Most of the house cleaners bought at stores contains harsh chemicals that can cause skin and eye irritations. Some of the chemicals can also cause asthma, cancer and birth defects. As per EPA some of the hazardous chemicals included in the household cleaners are carcinogenic chemicals, endocrine, volatile organic compounds, PBT-persistent bio accumulative and toxic chemicals among others. Look for house cleaning ideas that are safe for you and the environment as well.

You do not have to buy cleaners that are loaded with harmful chemicals to clean the house. Look for natural ingredients that not only clean tough stains, but are good for your hands and the environment as well. Chemicals can cause havoc to our local rivers and disturb the aquatic life as well. Natural home cleaners can clean the dirt effectively, kill germs, and leave a pleasant, natural fragrance. Plus, these elements are safe for you and your family as well. Here are a few natural house cleaning ingredients that you can use.

Borax
Borax is versatile and works as a multipurpose cleaner. Add a tiny amount of borax on a damp cloth and clean the floors, tiles, fixtures and porcelain sinks and get rid of stubborn marks, yellow stains and dark patches on the corners. You can also use it to make your greasy kitchen cabinets sparkle. If you add it as a booster to your laundry detergent, it will eliminate odor from your stinky clothes. And, if you soak your clothes that have tough stains on them in borax water, the stains will be gone in no time; just give them a good wash after the soak.

Lemon
Lemon is a non-toxic natural house cleaning ingredient. It also works as a bleaching agent and deodorizer. You can remove mildew and mold with lemon juice in a jiffy. When you clean hard surfaces with lemon juice, it gives a beautiful shine to the surface. Lemon juice also removes grease from kitchen cabinets and tough stains from clothes. Use this citric juice to clean the chopping board and kill the germs. Lemon juice can also be used to clean grout. What’s more, you can clean metal grills as well by adding some salt to the juice and tightly wipe them off.

White vinegar
Vinegar is antibacterial and antifungal kitchen ingredient. It can be used as a house cleansing agent for all over the house. Mix vinegar with water in equal quantities and clean the carpet. It is also a great degreaser. In fact, you can use vinegar to clean your veggies as well.

Baking Soda
Apart from being a deodorizer, baking soda is an antiviral agent. It can eliminate grease and grime like a champion. You can use to clean counter tops, grills, sinks, tubs and bathroom floors. You can also use to unclog blocked drain. Put the baking soda in the drain and slowly pour white vinegar until foam starts to form. Then flush it with hot water. Repeat the process until the drain is cleared.

Salt
Salt is the most common ingredient found in every kitchen, but only a few use it for house cleaning purposes. Add salt to white vinegar to make a powerful house cleaner; remove mildew and stains of rust mix some salt with lemon soda and clean the affected area. Make your own eco-friendly household cleaner with these non-toxic ingredients and keep your house clean and fresh all the time. And the best part is that these ingredients are inexpensive, safe and healthy.

Cleaning bathroom is one of the least liked domestic chores for most people. Nobody likes to spend time scrubbing the bathroom to make it shine. However, if you clean it regularly and keep it organized, you will not feel overwhelmed to keep it in order. Here are some tips that will help you keep the bathroom clean.

Daily routine
Follow a practice of keeping the things back in their place after use. Things like toothbrushes, toothpaste, hairbrushes and lotions must go back to their place once used. Teach your children also to keep their things back in place and wipe the paste off the basin after brushing their teeth. Keep the fan on when taking a shower to avoid mildew and mold in the bathroom.

Keep the cleaning supplies stocked up
If you have small children at home, then you need to clean the bathroom more than once a week. Keep the supplies stocked up so that you do not run out of cleaners. Choose only the best bathroom cleaners to keep the bathroom sparkling clean. Clean and sweep all the dust accumulated on the bathroom floor with a mop or a vacuum cleaner. Also clean the faucets, shower curtain, and soap holders.
Soak the toilet in the cleaner for a while before cleaning it. Clean around the base where the toilet bolts to the floor along with the lid, top and bottom of the toilet seat. Do not forget to clean behind the hinges, where most of the dirt and hair build up.

