Pre-Holiday Room By Room Cleaning Plan - The Kitchen

Here is the newest post in my holiday cleaning tips Pre-Holiday Room By Room Cleaning Plan - The Kitchen.

While the weather is still warm I like to plan ahead for a more organized Christmas. Getting the holiday deep cleaning done early, makes me less stressed come November and December.

**Now the list may seem extensive but it is just that, a list. Do what you can or what seems to be most pressing. I like to print it off and check off what I can but I usually never get all done but this holiday cleaning plan helps keep me on track.

Kitchen Quick Tip - How to Make Your Faucet Sparkle

How to make your faucet sparkle and shine.

At the end of the day, or even after a meal and clean up in the kitchen, there is nothing like leaving your kitchen clean and your chrome faucet shiny and spot free. Here is how to clean your chrome faucet and remove water spots.

I learned from the neatest house keeper I know, my husband's aunt, to always clean your chrome faucet after each use. She always sprayed hers down after dinner dishes when we would visit with Windex. I asked her why she did this and she said because it keeps hard water spots from developing on the chrome on your faucet.

I started doing this, but am much more conscious of putting chemicals on the sink than I used to be when I was young. Now I use a mix of vinegar and water and often the Method cleaners from Target. I love with glass and surface one that smells like mint.

So whenever you do dishes, to prevent water stains on your faucet, spray, wipe and shine. It is so nice to walk into your kitchen with the faucet sparkling.

Now if you have hard water build up here is a post on how to remove hard water stains from chrome and glass. This and other tips in the quick tip series.

Pre-Holiday Room by Room Cleaning Plan - The Dining Room

Okay, onto the dining room in my pre-holiday room by room cleaning plan. I am a bit behind with the start of school and a camping trip but I am going to try and quickly clean through the rest of the house making that a priority. Today is the dining room.

Holiday Cleaning Plan For The Dining Room:

1. Dust all crown molding and use swiffer duster to swipe walls of any cobwebs
2. Clean tops of high furniture 
3. Wipe tops of door jams
4. Dust and wipe down all hanging decor 
5. Remove plates from walls and wash
6. Dust hanging light fixture and clean bulbs
7. Wipe down all door and doorways of grime and fingerprints
8. Go around room cleaning marks on paint or touch up with fresh paint
9. Remove all nick knacks and dust and clean each piece of furniture as I do this
10. Tuck away summer decor for next year
11. Wipe down dining room chairs ( if you have upholstery then clean as needed)
12. Dust dining room table and legs
13. Clean wood floor of dining room (I have no rugs in here)
14. *If you have rugs then vacuum and flip over area rugs to vacuum other side

  I do have a china cabinet in here. I will not be taking everything out and cleaning inside because I do this once a year in spring and it seems to stay dust free fairly well.

Having a holiday grand plan will relieve stress and keep you on track to an organized Christmas.

How to Clean Your Mattress

I am going to tell you how to clean your mattress. 

So you know you can't throw your mattress in the washing machine but you can freshen it up and spot clean your mattress without water.

About every six months we flip our mattress. When you do this you can take the time to clean it and freshen your mattress too.

First, strip every thing and wash all your bedding and mattress pad and bed skirt if you have one. While you have the mattress up for flipping vacuum that box spring.

Second, if you have any stains you can use a solution of one part dish soap to two parts hydrogen peroxide.  Do not soak any stains but dab a very warm damp clean cloth  into the solution and work the stain and keep dabbing it dry with a clean dry cloth. Most mattress stains are protein in nature so this solution to clean the mattress should work. The sooner you get to that stain the better.

Third, when you are done with any spot cleaning of your mattress, let's deodorize it. Take some baking soda and use a sifter or a shaker to sprinkle a thin layer of baking soda over the top of your mattress. Let it sit for at least an hour and then come in with you upholstery attachment and vacuum. Get in between the flap on the side of the pillow top and vacuum all the crevices well.

I am telling you this really does freshen your mattress. I swear it even smells better in your room after a thorough cleaning of your bed.

Now bring in your freshly washed bedding and make up your bed and you will sleep like a baby not only from all that work, but because your bed is so fresh and clean.

Top January Pinned Posts

                          It is interesting to see what pins get pinned the most on Pinterest. Here are two oldies but still great posts and a current one that are my most pinned posts for the month of January.

                                      How to Clean Your Stove Burner Grates

                                    How to Remove the Smell from Your Vacuum

                                                Creamy Italian Ranch Pasta Salad

How to Clean Your Coffee Maker and Keurig Brewer

I am going to show you how to clean your coffee maker and Keurig brewer. If you love coffee like us it is important to do regular cleaning of your drip coffee maker and any K-Cup brewer like my Keurig.

