Selfsufficientish.com

this is probably in the wrong place but i didnt know where to put it!!

does anyone have any good home made nasties free recipes for kitchen surface cleaner (to go in a spray bottle) and dishwasher detergent?

I think we have recipes for cleaning products scattered all around the forum so it's a good idea to post them all together.


Bathroom Scrub

You'll Need:
Squirt Bottle

1 2/3 cups water
1/4 cup liquid soap
1/4 cup baking soda
2 tablespoons vinegar
3 or 4 drops essential oil (optional)

Mix the soap and water until the soap dissovles. Stir in the baking soda and then the vinegar, adding a few drops of your favorite essential oil. Store in the squirt bottle and be sure to shake the mixture before each use.
Rinse this cleaner away completely to avoid leaving a film on your bathroom surfaces.


Toilet Bowl Cleaner

You'll Need:
1 cup borax
1/2 cup vinegar (optional)

Sprinkle borax into toilet bowl at night. In the morning, just scrub and flush the toilet. This should help dissolve grime and even old rust stains.
For extra strong toilet bowl cleaner, add a 1/2 cup vinegar to the borax.

Oven Cleaner

You'll Need:
Water
1/2 to 1 cup baking soda
non-abrasive scouring pad

Sprinkle water generously over the entire bottom surface of the oven. Sprinkle the baking soda over the water and let sit overnight. The baking soda will lift and loosen the grease. Just wipe the oven clean with the scouring pad and rinse away any residue.

Wood Cleaner and Polish

You'll Need:
Glass Jar with Lid

1/8 cup vinegar
1/4 cup lemon juice
1/8 cup food grade linseed oil
a few drops of vitamin E

Mix the linseed oil, vinegar and lemon juice in the glass jar. Rub the mixture into your wooden furniture with a soft cloth. Mix in a few drops of vitamin E before putting the lid on the jar - this will let you save the leftovers for another cleaning.

Glass Cleaner

You'll Need:
a spray bottle

1/4 cup vinegar
2 cups water
2 teaspoons lemon juice OR 2 tablespoons rubbing alcohol

Combine all ingredients in the spray bottle. Shake gently to mix. Spray the cleaner onto glass surfaces and wipe clean with a soft cloth or paper towel. Old newspapers can also be used.

Mold and Mildew CleanUp

You'll Need:
A spray bottle

2 teaspoons tea tree oil
2 cups water

Combine ingredients in the spray bottle. Shake gently. Spray on household surfaces that are affected by mold and mildew. Do Not Rinse.
The smell of the tea tree oil will dissipate in a few days. (It's medicinal smelling; tea tree oil is known for its antifungal properties.) Try adding a few drops of lavender essential oil to sweeten the smell.

One of my favourite general purpose cleaners

In a spray bottle fill up with warm water and add:
20 drops Tea Tree Oil
10 drops Patchouli Oil

shake well before each use
Just spray and wipe down wherever you want.
This keeps until it's all used up and is very antibacterial as well as smells good.

My cleaning box contains the following:

1 box household borax
1 box bicarbonate of soda
1 bottle white vinegar
1 box table salt

That's it really, apart from the occasional lemon for cleaning the fridge. To clean the work surfaces, I use a spray bottle with half and half water and white vinegar. Being acidic, it's a good de-greaser (although lemons are best) and since it's acidic, it's anti-bacterial as well. The first time I handed my kids half a lemon each and told them to clean the fridge, they thought I'd gone mad! As soon as they saw it work, they were hooked!

For scouring, I have an old jam jar with a mix of equal quantities of borax, bicarb and salt in it. Works a treat, especially on sinks. Lemons make great bleaching agents, a mixture of vinegar and bicarb will get rid of almost anything. I keep an old egg cup full of bicarb in the fridge as a deoderiser and each week, I dump it down the kitchen sink to deoderise that too!

That'll do for a start

Lynne

Thanks for those great tips. Hedgewitch....is that general purpose cleaner suitable for a wooden highchair? And I don't have patchuoli (sp!!) oil, is it ok with just tea tree?

how do you all feel borax rates in terms of eco friendliness and safety for us mere humans?