Organize the cabinets
Organize your bathroom cabinets and assign each shelf for one category like one for cosmetics, one for first-aid, one for hair care and one for men’s grooming. Hang your hair dryers and curling irons. This will make space for other items in the shelf. Never keep items loose in the bathroom whether it is under the sink or in the shelves. To keep nail clippers and tweezers in place, use magnetic strips. The metal tools will be stuck to the magnet and will not be lost. Use tray in the cabinets to keep the items so that in case something happens to leak, it becomes easy to clean, without making the cabinet messy. Hang the towel rack behind the door. Stack the toilet paper rolls in the toilet paper holders, on the flush tank if there is enough space or in the cabinets.
Cleaning the bathroom and making it shine is one task, but keeping it the same way is the bigger job. With small children at home, it is bound to get dirty as soon as they get home from school. However, cleaning becomes easy when you are organized and know which thing goes where.

While cleaning a surface like the sealed hardwood floor is fairly simple, lacquered, varnished, shellacked or oil-treated floors may be more difficult to maintain. Although most of the new houses use surface-sealed hardwood, many older homes and Victorian houses still have the sealtreated floors. Here, we give you a few tips to keep your seal-treated or oil-treated floors in premium condition in smart ways.

Routine cleaning
Regular dusting with a dry mop keeps the surface free of dust and sand particles. Use a dry microfiber mop for this purpose. You could also use your vacuum for the routine dusting. Standing Water can damage any kind of wood surface, but you can use a damp mop to wipe clean surfacesealed hardwood floors. However, moisture just does not go down well for oil-treated or lacquered surfaces, so you should never mop waxed surfaces.

Waxing
You would want to wax your oil-treated floor a few times in the year. High-traffic areas like the living room or kitchen may need to be waxed every few weeks. Keep these things in mind:

• Vacuum the surface to clear it of dust.
• Spirits and wax used in the process have strong pungent smells that can be nauseating. Ensure that the room is well-ventilated before you begin work.
• You could use spirit to strip off the old wax from your floor. However, it is more appropriate to follow the directions given on the package. After the floor has dried up, apply a thin coat of wax with an applicator or a cloth. Allow it to dry. Use two coats for best results.

Buffing
You can think of hiring a buffing machine to make your job easier. Remember to buff in the direction of the wood grain, though. Commercial waxes are made available by a number of brands. Before selecting a product, read the directions carefully and refer to the recommendations of your floor’s manufacturer. You can follow the simple tricks listed below for everyday care.

• Place doormats at entrances to prevent dust and debris from entering your house.
• Ensure that all your furniture has rubber padding underneath to avoid accidental scratches.
• Chalk out a weekly schedule for cleaning depending on traffic in the area. High traffic areas may need to be dusted and waxed more often.
• Carpets tape sticks to the hardwood floor and can be very difficult to remove. It is best to avoid them altogether if you want to save your hardwood floor. Plasticized backings on certain area rugs can also damage the finish of your hardwood floor.
• You would want to think of placing rugs or plastic trays in areas which are more likely to have standing water. For instance, under planters or near doggy bowls and outside the bathrooms.
• Always buy the appropriate cleaning solution for your hardwood floor; harsh and abrasive liquids can damage the surface permanently.
• If you have pets, make sure that you clip their nails regularly to avoid scratches.
  There is no reason why your hardwood floor will not look as good as new, if you care for it on a regular basis.

Hardwood floor adds a certain level of charm and grace to the house. It might be look like it’s difficult to maintain them, but the elegance they bring to your house is worth the trouble. Contrary to popular belief, it is neither difficult nor time-consuming to clean your hardwood floors. In the recent years, surface-sealed hardwood floors have gained popularity as they are easier to maintain. These hardwood floors are usually sealed with urethane, polyurethane or polyacrylic and are stain resistant. Here’s how you can clean the hardwood floors.

Basic, daily cleaning
Dust your floors with a microfiber mop to prevent surface damage. You can decide on a dusting schedule for each area, depending on how often the place is used. The high traffic areas in your house, like the kitchen, living room or entrances should ideally be dusted on a daily basis. For the other rooms, dusting on alternate days or twice a week would suffice.