Hard water deposits on your heating element and and other parts of the coffee pot really take a toll on the life and quality of your appliances. If your coffee is perking slower than you know you have build up that needs to be removed as well as a constant moist environment can lead to bacteria. Manufacturer instructions call this cleaning "descaling" and this should be done every three to six months depending on the mineral content of your water.

Cleaning Painted Kitchen Cabinets

I am chuggin along in my Christmas Countdown. Onto the kitchen. I am wiping down the cabinets and I always use T.S.P. to clean my painted kitchen cabinets.  I have found nothing that works as well to degrease them. Dilute in hot water and wear gloves. I wipe down and then dry with a clean cloth. Works wonderful on the walls too.

 You can find posts and pics on how I organize the kitchen and a tour from Christmas three years ago.

I am going to be sharing a new updated tour of the kitchen when I finish my Christmas Countdown and cabinet cleaning. Stay tuned.

Tips for Washing Windows and Shower Doors

Anything to make cleaning faster is great and here are my tips for washing windows and shower doors. I used to go around to all the glass doors in the house and spray and wipe and I still do on the interior doors but for all exterior glass windows and doors and my shower doors I now have a much quicker and easier way to clean.

Tips for washing windows and shower doors

Meet my best window cleaning friend the sponge/squeegee thing. How did I not have one of these all those years? My husband actually bought me this and now it is a weekly item I use to clean the glass in the house.

For Shower Doors:

1. Here is what I do. Take a bowl and add a drop or two of Dawn, about a cup or so of white vinegar and then add hot water. Take an old sponge with the scrubber side and head to your shower doors. 

2. Go ahead and scrub those doors and let the water run down, it will help you to clean the tub and floor by the shower too. Just lightly rub with scrubber side to remove hard water spots and then get some on that squeegee sponge and wash the whole door or window. 

3. Now turn over and squeegee off the soapy water, no rinsing needed. Keep a dry rag to wipe off the rubber strip of the squeegee and to wipe the edges of the glass and any you slopped on the tub or floor. Heck wipe up that bathroom floor too. You will be so happy with that clean bathroom.

Cleaning Outdoor Windows

1. When you are done in the bathroom with your shower doors then head to your outside sliders and glass doors and while you are at it do one or two of your outdoor windows. This way you keep up and always have pretty clean exterior windows. The one I have has an extendable handle which is awesome for those hard to reach windows.

If your outdoor windows are really dirty, hose them off first to remove the dirt and grit. Take the sponge side of the squeegee and dip in your cleaning solution, scrub and the flip and squeegee all the excess. Take a clean rag and wipe the edges of the window. You can even throw the rag over the rubber side of the squeegee and dry the window edges.

Okay, now clean windows and doors are in your future. Ask your significant other to get you one of these too and you will be so glad they did.

Best Homemade Indoor Fly Spray

It's summer and the flies are out and annoyingly in your house. Now here is a great way to make your own safe indoor fly spray with just two ingredients.

How To Make Safe Indoor Fly Spray

• Mix 2/3 water to 1/3 rubbing alcohol
• Keep in a clean plastic spray bottle

The wonders and uses of rubbing alcohol in the home never stop amazing me. You already know I love it as a multi surface cleaner in our home. It is great for a degreaser and for cleaning wood blinds and other types as well. But let me tell you this year the flies were bad when we had a hot snap of weather and when they get in the house they drive me bonkers.

 Low and behold, I started using my diluted alcohol and water spray I use for cleaning glass and counter tops to spray the flies and it works GREAT! Just spray the fly a couple of times when it lands and they just fall. Take a paper towel and pick them up and toss but then just wipe down your window or whatever that you sprayed and it is now sparkly clean.

A safe way to kill flies indoors. But also a very frugal bug killer spray you make at home.

For controlling the flies outdoors so they don't get indoors you may want to try Fly Predators. We use them and LOVE them. It was about quality of life in our small yard and I wanted to BBQ and not have flies all over our food. I can't say enough about them. Read our post on using Fly Predators outdoors.

Making Homemade Household Cleaners

Make your own homemade household cleaners.

There are so many folks out there starting to make their own cleaning supplies these days and that makes me so happy. At least we know what we are spraying all over our counters and bathrooms. Less chemicals and so much cheaper than buying the store products.

