It’s that time of year to get spring cleaning – to go through all the cupboards and corners and get rid of junk, as well as time to give everything around your house a good scrub and polish. But when you declutter and clean out junk in your attic or garage, don’t just blindly thrown things out into the rubbish to go to the local landfill. The planet needs to be kept clean as well as your house. This doesn’t mean that you’ll be left with heaps of junk that might be useful some day. Instead, you might just be able to find a good use for everyday rubbish that is handy and will help you keep a clean house and a clean environment.
* Old sheets, towels and t-shirts can be torn up and used as cleaning rags. You will save more than a few pennies if you use reusable rags for cleaning, polishing and dusting rather than paper towels. Old socks also have their uses (and not just as glove puppets for small children to make on a rainy afternoon). Old socks can be fitted over brooms to remove cobwebs, or just keep a thick old pair for polishing the floor without getting down on your hands and knees – after applying polish to the floor, buff it to a shine by putting the old socks on your bare feet and slithering all over the floor. You get a great workout and puts a bit of fun back into cleaning floors. Old socks and pantyhose are also good for storing soap scraps to be melted down for soap gel.
* Glass jars are ideal for storing dry goods in your kitchen. Use big ones for flour, rice, oats, sugar and the like, while smaller ones can be used for spices, cocoa, instant coffee and the like. Glass jars wash easily, are vermin-proof and airtight, and let you see what’s in your pantry straight away.
* Plastic bottles that have handles can be sliced in half on the diagonal and used as scoops for flour and sugar (in the kitchen), detergent powder (in the laundry) and fertiliser (in the garden). This helps to prevent messy spills.
* Old newspapers have a multitude of uses. Try scrunching them up to clean glass and mirrors. (Use them to polish off any window cleaning product you have used – the ink seems to act as a polish, although I’m not sure about this 100%. It works though!) As newspapers are very absorbent, they can also be used to clean grease out of frying pans or off a barbecue, for picking up cat or dog poop if they’ve misbehaved on the carpet, and for absorbing spills. You can also shred them for pet bedding, especially for mice, guinea pigs and rabbits.
* Collect paper that’s blank on the back and make jotter pads for shopping lists and telephone messages. All sorts of bits of paper can be used this way, ranging from old envelopes to the insides of paper shopping bags as well as more obvious bits of paper like the backs of old form letters and junk mail. Use magnets or thumbtacks on a pinboard rather than sticky notes and save a few pennies.
Cleaning a coffeemaker is not difficult a task and requires little to almost no effort on your part. But it should always be borne in mind that a coffee maker needs a thorough cleansing at least once a month to make it get rid of its grim and dirt so that it ensures smooth functioning. A cleaning process if needed for a coffeemaker not only to get rid of the dust particles, but also the old oils from that of the pots which were previously brewed.
The best way to clean a dripping coffeemaker is by cleaning it with a mixture which contains 1 part of vinegar to 2 parts of water. First of all you should be making a solution of the vinegar and water and then pour it all into the reservoir and then switch on the coffeemaker. After there is a through running of the mixture you should turn on the dripping wet coffeemaker and then let it cool in a dry place for a considerable span of time. But you must bear this fact in mind that if you are cleaning a coffeemaker which has not been cleaned on a regular basis then you might need to repeat the process for quite a few times. But make sure everytime the mixture or the soltution that you use, is fresh.
After repeating the process for a few times you must make sure that you have rinsed the pot thoroughly with plain and water. Following that you must pour some plain water into the coffeemaker reservoir and then switch on the knob again to ensure that you have followed a thorough rinsing process. As soon as you get rid of the rinsing process for the final time let the coffeemaker dry under the shade. Don’t ever expose the coffeemaker to the harsh rays of the Sun.
For cleaning a coffeemaker, one does not need to apply rocket science. If you have a mesh filter after the cleaning process you will be able to see that how much grim and dirt has accumulated within it. But instead of following a hectic process it is wise if you clean your coffeemaker at least once every week. To clean the coffeemaker you should make use of commercial cleaning products for coffeemaker as they come with a guarantee. But before buying any coffeemaker cleaning products make a thorough market research. Don’t go for the attractive packages as they will not be any worth. Always make sure that the cleaning products that you are using are the best available in the market. Using them you can be assured that they will give you the best cleaning of your priced coffeemaker. Before using the coffeemaker cleaning products you must also read the instructions that are given in the sidebar. Always follow the instructions so as to maintain the standard of your coffeemaker. Remember these instructions were put here for a reason and it does not help to ignore such instructions and warnings.