When you’re mopping
If you dust your Harwood floor regularly, there is little requirement for routine mopping. Once or twice in a week should be enough. The cleaning process is fairly simple. Begin with dusting the floor to rid it of dust and gains, which might damage the surface of your hardwood floor. For a more through sweep, you could use your vacuum cleaner. However, ensure that the wheels of your vacuum are padded to avoid accidental scratches. Plus, do not use the rotator belt of your vacuum on hardwood floors.

A word on cleaners
Once you are done, dip a clean mop into the bucket of pre-prepared cleaning solution. Using plain water will not clear up the dirt and grime that builds up over time. You could use water and soap mixture, or cleaning solutions available in the market. Commercial cleaners are quite effective at cleaning oils and greasy residues.

Learn the right way
Make sure that you wring out the mop completely, as it should be damp and not dripping. Mop the floor in the direction of the wood grain. Repeat the process with a mop dipped in clean water to rinse.
Buff the floor with a soft dry wipe to soak up any residual moisture.

Dos and don’ts
There are a few things that you should take care of. Don’t use oils, waxes or furniture sprays, and don’t use strong bleaches, alkaline products or abrasive cleaners. Some people suggest using a vinegar and water solution for cleaning hardwood floors, while still others claim that it dulls your hardwood floor over time. Use a damp sponge dipped in baking soda to clear scuff marks. Lastly, for dark spots, pet stains, heel marks and water marks, rub the spot with steel wool and floor wax.

Don’t forget to polish them
Even with regular dusting and mopping, your hardwood floor needs to be polished at regular intervals. Ideally, you should polish your hardwood floor every few months to keep it in a premium condition. Polishing fills up the microscopic holes and scratches that may not be visible to the eye but can damage the surface over time. There are several good brands of polish available in the market. You can easily polish the floor on your own with one of these products.

There are several kinds of bathroom cleaning solutions available in the market. While each one of you may have used a basic product like an all surface cleaner or a floor cleaner at one point or the other, some other bathroom cleaning solutions can make even the toughest of cleaning jobs agreeable. Here is a list of the variety of bathroom cleaning solutions that you may use.

All-purpose cleaners: These basic cleaners are a must-have for all bathrooms. They can be used on any kind of surface including walls, floors, tiles and shower heads. They are quite effective when it comes to general cleanliness and hygiene.

Floor cleaner: Keeping the bathroom floor spotless is not always an easy task. The dirt and stray strands of hair cling to the tile surface due to moisture and humidity. A separate floor cleaner may be the answer to your woes one, because it can remove soap scum and stains and secondly, it can even get through to the grout. Ideally, you should be looking for a product that can be used on any type of surface including marble and stone.

Toilet cleaner: The toilet bowls need to be cleaned and disinfected on a regular basis. You need more than an all-surface cleaner for the task. Select a strong product that has disinfectant properties and is also efficient at removing stains. Some of the cheaper products contain harsh chemicals which, over a period of time, may destroy the porcelain surface of your toilet seat. You should also consider the pungent odor of these liquids, which while being irritating when you are scrubbing, can also linger for quite some time.

Bleach sprays: Bathroom tiles provide the ideal surface for moulds and mildew. If you do not scrub your tiles regularly, you can easily spot these light green deposits, especially in the corners and the shower area. Apart from being unsightly, these can trigger allergic reactions. Bathroom bleach sprays not only kill the mould and mildew, but they also ensure that it won’t be coming back soon.

Faucet cleaners: If you are really proud of the designer faucet you chose for your bathroom, you may want to spend another few bucks on keeping it in premium condition. They are quite effective at removing scales and calcium deposits on faucets.

Bathtub cleaners: All of us enjoy a warm bath, but cleaning the tub afterwards is another story. The soap scum, calcium, lime, hard water stains, grease, and grime on the bathtub may require special care by a bathtub cleaner. Several popular brands manufacture bathtub cleaners, which leave your bathtub sparkling within minutes.

Grout cleaners: The slimy deposits over the grout between the tiles and open surfaces can be pretty tough to clean unless you are prepared to bend over and apply yourself to some serious scrubbing. If you want to skip the elbow grease, you should find yourself an efficient grout cleaner.

Along with following these bathroom cleaning tips and owning an effective bathroom cleaning solution, remember bathroom supplies, which include vacuums, grout brushes and cleaning wipes, help in making the scrubbing and cleaning much easier.