I've tended to be very cautious of it, using vinegar and bicarb and essential oils for most cleaning jobs, but I sense that borax might have a bit of muscle for really greasy jobs?

For spraying in the kitchen we have a plant mister filled with water and 5 drops each of lemon essential oil and lavender. When dd was a babe, I used to spray this directly onto her hands and face after a meal too! It's antibacterial and safe for the whole family. Perfect for worksurfaces, table, highchair and now I use it on our wooden floor with an ecloth.

Ecotoxicity data
General: Boron (B) is the element in sodium tetraborate
decahydrate (Borax) which is used by convention to report
borate product ecological effects. It occurs naturally in seawater
at an average concentration of 5 mg B/L and generally
occurs in fresh water at concentrations up to 1 mg B/L. In
dilute aqueous solutions the predominant boron species present
is undissociated boric acid. To convert sodium tetraborate
decahydrate into the equivalent boron (B) content, multiply by
0.1134.
Phytotoxicity: Boron is an essential micronutrient for healthy
growth of plants; however, it can be harmful to boron sensitive
plants in high quantities. Care should be taken to minimize the
amount of Borax released to the environment.

Environmental fate data
Persistence/degradation: Boron is naturally occurring and
ubiquitous in the environment. Borax decomposes in the
environment to natural borate.
Octanol/water partition coefficient: No value. In aqueous
solution Sodium tetraborate decahydrate is converted
substantially into undissociated boric acid.
Soil mobility: Borax is soluble in water and is leachable
through normal soil.

read more......

Thank you. Hedgewitch; I'll have a good read through later.

You are very welcome.
I had exactly the same concerns.
The conclusion I came to is that it's OK to use in small amounts.
I can't find any to buy near me so it's not like I'm gonna be using it anytime soon anyway.

Let me see, for an environmentally friendly, biodegradable and CHEAP cleaning products..
kitchen surfaces
amonia
Cookers
amonia
Lino floors
amonia
wood
amonia
glass
amonia
killing black mould
amonia
sinks
amonia
baths
amonia
toilets
amonia
White paintwork
amonia
Walls
amonia

all you do is to vary the dilution of it.

Now I'm confused LOL! I thought amonia was bad to use..........
Where will find some information on it?

starchild wrote:Now I'm confused LOL! I thought amonia was bad to use..........
Where will find some information on it?

Well as it is a constituent of urine (think baby nappy smell) it has to be biodegradable. I did a quick google search just now and although I didn't follow the links (sorry on ultra snail dial up here) there are plenty references to it as an environmentally safe household cleaner.

In NZ it is available in the supermarkets (I had never seen it on sale before here). We have a septic tank so ideally everything should be easily biodegradable

AMONIA!!!!
Woah I am shocked.

*goes off to do some googling*

Ammonia is found in small quantities in the atmosphere, being produced from the putrefaction of nitrogenous animal and vegetable matter. Ammonia and ammonium salts are also found in small quantities in rainwater, whereas ammonium chloride and ammonium sulfate are found in volcanic districts; crystals of ammonium bicarbonate have been found in Patagonian guano. The kidneys secrete NH3 to neutralize excess acid.[6] Ammonium salts also are found distributed through all fertile soil and in seawater. Substances containing ammonia, or those that are similar to it, are called ammoniacal.

It is also sometimes added to drinking water along with chlorine to form chloramine, a disinfectant. Unlike chlorine alone, chloramine does not combine with organic (carbon containing) materials to form carcinogenic halomethanes such as chloroform. However, chlorine and ammonia should never be mixed in an uncontrolled environment because they cause a chemical reaction that releases toxic gas.

read more....

I don't think I'll be using ammonia to clean with - the smell is shocking!

In France we used to have a cleaning produce called "Ajax ammoniaque" so I am not that shocked. I really dislike the smell too though. Let's go for lemon and lavender instead

hedgewitch wrote: I don't think I'll be using ammonia to clean with - the smell is shocking!

When concentrated yes it is, but dilute you soon stop noticing the smell, also the smell does not linger at all, gone within a minute or so.