Cleaning made easy (Hints and Tips for Household Cleaning)

Member Name: adam171275

Product:	Hints and Tips for Household Cleaning
Date:	13/04/09 (295 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: cheaper, easy better for the environment

Disadvantages: none

My wife is an absolute cleaning machine and if it was possible I'm sure she would clean all day long but due to the fact that she looks after our 19 month old son it is not always possible. Due to her cleanliness I myself have become quite domesticated (when I have to) here are some of the cleaning tips I have learnt from her.



1) Buy an E cloth

You can purchase many different types of E cloths; these vary from bathroom and kitchen kits to shower or window cleaning ones. These cloths are thought to be environmentally friendly as you don't need to use cleaning products with them and the cloths can be machine washed many times. My wife has the general purpose cloth and the glass and polishing cloth. You can buy these cloths and see the full range on their website at www.e-cloth.com; she brought these two cloths for £4.88 each. You may think that the price is quite expensive but as you can wash them many times they last for ages working out to be much cheaper in the long run. You can use the general purpose cloth on anything such as kitchen surfaces when wet or when using dry it can be used to wipe away household dust. The polishing cloth is great for using on mirrors and any chrome in your house such as taps. This really has become quite an obsession of my wife's, she is permanently polishing her taps to leave the perfect shine, and if I'm honest they really do shine! These cloths are really worth the money although I'm not sure if you would need to buy them all, the general purpose one and polishing cloth is quite sufficient.


2) My wife swears that if you wipe over the bath or shower every time you use it there is never the need to scrub it. I have become quite used to this and every time like robot fashion I will take the bathroom cleaner and cloth and wipe it round after I have bathed. I can see her point as the scum and lime scale isn't left around the bathtub/shower to build up this will save you wearing yourself out scrubbing.

3) Vinegar
This is my wife's favourite cleaning tool, she adds 1 part white vinegar to 3 parts water and puts it into a spray bottle so it's easy to use. She uses this especially on windows and swears by it. We have a window cleaner for the outside of the windows but do the inside ones ourselves. If I'm around I will clean the windows ever so often and the solution of vinegar and water really does work. When we used to use the window cleaners we found that the windows smeared a lot which is horrible to look at especially if the sun is shinning on them. All you need to do is spray on the window and wipe clean, we use the all purpose e cloth and believe me the result is worth it and effortless.



4) Dust before you Hoover
This does seem to make sense if you think about it; once you have dusted the dust will come straight off your surfaces and float into the air, releasing the dust to the floor. If you Hoover after you are able to Hoover up all those dust particles released from dusting, a great tip in my opinion as it will save you work in the long run.


5) Bicarbonate of soda
This is great for cleaning you oven and is what we always use; most oven cleaners are highly toxic and can be very dangerous for children or animals. Having young children we like keep any chemicals we may use to a minimum. What you need to do is take the oven shelves out of the oven and fill the bath with enough water to cover them. Then simply sprinkle some bicarbonate of soda in the bath water and leave it over night to do its magic. The amount of bicarbonate of soda you use is entirely up to you and also depends on how dirty the shelves are. With the inside of the oven you simply fill your kitchen sink in the same way, grab a scourers and scrub inside, try this I promise you will be pleased with the results. Most of us hate to clean the oven so my advice is to not leave it too long in between cleans as the longer you leave it the dirtier it gets meaning the harder it is to clean.


6) Expensive cleaners aren't always the best
Due to the recent credit crunch we have tried a lot of Tesco value products and to be honest they work as well as the leading more expensive ones. Although we use the E cloth to polish my wife still has to use a polish too, I think if she can't smell the polish then she hasn't cleaned. The Tesco value polish is just as good as the leading brands without all the fancy packing, although the smell isn't as nice but you can't have it all. The value toilet cleaner is also very good so I recommend you try this also. I also want to add that don't put polish on painted window sills, my wife used to do this until I pointed out that it takes the paint off not a cleaning tip but a tip all the same.


7) Lemons and more lemons
These are truly fab at cleaning the inside of a microwave and great for the environment and inexpensive too. All you need to do is put some water in a jug/bowl, add the juice of a lemon, place the mixture in the microwave and put it on full power for 10 minutes. Once the 10 minutes is up you can remove the jug and simply wipe the inside clean, this will also leave the microwave and your kitchen smelling nice and fresh, all this for a price of a lemon!


8) Washing up liquid
Most people when cleaning carpets and floors will use a carpet cleaner like 1001 for carpets or an all purpose cleaner for kitchen floors etc. We always use washing up liquid, this is much cheaper, environmentally better, and in my opinion works as well. All you need to do is use it as you would if you were washing up, then simply either grab your mop or your carpet brush and wash away, we really do find it as effective, although the only bad side is it is not as good for getting out any large carpets stains so a proper carpet cleaner may be needed.


9) Toothbrushes
These are great for reaching into to smaller parts when cleaning, like corners of baths or in corners of cupboards. You don't need to buy expensive brands, shops cheap varieties are all you need we always have a stock in the cleaning cupboard. If cleaning a corner of a cupboard which is hard to reach all you need to do is had a bit of hot water and reach with the toothbrush and wash away any marks it's simple.



10) Wet wipes
As we have a 19 month old son we always have plenty of packs of these in the house and they are used for more than one way. I swear we use these as much when cleaning as we do on our son. We always have a pack in most rooms of the house so they are always at arms reach. We use them in various ways, here are a few examples:

Highchair
Sticky finger marks on the walls
The kitchen surface
Marks on the sofa
TV screen
The doors on the kitchen cupboard again sticky fingers!
Venetian blinds
Quick sink wipe
Just about anything!


Well these are my ten cleaning tips I hope they are of use.

Summary: sipmly and easy ideas for better cleaning