Cleanse your coffeemaker frequently enough to retain the flavour of your freshly brewed coffee that you take every morning. The best way to savour the divine taste is to consume coffee from a clean coffeemaker.
We have a recipe book passed to us by my husband’s Gran. As old-fashioned recipe books often used to, this one has a hints and tips section at the back – plus a few others cut out from the newspaper by Gran herself – that has some very handy odds and ends. Here’s some of the gems about cleaning and keeping house (leaving out the real beauty: a recipe for tanning skins):
* The best way to clean a raincoat is to mix up quarter of a bucket of warm soapy water and add a couple of tablespoons of methylated spirits. Spread the coat out flat and scrub the outside. Turn it over and repeat on the inside. Rinse once with fresh warm water, then with cold water. Sponge with acetic acid (I guess vinegar will do) to set the colour, then dry the coat outside, turning the pockets inside-out.
* Wipe down wooden furniture with a mix of vinegar and water to remove finger marks before polishing.
* To remove ink from a fountain pen (i.e. ink that has leaked out from a fountain pen), cover the spots with wet mustard and leave overnight before washing in soapy water. (The mustard in this case can’t have had much turmeric in it – turmeric stains like anything and can even be used as a sort of dye. Best to stick to ink stain removal tip number two from the book: methylated spirits.)
* Clean the stained insides of teacups by rubbing a paste of salt and water around the insides.
* White chalk is good for removing grease stains from white wallpaper. Just rub the chalk onto the stain.
* If you need to clean the inside of a silver teapot (which is a bit hard to clean by the standard natural silver cleaning method involving baking soda and tin foil), mix up a paste of flour, soda (Gran’s book doesn’t specify whether this means baking soda or washing soda, but I presume that baking soda is meant) and vinegar. Brush this around the inside of the teapot and leave it overnight. Wash out with boiling water in the morning.
* Half a walnut rubbed over the spot helps to remove scratch marks from wooden furniture.
* If you need to banish the smell of stale smoke from a room (that’s one thing that the end of tenancy cleaning won’t get rid of if the former tenants were smokers), put some vinegar on a hot shovel and burn it. That’s how Gran’s book worded it – in modern terms, boil vinegar on the stove until it evaporates. The place will smell of vinegar, but that’s not as bad as stale smoke.
* To clean a coir mat (e.g. a door mat), tie it onto a clothesline outside. Hose it to wash the dirt out. This is much more effective than shaking.
* A pint of cold tea with a teaspoon of glycerine can be used for window cleaning.
* Remove heat marks from table tops by mixing equal amounts of methylated spirits and linseed oil. Use this to polish the marks, and keep going, adding more, until the marks go.
Oh all right – the recipe for tanning skins for the curious. Mix up a paste of baking soda and kerosene, plus some wood ash. Spread this on the raw side of the skin and roll it up for a week. Then remove the paste, let the skin dry and soften the tanned bit by rubbing it with pumice stone. Just in case you ever wanted to know!
Quentin Crisp once (in)famously stated that dust doesn’t get any worse after seven years if you have the strength of mind to leave it alone, or words to that effect. While this statement has been used by a few lazy so-and-sos to justify their sloppy housekeeping, most of us agree that dusting is an important part of the domestic cleaning work. And, Quentin, it does so get worse – I’ve had to clean out the den my late grandmother left untouched for over seven years before her death.
Why dust at all? Is dusting just an aesthetic thing designed to make sure that all your surfaces and ornaments are seen at their best (and windowsills are safe from folk who try writing their name or the words “Clean me” in the dust)? While this is an important part of dusting – after all, can you really appreciate the beauty of a lovely finish or the delicate details of a sculpture if it’s covered in an ugly patina of grey – there’s more to dusting than that.
