Ideas about cleaning your house and using essential oils.

NOTE: this is not a how you should clean post.  Or, at least don't read it that way.  It is a this is how I make cleaners post.  xo kq.
 
Did you read this? A few of my loyal band of merry readers emailed me about making my own cleaners.  So this post is a) to share how to clean a house with green/eco/frugal/non toxic/friendly and generally happy cleaners that you make.  and b) offer proof that it cleans very well.

This works especially well if you are cheap frugal and/or have sensitive skin or respiratory allergies.   

what to clean with.
basically, vinegar, lemon juice, baking soda, dish soap (phosphate free), optional essential oils.

Why vinegar?  it is acetic acid, a strong acid with a ph of 2ish.  Bleach is used because it is a strong base with a ph of 12 ish.  Extreme acids and extreme bases are good cleaners because bugs and people like neutral environments (ph of 7).  Not that I am saying to use bleach for everyday cleaning...but I digress...

Basic spray cleaner: 32 oz spray bottle.  1/2 to 1 cup vinegar, 1 squirt (1-2 teaspoons dish soap), blend of essential oils (total 20-30 drops.  less if peppermint or tea tree because they are strong!).  fill rest of bottle with wash water and shake to mix up.  This can clean just about anything. 

To scrub (grout, toilet bowls, burnt pan bottoms): baking soda and good scrubbing tool (tile brush, old toothbrush, toilet brush, scour pad). 

clean microwave: 1 cup-ish of lemon juice in a bowl + water to fill up.  cook in microwave as long as you would a cup of tea (3-5 minutes). Open door wipe down. Lemon juice evaporates to deodorize, the citric acid disinfects, and the humidity softens any crusty stuff.   I usually put my dish sponge in the bowl with the lemon and water to cook it (yummy).  I feel like it disinfects sponges.  And feeling like something has been cleaned counts, right?   

essential oils.
I order mine from New Directions.  Make sure to use Essential oils and not aromatic oils.  Body Shop also carries them.  What are they?  Read wiki.  I like Worwood's book Complete book of Essential Oils and Aromatherapy I got that book a couple of years ago and it has been really handy. 
In the winter I like to use clove (smells Christmasy), otherwise a good household scent is peppermint and lavender (1part peppermint to 2-3 parts lavender).  The best disinfectant is tea tree.  Diaper pail or bottom of trash can getting stinky?  A few drops of tea tree on a piece of TP, thrown, should take care of the smell and diinfect the cause of the smell too.
A good combo for sick person clean up and to disinfect when a virus is going around is tea tree + eucalyptus.  A palm size of vasoline+ 1 drop eucalyptus is a nice chest rub for a stuff nosed child that can't sleep well (a la vicks vapor rub)
Citronella smells like lemon pine sol cleaner and it is a natural bug repellent.  About 30 drops of citronella in the mop water smells really nice and it helps in the spring time if ants are fighting to move in.   The ideas run on and on to the power of ten.  

but does it clean as well as my blue/pine scented/foamy/$4 non-reusable bottle? or silly hippy Kristen thinks this works because...? 
Lots of reading and research backs me up.  Using the stuff above is effective for cleaning and sanitizing.  Need something more solid?  I took a microbiology course at Boise State a couple of years ago (has it been that long already?)  For a lab project, I brought home supplies.  Swabbed, smeared, cultured etc.  ta da. The petri dish does not lie.  I have a fantastically clean house (um. well.  when we've actually cleaned it is clean. Of course an excellent cleaning product unused is very ineffectual. whoops.)

and finally get some equipment
Paper towels are flimsy.  How can you really get remnants of bread dough off the counter tops once it is dried down on there like cement?  No.  you need lots of rags, a grout brush, scour pads and elbow grease.  Lots of elbow grease. Leila (her again?) posted about cleaning.  It's good if you want to read a long post about rags.  but I guess if you've read this far you are a sucker for long boring posts.   

Thoughts on housekeeping

Housekeeping is a funny thing to do.  Especially with a 3 year old whirling dervish that loves to help with chores.  Sometimes I wonder if I shouldn’t just hold off a couple of years and give it a go then.

popcorn is never a tidy snack.

I really like the articles by Leila that talk about a reasonably clean house. Hum.  That phrase reasonably clean has rung through my head since I first read it.  A perfectly clean house is not practical.  More so, I think, because our house is negative 600 square feet big. 

Thought I would randomly pepper this post with pictures of some projects that Izaak & Elliot have worked on - a castle

There is no space that is child-toy free.  I do not have a dedicated playroom to help manage her things.  I do not have a formal living room to keep perfectly clean as a refuge from all the living that we do.  In cleaning and tidying the house, Elliot follows behind me playing duplos and getting out markers and…before you know it I need to start all over again.  

A dog chasing its own tail. 

A perfectly clean house (with little ones, and small spaces) is not attainable.  So, I like the idea of a reasonably clean house.   I have a dear aunt who said to me once that clean doesn’t have a  smell.  Yah, that stuck with me too.  Clean doesn’t smell like expensive scented candles, plug-ins, or chemical pine.  Clean is just fresh air.

Elliot can do awesome things with glitter glue and wiggly eyes, right?

As an aside, I have for over three years now, made all my own cleaners.  I got this book from the library about the time that Elliot was born.  Changed my pine-sol-bleaching-409 housekeeping to a something else entirely.  (And thankfully, because this was before we were fully aware of her skin issues...she, as it turns out, is super chemical sensitive)  That all to say that sometimes there are whiffs of tea tree, clove, or mint in the air.  All from essential oils . (not just perfumes.  Eo's have antibacterial properties, ya'know.)

Why I am talking about all this now?  Well, I was pondering how much calmer I am when my house was clean and tidy...and how being reasonably clean might just mean different things to everyone else.   That to me, it feels nice and calm with a little tidying and vacuuming.  I am also and perhaps foremost a fan of a place for everything, and everything in its place.  That if I had one housekeeping rule that would be it.  No matter how messy life gets, there is always the possibility that everything can be put away somewhere.  (And, if company is expected, it can be put away very quickly.)

So. Ramble ramble ramble.  Happy pre-thanksgiving