Check out our current e-mail newsletter! Don't miss the February/March 2010 issue, it's coming soon! Subscribe now.
A few weeks ago, on Earth Day, I posted a link to Lindsay Coulter’s homemade green cleaning recipes. I also said I’d give them a try sometime. That sometime came last weekend.
The recipe for the all-purpose cleaner called for 3 ingredients. All I had to do was mix these with a gallon of hot water:
- 1 tbsp Borax**
- 1/2 cup castile soap [I used Dr. Bronner's almond castile soap]
- 1/2 cup white vinegar
[optional is 20 drops essential oil like lemon, lime, grapefruit, bergamot, lavender, tea tree]
Note: If you don’t have a container to fill a gallon of water, use your big pot for mixing.
The resulting liquid is whitish (castile soap becomes foggy white with the addition of water). I’m thinking this batch will last us for months unless I go on a tri-weekly cleaning spree. I filled one empty bottle spray with the liquid, and was able to fill an empty tequila bottle and an empty bottle of soap refill with the remaining liquid. If you’re planning to make this, have empty bottles to reuse — wine bottles, milk bottles, etc.
For anyone thinking that it would be expensive to make your own green cleaners — it’s not. The most ‘expensive’ ingredient to buy was the 1qt/944ml bottle of castile soap and it will last you a long time for quite a number of uses.
After having gone ‘greener’ and biodegradable with my all purpose cleaner, the big question in my head when I started this was — Does it really clean? YES, it does! It worked on the counters, on the stove, and on the super greasy areas that were casualties of cooking. I was honestly very surprised, but it worked! I also used it to clean the microwave oven and the refrigerator.
If you’re looking to make your own, the complete list of green cleaning recipes are here. You’ll find “Green Spa” recipes from there as well.
**If anyone can enlighten me more on Borax, I’d love that. I’ve searched all over the ‘Net and found that it has a low level of toxicity, but regardless, one shouldn’t ingest it. It’s a naturally occurring compound but that doesn’t meet it’s fully safe, just like your other household chemicals. Lethal dose for humans would be 5 grams. Direct contact of pure borax with skin is not recommended because it can be an irritant. It’s not to be used by pregnant women.
I am surprised how well these homemade cleaning products work. I just made one with vinegar and baking soda for the bathroom that was just amazing. I will try this one for my next cleaning spree in a couple of months. Did you know that borax is also very effective in the war against roaches?
Bens last blog post..Lamb Wellington (kind of)
These are great tips! It’s funny that the products used by our mothers and grandmothers are now turning out to be not only effective but environmentally friendly! My mother grew up using Castile soap for cleaning but as I was growing up it wasn’t always as easy to find. We also used vinegar and baking soda for many cleaning tasks. Who knew that one day progress would mean returning to the products of old.
Karen Swims last blog post..Three Tactics for Managing Roadblocks On Your Road to Success
I’m a recent convert to Dr. Bronner’s soap, so I’m glad to find these tips and the recipe. As for Green Spa or Home Spa recipes, there is a treasure trove of spa recipes you can make in your own kitchen, here: http://www.spaindex.com/HomeSpa/HomeSpa.htm
Kates last blog post..No Recipe Night: Carnitas Wrap
Ben — Yup! I read about the ‘roaches. Eeek. I haven’t encountered one here yet. **crosses fingers**
Karen Swim — I know. After all these years of New! Improved! cleaning products, the only things we really need are the basics.
Kate — I’m currently using the bar soap and so far it’s good. Thanks for that link. What a great resource.
Thanks for encouraging us all to be more green!
Hillarys last blog post..Top Chef Chicago Watch: Episode 11
Hillary — You’re welcome. Just doing my part in spreading the green word. :)
Joy,
Great article. I have found that you can clean almost anything with baking soda and/or vinegar. Non-toxic, safe for the environment and affordable. I think our generation has been overly influenced with marketing and advertising, which has made us belief that we need expensive products full of chemicals in order to get things really clean.
One of my favorite uses of baking soda is as an oven cleaner. Oven cleaning products are SO toxic and the fumes are nauseating. I tried cleaning the oven this way a couple of weeks ago and it worked great!
http://www.care2.com/greenliving/nontoxic-oven-cleaner.html
Kim Woodbridges last blog post..Streaming the Minutia of My Life
It’s funny – I’ve been really working on reducing our household budget on food, primarily by growing our own organic produce, making things from scratch, and so forth, but I hadn’t even considered the cleaning products.
I am doing this!
On Borax, I can’t address the safety really (although from everything I’ve read it is not nearly as toxic as the chemical equivalents), but one other really good use for it is as a natural ant bait. If you create a sugar-water dilution with 5% borax (no more than that), it is relatively harmless to most everything but ants – the 5% idea is so that the ant will make it back to the nest, share the food, and in theory, knock out the ant hill. It’s worked this year for us.
Thanks for the great post!
Metroknow
http://www.almostfit.com
Metroknow – AlmostFit.coms last blog post..Almost Fit article featured on GetFitSlowly.com