The importance of dusting is seen when you consider what dust actually is. Most people can probably guess that dust is made of bits of fluff and the like that gets rubbed off clothing and carpets, mixed with bits of windblown dirt from outdoors. However, dust also contains skin flakes shed by you, your visitors and your pets. As everyone who’s ever watched a cop show on TV, one of the basic premises of forensics is that everywhere we go, we leave minute traces of ourselves. Every time you make the slightest move, you shed a small avalanche of microscopic skin particles. (As an aside, if you ever have the misfortune of having to call the police in because your home has become a crime scene, resist all impulses to tidy up, even though your instincts say that the house should be orderly when important people come to call. Do not straighten a cushion; definitely don’t vacuum.)
And microscopic animals live on these skin flakes: dust mites. While these little beasts are insignificant, they can have a devastating effect. The droppings of dust mites are one of the most powerful allergy triggers we know, and it is widely thought that these droppings are responsible for triggering asthmatic attacks. If you dust (and vacuum) your house regularly, you remove the food source of these mites and thus reduce the likelihood that a family member or a guest will have an asthmatic attack.
So how do you dust? The blatantly obvious answer is “with a duster, of course.” The whole aim of dusting is to collect the dust so it can be removed from the place you don’t want it and get it into a place where it can be washed away or dumped into the compost heap. Dusters that simply flick the dust up into the air do no good at all – the dust will merely resettle.
The best sort of duster is a soft cloth, preferably one that’s slightly damp (it should not be dripping). A soft cloth will not scratch delicate surfaces while you are dusting, and it will hold enough water to really stick the dust to itself. You can use paper towels for dusting, but these are more expensive and can’t be reused; they also have a tendency to disintegrate after a few minutes of dusting. If you are doing a heavy duty session of dusting, you will need several dusters, as the one you start off will turn black before very long.
The best thing about dusting is that everybody agrees that it is one household chore that doesn’t require chemicals. If you hear anyone saying that dusting does, ignore them. And you don’t have to bother about buying a fancy cloth to use as a special duster, either. Old sheets, towels, T-shirts and teatowels make excellent dusters, and is a good way of recycling these once they have worn too thin to be used as they were intended.
You can get your house cleaners to clean just about anything thing or any part of your home. Especially if you live in the London area and have access to the top level cleaning services available there. But there are some things you will always need to do for yourself, maybe not often, but once in a while, when the occasion arises – things like cleaning your drinking water.
Water is something we all take for granted and presume that we can just open the tap and drink it. That’s usually true but what happens if the water does get contaminated for a few days – broken water mains and chemical spills are not that uncommon. You can buy bottled water for drinking, but you still need water for so much else and a few simple steps will ensure that your water is safe to use. The two most common methods of doing this are by boiling the water or using iodine tablets.
Boiling is the simplest method of cleaning water and requires no special equipment or chemicals of any kind. Start by finding a container large enough to hold the quantity of water you want to boil. Clean it out thoroughly using clean water (use bottled water if need be), using a disinfectant if necessary. Rinse out the container and let it dry. Fill the container with tap water and place it on the stove with the heat turned to maximum. Once the water starts boiling, wait for a minute and skim off any scum or residue that may rise to the surface. Repeat if required. Allow the water to boil for at least 3 minutes and then turn off the heat. Transfer the water to another clean container. It is important that you do not store boiled water in the same container since this may have contaminants or bacteria left as deposits from the un-boiled water. Keep the container with the cleaned water covered. If you find the taste of the boiled water unpleasant, add a pinch of salt to it as it boils.
The other common method for cleaning water is to use iodine tablets. This again requires a clean pot and iodine tablets available from any chemist. Add the tablets to the water as per the manufacturer’s recommendations and allow the water to stand for at least 30 minutes after the tablets are added. Remember using to much or too little iodine can be dangerous. Transfer the water to a clean container for storage. Do not use this method if you or any member of the family has a thyroid problem.
It’s not the job you want to do every day – and you probably shouldn’t – but every once in a while, you will need to clean out the inside of a freezer. No matter how scrupulous you are about leaving the door open for the minimal possible amount of time, the ice will build up inside the freezer, leaving less space for you to store frozen food in. If the ice is left because you are procrastinating about cleaning it up, it will build up to a point that you can’t close the door.