It’s one of the most annoying things for a person to clean windows, especially if you do not know the techniques well. It simply gets next to impossible to clean and then dry the glass windows. Here are some easy ways you can follow, if you wish to know how to clean windows!

Necessary equipment
Until you know the equipment to be used correctly, you cannot excel in this task. Right choice of equipment can help you do your work faster. When you have the right equipment, cleaning windows doesn’t remain a hassle any more. The equipment must include everything listed below!
A bucket
A sponge
A squeegee
Purpose-made window cleaning solutions or vinegar
Brown paper or newspaper
Chamois or microfiber cloth
Dry lint free cloth or drying pad

Remove the dust or dirt
This is the primary step that you need to do. If you wet your window without dusting it, then instead of getting clean, it could acquire more dirt on the window pane as well as the duster. So it is recommended that you first dust the dirt with a dry cloth and then start with your major cleaning.

Wet the window pane
Once you have removed the initial layer of dirt by dusting, go for cleaning the patches. These patches are hell bent when it comes to getting them removed. Hence, you need to first wet them and let them get softer. Patches of bird’s poop aren’t very smooth to remove, right? Hence, you need to make them softer with water in order to get them out of your pane completely. Wet the window pane, leave it for some time and with the help of a dry cloth, you can either dry your window or remove the excess water that is dripping from the window pane.

Wash them with vinegar/other solutions
Take a sponge, apply the solution and just rub it against the window. Rub it little harder when required. On the dry patches, you need to rub them and wash them. Sometimes you might need to rub them rigorously to get them out of your window. You can use this step to remove the labels that dominate the beauty of your glass window. For greasy windows, use two tablespoons of household ammonia or domestic borax per gallon and rinse with vinegar solution. This will help you get rid of the greasy dirt.

Glass shiner
The task of cleaning the window is not complete without this step. After performing the above steps, you need to dry the window with some dry fiber cloth and leave that to dry completely for a few minutes. Then apply some glass shiner on the window panes and gently rub them with a dry cloth. This way your window will not only get cleaned, but also get the shine of a new window. Moreover, the glass shiner contains some of the chemicals that clean the dirt, which other cleansers may not take out.

A lot of dirt gets accumulated on the windows and it is very important that they are cleaned regularly to avoid such grime. The main factors that cause the dirt to accumulate are climate and the place where you live. Just as gutter cleaning is important for the maintenance of your home, cleaning of windows is important to avoid pollutants, mold, dust and dirt to get caught in the windows. So it important to know how to clean windows the right way along with the do’s and don’ts of window cleaning.

What to use while cleaning windows
There are many people who do not like the job of cleaning windows mainly because they have to deal with dripping water, annoying streaks and dirt. The task of cleaning windows can be simplified by making use of effective yet simple methods and techniques. Cleaning the windows of your house before winter is a good idea as it makes your home look bright.
It is very important that you have proper equipment to clean the windows and these include soft cloth, hose and a ladder. You can make the job of cleaning the windows easier by making use of a sponge and a good quality cleansing liquid. In addition, wear gloves to keep your hands clean and dry.

Types of solutions to be used for cleaning windows
The solution used for cleaning windows must be mild. One of the effective methods that can be used to clean windows is by using soap and water. Use a soft cloth for wiping the dirt off the windows. Use a stronger solution only after using a mild solution for cleaning. You can make the solution for cleaning the windows at home also. Add ¼ cup of vinegar, 2 cups of water and ½ teaspoon of soap to get your home-made cleanser ready.

How to clean windows with stubborn stains
Stubborn stains on windows that are caused due to exposure to bird droppings, hard water and other elements can be cleaned by making use of mineral deposit eliminating cleaners like the CLR. Dampen the sponge with the cleaner and rub it on the windows that have stains on them. Then rinse that area with water. You can also spray vinegar on the windows with stains and leave it for some time, before rubbing the stain marks on the window with a cloth or a sponge. You may use both these methods to clean windows with stains and then proceed with regular cleaning.

The other simpler option to clean windows with stains is to make a paste of a cleaner that contains oxalic acid and water, and apply it to the affected area. You can clean the paste with a clean cloth and then wipe the windows normally. Newspaper soaked in water and vinegar can also be used to make your windows sparkle and free from dust, without causing any damage to the glass.