While you were sleeping

Good morning!  While probably every normal person with a 15 month old child who likes to wake up extra early was sleeping last night I was searching for a solution to streaky stainless steel (and catching up on teen mom, and drinking some wine, but I digress).  Well, I think we have a winner, maybe, only time will tell.  This is the pacific northwest so I really don't know when the next time is that sun will hit some of these appliances, but in the cloudy morning light they're looking good.   

Streaky refrigerator doors are really hard to capture on film, but here is my sad attempt.  The first picture is before and the second picture is after.

All I used to remove those nasty streaks was some olive oil on a rag.  Pour a pretty liberal amount on any soft rag you have around the house, and start rubbing it in.  You might be thinking won't this leave a greasy film on the fridge?  It really does not, I have no idea how or why it works, but it does.  Now, this is not the easiest way to clean a fridge, because it is a two step process.  Straight vinegar to clean disinfect, then olive oil to remove the streaks.  But now I have appliances that I can feel good about Monkey licking (and she will).  Plus, I am meeting my goal of no unnecessary chemicals in the house, while still satisfying my perfectionist tendencies.

In the interest of full disclosure, I did not use our expensive organic olive oil to clean the fridge.  We still have some non organic here and I was not gonna waste those organic dollars on something we were not ingesting our rubbing all over our bodies.  If this ends up being the route we go for cleaning appliances I will probably continue to keep a small bottle of cheap olive oil on hand for this purpose.  Other than Monkey's tendency to lick and kiss inanimate objects, no on is going to be ingesting these cleaners, so it is one place we can save some money.

My First Homemade Cleaner

I am about to save you lots of money people!  Listen closely.  When we moved into our new house 2 weeks ago my mom helped me to make my first natural homemade cleaner, and so far I am LOVING it.

All you need:

 White vinegar, a spray bottle (I bought mine for $3.50 at Target), and some water.

 Fill the bottle halfway with vinegar, fill the rest with water

Voila!  An all purpose cleaner!  This half and half mixture works great for windows and general cleaning.  If you need something with more power you can use straight vinegar.  I also use my half and half mixture to clean our laminate floors with a microfiber mop/swiffer type thing.

I am absolutely shocked at how well vinegar works to clean pretty much everything.  It is such an easy switch and it is soooooooooo much cheaper than traditional cleaners.  I will admit that while it is wet your house will smell like a salad, but the smell dissipates pretty much immediately once it dries.  Plus this is a cleaner you can leave under the sink without worrying about little ones poisoning themselves, or ruining furniture or carpet spraying it.  The only issue we are running into is Mr. B hates the smell of vinegar, so I am looking for some alternatives that may be easier on his nose.

The one spot that we are not having luck using this as a cleaner is our stainless appliances (so far I have used it on granite counters, laminate floors, ceramic tile, linoleum, toilets and sinks, and bathtubs).  I am currently on an internet hunt for an easy to make stainless steel cleaner and I will report back.

Financial Verdict: While you have the initial start up cost of buying a spray bottle, the vinegar is only $1.99 a gallon.  So overall this is WAY cheaper than buying a natural cleaner, and still significantly cheaper than traditional cleaners.