Cleaning equipment you will need:
* An empty bucket
* A bucket of warm soapy water
* soft scrubbing brush (the sort you use for cleaning the outside of a car works well)
* A spatula or fish slice
* lots of towels
* gloves – not rubber gloves, but thick ones suitable for skiing
* one of those insulated boxes suitable for picnics
* boiling water and another bucket or large bowl
* blankets and newspaper
* baking soda
* rags –some damp and some dry
Method for cleaning the freezer.
First, switch the freezer off at the wall and open the door. Remove all the frozen food from the freezer. Put this into the insulated box and shut the lid so they don’t thaw. If you have other stuff that won’t fit into the freezer, wrap this up securely, first in newspaper to absorb any water, then in blankets as insulation. Shove the whole lot together in a cool, shady place such as the garage while you work.
Next, start thawing the ice. This can take some time. Put the towels down the bottom of the freezer to catch any drips so you don’t get water going everywhere. You can either leave the freezer turned off and leave it to defrost while you go and tackle a few other domestic cleaning jobs while the ice melts, or you can speed things up by putting a bowl or two of boiling water inside and closing the door. You will still need to wait for thing to do their work – you will probably have enough time to vacuum the floor or clean the bathroom while you wait.
Once you have waited long enough, open the door and remove the bowls of now-cool water, if you used the boiling water method. Pull on the ski gloves and pick up the spatula. Use this spatula to prise the ice off the side of the freezer. Be careful not to scratch the inside of the freezer. Pick up the chunks of ice and put them in the empty bucket. When the bucket is full, take it outside and dump it in an odd corner, where it will melt happily.
Once you have got the ice out, you can wash around the inside of the freezer walls. And give the trays a good scrub, too (you may like to take these out and wash them in the kitchen sink as you would a saucepan). The soapy water is best for the walls, using the soft scrubbing brush. If any bits and pieces linger on the walls of your freezer, use the rags and the baking soda to get them off.
Rinse out the soap and baking soda residue with fresh water and remove the soggy towels from down the bottom. Dry the walls and the trays, then put the trays back in. Then put the food back in. This is a good time to check that nothing has past its use-by date: even frozen foods shouldn’t be kept indefinitely. If you’re really organised, make a list of what you have in cold storage.
Lastly, don’t forget to clean the outside of the freezer. If you have a large freezer kept in an obscure place like the garage, the top is often neglected and gets very dusty. Give the whole outside a good going-over, applying the baking soda with one damp rag and rinsing off with another. Alternatively, a spray made of vinegar and water can be used for cleaning all whiteware, including the freezer.
More and more people are finding the Wii Fit to be the ideal way to exercise in the comfort of their homes. The Wii Fit balance board is a tough piece of equipment and is designed for heavy use. But it does get dirty and needs to be cleaned regularly. Silicone sleeves are now available to cover the balance boards, but not only do these need to be cleaned themselves, using them does not mean that the board itself does not require an occasional cleaning. This is something that most house cleaning services do not include in their standard list of cleaning activities, and since it’s so easy, you should consider doing it yourself.
First of all, make sure that the balance board is only used with bare feet. But even bare feet can lead to problems as germs are deposited in the board. The more people who use a balance board, the higher the chance of it being the cause of athlete’s foot, and other such problems.
When cleaning the balance board remember that it is an electrical device and should never get wet. Start by wiping down the balance board with a soft lint free dry cloth. Make sure you wipe the underside also. If there is any accumulated dirt or spots of grime, try and rub them off with a dry cloth, making sure you do not use so much pressure that the balance board gets damaged. Once that is done, use disposable disinfectant wipes to wipe off the surface – do not rub, just wipe. Once this is done, use another soft lint free cloth the remove any residual dampness left behind by the wipes.
Depending on how much the Wii balance board is used and by how many people, a regular cleaning schedule of once a week to once a month will normally keep it in a clean and infection free state.
To clean a silicone sleeve just place it in some warm soapy water, let it soak for about 30 minutes and then scrub it gently. If any dirty spots remain, scrub them with a soft cloth. Rinse the sleeve in clean water, repeating the process 2 or 3 times if need be, to ensure that no soap deposits remain on the sleeve. Wipe the sleeve, both inside and out with a clean towel. Allow to air dry until you are sure no moisture remains on either the inner or outer surfaces or then refit on the balance board.