1. Rubbing Alcohol

My absolute favorite homemade all purpose cleaner is  plain old rubbing alcohol. I use it diluted in a spray bottle for my everyday cleaner and glass/window cleaner. It works better than anything else I have tried. Just mix 1/3 part alcohol and 2/3 water in a spray bottle.  Use it on counters, my kitchen floor, windows, mirrors. Works wonderfully. I used to use vinegar a lot until I tried the alcohol and it just works so well I use it for everything.

You can see how I use it to clean the blinds in my kitchen here.

2. Vinegar 

I do use vinegar 1/4 c. in a half bucket of warm water for my wood floors. I just make sure I do not get the floors very wet. Ring out the rags very well.

You can clean drains with baking soda and vinegar. Pour 1/4 c. baking soda in the drain. Follow with a cup of vinegar. Let set about 15 minutes and then follow with a pain of hot boiling water. My pipes and drains seem to keep clear with regular cleaning with this solution.

3. Baking Soda

I also use baking soda to scour things I don't want to use regular cleanser on. Places where you prepare food, cleaning my crockpots, etc. I just keep this handy sprinkle container full of it in my kitchen.

I use it in my oven. My daughter is very sensitive to chemicals in the house so I cannot use oven cleaner. So at night I will put a wet paste of baking soda and water on areas of my oven that have baked on gunk. The next day I come in with my wet scouring sponge and scrub off.

You can use baking soda to clean hair brushes and combs. Just put 4 Tbl. mixed in a bowl of hot water. Soak brushes for about 15 minutes and then rinse clean with warm water.

4. Laundry Soap
 Because of my daughter's sensitivities I started making  my own laundry soap years ago. It works great and I figure I spend less than $15 a year on detergent. Here is the recipe for my homemade laundry soap .

I spend very little now on my cleaning supplies. That is a good thing.

Simple Sundays

I have already extolled the virtues of cleaning your kitchen with baking soda here. In my quest to find less toxic ways to clean that also happen to be economical I found another great way to use baking soda to clean.

Now, if you are like me and make coffee everyday and leave the coffee pot on warm you know you can get a stained coffee pot. Ours was also full of hard water spots.

Here is a simple way to make that coffee pot shine. Take 1/4 cup of baking soda and dissolve with one quart of very warm water in the coffee pot. Let sit at least a half hour. Once it is done just rinse out. I wanted to work on some of the hard water stains on my pot and on the bottom of my coffee maker so I made a paste with the baking soda and scrubbed the pot inside and out and wiped down the warming element of the coffee maker. Everything is now all sparkly and clean.

I also like to clean out the coffee maker and disinfect it with vinegar. Just pour about a cup of vinegar straight into the coffee maker like you were going to make coffee. Turn on and let it run through. I then rinse thoroughly by running about 3-4 full pots of water through the coffee maker.

Simple Spring Cleaning

Tips on spring cleaning the home, easy spring cleaning.

Let's just say that when my husband and I were married, we were both house keeping challenged. We married young, and other than short stays at college, had never kept house prior to marriage. We just had no clue how the house got so messy and then why it would take so long to pick it up every weekend. It took many years of trial and error for us to work out a system that kept the house in order day to day. Now, our house is far from perfect, but I am able to receive guests at a moments notice. There may be a few things lying about, but for the most part, the house is always presentable.
I am no expert, but a few things I learned were to pick up daily, focus on one room at a time and clean up the kitchen as soon as a meal is done. I easily get overwhelmed. And as for the big jobs like spring cleaning, I just do it all year long. A little at a time with some of my spring cleaning checklists.

It can seem daunting to think of spring cleaning a whole house when you are struggling to keep up the daily tasks or maybe you are lucky enough to hire a spring cleaning service, but most cannot. Here is what I do. Right now I am focusing on the den. Every time I vacuum in there, I do one extra deep spring cleaning chore. This time it was vacuuming under the cushions and the backs of the couches. Prior to that it was dusting the entertainment center and vacuuming under the TV. Next time I will dust the shutters. I simply plan to always do one deep cleaning chore each time I clean in that room.

Another area is cleaning out the fridge. Hate it! It is overwhelming to me to take all the contents out and have to clean the whole darn thing. Plus with the four kids I never seem to have long periods of time to devote to cleaning anything. So after I fill a sink with hot sudsy water, I just take one shelf at a time. I do this continually  and usually before I go shopping for the week when the fridge is near empty. It is less daunting for me to deep clean this way. I have one of those brains that gets overwhelmed easily so breaking these chores down is my way of keeping our house up and my mind in tact.