cheap, cheap, cheap!  And you can make it yourself, at home, with ingredients that you probably already have on hand.  It is an effective degreaser and disinfectant.  It won’t harm your health or your septic tank.

You can use it for dozens of cleaning purposes and it lasts for years. Get the recipe and ideas for using it in the article – DIY Lemon Vinegar Cleaner.

DIY Toilet bowl cleaner

I’ve found a method that is efficient, nontoxic, even pleasant, that gets the toilet clean and fresh in just a minute or two of hands-on effort. I’ve brought that knowledge home to make my job at home easier and less toxic.  After all, there are more creative activities that we’d all rather do than scrub toilet bowls.

The Naturally clean bathroom

One of the most toxic areas in your home is your bathroom.  Bathroom cleaners, toothpaste, shampoos, deodorants, perfumes, and hairspray fill the bathroom with chemical toxins that damage your health and upset your endocrine balance.

Clean up your indoor environment by cleaning with these natural nontoxic alternatives to dangerous household cleaners. You’ll find recipes for tile & grout cleaner, fibreglass countertop scouring cleaner, glass & mirror cleaner, and an all-purpose disinfectant.

DIY Yoga mat spray

Don’t allow Eu de locker room to keep you from your happy place. Make this easy DIY herbal yoga mat spray to keep your exercise equipment fresh and disinfected after class. This will naturally clean and disinfect your mat to keep it smelling sweet.

How to clean oil lamps

To get the full light output from your antique oil lamps you’ll want to clean them and keep the fuel topped up. But be aware that fuel evaporates from the reservoir of your oil lamps over time, as the wicks are exposed to air. If you are conserving fuel, you may want to keep your lamp reservoirs only partially full, filling them up just before intensive use, during a storm or expected power outage.

7 Tips to spring clean your wardrobe

Here are some tips for spring cleaning your wardrobe and getting your clothing ready for the change in the seasons. Update those summer garments to give them new life. Get the recipe for Moth Repellent Sachets for wool clothes.

The hidden dangers of plastic dryer pods and a safer alternative

One day I overheard two nice sales ladies discussing plastic dryer balls and how “cool” they were. So I told them about how wool dryer balls were a better alternative to dryer sheets and plastic dryer pods.  Usually when I launch into my passion — natural living, natural fibres, and natural cosmetics — which means getting rid of the toxic, plastic, dangerous stuff from your life and embracing freedom and well-being — I get this glazed look.  And I think they are thinking, “forget your medication again today, Dear?”

Learn to make your own wool dryer balls from natural materials. They are non-polluting, and unlike ugly plastic dryer pods or poly-dryer sheets, they break down naturally in the compost when you are finished with them.

9 Natural cleaning recipes for every room in the house

Household cleaning products are some of the most toxic polluters of indoor air, even when they are not in use. When they are in use, they injure those using them and then enter the water table when they are rinsed and flushed down the drain. Once they leave your home they continue compounding the environmental damage until they are broken down into their basic parts — which can also be toxic. Find out more at Green Your Clean, 9 natural cleaning recipes for your home.

The solution is nontoxic options that you can create in your kitchen using things you probably already have on hand.  Making your own natural cleaning products will save you money and protect the environment. Give these recipes a try.