Can you imagine an office without computers? Next to impossible, isn’t it? Computers are such a critical part of our office operations we spend time and money on cleaning and maintenance to ensure that they are always up and running. But what about the laptop-the most personal form of computer work you do? It works in the oddest of environments and is subject to exposure to the elements on a daily basis. While office cleaning services will clean your laptop for you, there are some things you can do to make sure the dirt accumulation is not so great as to endanger the functioning of the laptop.
* Open the laptop, hold it with the keyboard facing down and gently tap on the base. This will loosen any dirt stuck between the keys and will allow it to fall away.
* If you have a vacuum cleaner available, run it over the key board to suck up any dirt left behind.
* Open the CD /DVD tray and use the vacuum to cleanup any dirt there. Be careful not to touch the lens that covers the laser as you could easily scratch and damage it.
* If the outer case is dirty, use a mild cleaning liquid to dampen a cloth and wipe the body of the laptop clean. Never spray anything directly on to the body – the liquid could get in the laptop and damage it.
* To clean the screen uses a soft cloth very slightly dampened with plain water and wipe the surface gently. Make sure no water collects on the screen surface.
Office cleaning services know the operating conditions of the computers in the office, but not of your laptop. They won’t know if you’ve used it in the tube or on a London bus and exposed it to a great deal of atmospheric pollution. A regular weekly cleaning of your laptop will keep it in good condition. When the office cleaning services come in and clean you laptop they will not have to deal with a large amount of dirt accumulation and so the cleaning they do will be far more effective than if they were dealing with a laptop that was exposed to adverse operating conditions but never cleaned.
It’s all very well to say that laptops are built to withstand tough use. But regular cleaning will reduce the chances of anything going seriously wrong with it and leaving you stranded with all your data lost.
After our homes, our workplaces are the environment in which we spend the most amount of time – sometimes, it seems as if we spend most of our time in the office, full stop. So it’s just as important to minimize the amount of toxins you have in your office as it is in your home.
Unfortunately, there is not a lot you can do about the commercial cleaning products that the janitor or professional office cleaner is going to use when they nip around your cubicle or office space doing their job. This probably means various disinfectants and ammonia based products as well as damp dusters and vacuum cleaners.
Unless your office has rather progressive notions about living and working naturally and encourages the cleaner to use vinegar and baking soda to clean everything, trying to get your office cleaner to switch to natural cleaning products is going to be a waste of time. If you are serious about reducing toxins in your environment, you could have a quiet talk to the cleaner and offer to take care of your cubicle yourself using natural products. He or she will probably agree to this – it’s one less area they have to do. If you are very keen, you could try proposing switching to purchasing, for example, Enjo cleaning cloths for the cleaner as a cost cutting measure – the business won’t have to pay for all those chemicals used for cleaning… It’s worth a try, anyway!
The next best thing you can do to reduce the amount of toxins in your working environment is to put toxin absorbing plants in your cubicle or office. Spider plants and peace lilies are two varieties of plant that are particularly good at absorbing environmental pollutants (and they are thought to absorb some of the e-smog or electromagnetic frequencies put out by all that electrical office equipment). Other plants that remove environmental pollutants and look good include English ivy, weeping fig and areca palm.
Don’t use plastic cups or plastic bottles for your drinks at the office. Yes, it’s important to stay well hydrated and water is by far the best drink (meeting people at the water cooler also helps reduce stress levels), but you don’t have to use the plastic cups (or even paper cups) provided. Sometimes, toxins can leach from the plastic into the water you drink – to say nothing of hot drinks, as heat makes more toxins leach out. Take your own china mug and re-use it through the day (and take it home at night with you to wash, of course!).
You might not be able to stop other people using that ghastly chemical-laden air freshener in the office loo, but this doesn’t mean that you have to use it as well. Good ventilation in the lavatory will help remove any smells, or take a box of matches in with you and light one before you leave. The little flame from the match will burn the methane that creates the worst stink, so your co-workers will have nothing to complain about. An option that could be proposed as a cost-cutting measure is a stainless steel “Smell Killer”. Apparently, these little stainless steel disks neutralise or absorb odours somehow.
If you can bag a desk near a window, or if you have an office to yourself, make the most of fresh air and natural lighting instead of canned air and fluorescent air. You’ll feel better for it and will work better.
Talk to people face to face or leave sticky notes instead of using instant messengers, text messages and emails for intra-office communications. This will reduce the amount of electromagnetic radiation you and your co-workers are exposed to. And to save adding extra paper in the form of sticky notes to the waste stream, do your own recycling and use GOOS (good on one side) paper.
Don’t buy food from the office canteen. It is probably not the healthiest option, and you don’t have any control over the ingredients used. It’s better for your health – and a lot cheaper – to make your own sandwiches or pack leftovers from last night’s dinner and eat that for lunch instead. As a timesaver, make a large batch of sandwiches and freeze them in zip-lock bags (which you can wash out and re-use rather than throwing away). Then all you need to do is grab a frozen pack of sandwiches as you head out the door – it will have thawed out nicely by lunchtime.
If you’ve never tried making your own cleaning products for everyday round-the-house work, give these a go. The fanciest ingredient that gets used is essential oil – which you can easily pick up at a chemist’s shop or a health food store, or even at flea markets – and won’t sent you on a search for diatomaceous earth, glycerine or washing soda. Instead, these household cleaner recipes use everyday ingredients that you probably already have in your cupboards.
Super spray:
Hardware needed: a spray dispenser. Either buy something meant as a plant mister, or rinse out and reuse a bottle that formerly contained a commercial cleaning spray.
-2 parts plain white vinegar (let’s say 400 ml)
-1 part ordinary tap water (200 ml)
-20+ drops essential oil of tea tree or lavender
Put the liquids in the bottle and shake well to combine. This super spray can be used for all sorts of cleaning jobs. It’s great for cleaning mirrors and cleaning glass, removing fly spots, wiping down kitchen benches, disinfecting the toilet seat and as an air freshener. Leave out the water (i.e. just use the vinegar and essential oil) and you can use it as a fabric softener.
Soap slime:
Hardware: a kettle and a plastic container (something recycled like a 1-litre yoghurt tub is great). If saving soap scraps, a plastic mesh bag is handy.
-Soap, any sort, either grated, chopped up or in little pieces too small to use for washing hands and faces
-Boiling water
-Essential oil (optional) –again, any sort will do
Fill the kettle with the water and boil the water. Chop up or grate the soap and put in the plastic container. Pour the boiling water over the soap scraps, stir and leave for a few hours. The soap will melt, combine with the water and create a slimy goo. If you save soap scraps, collect the scraps in a plastic mesh bag (the sort oranges are often sold in) and keep this permanently in the container. The bag help you strain out the lumps from the gel, and you just pour in boiling water when the container has more unmelted scraps than goo.
Soap slime can be used for washing floors, especially tiles, vinyl or lino, washing the paintwork of cars, cleaning toilet bowls, spot-cleaning carpets, cleaning toys cleaning rugs and for handwashing woollens. It can also be used as liquid soap, if put into an appropriate pump dispenser, and as shampoo. Add some food colouring (not too much) and you have something that’s perfect for a preschool messy play day – slimy, squishy, stringy and messy, but washes out like a charm.
The Old Sailor’s Brass Polish
Hardware: a saucer or small pottle and at least two rags, one (or more) damp with fresh water.
-half a cup of salt
-enough white vinegar to make a paste (less than you think – salt dissolves readily)
Mix the salt and vinegar to make a paste. Apply the paste to the brass, bronze or copper to be cleaned, and coat whatever it is thoroughly. Leave the paste on for at least five minutes. Scrub as much paste off with the dry rag, giving the brass or whatever a good rub as you take it off. Clean off any residue with the damp rag(s). This worked a treat to clean a brass candelabra that had been neglected for years (tarnish, dust, fly spots…) and left it gleaming like gold. The paste can also be used as a marinade for meat, as a disinfectant for open wounds (stings like heck, but works) and as an addition to the bath for deep cleaning.
