Baking soda: clean and green!
No matter how you feel about global warming or climate change, there is no good reason to damage the planet or the environment, especially if it is avoidable.
There is no time like the present to implement new methods around the house for cleaning and saving energy. The good news is that by being more Earth friendly, you will most likely be more pocket-book friendly.
So lets clean and green cheap! There are many alternative cleaning solutions you can create at home that are cheaper than the store-bought versions we have used our whole lives and are much easier on the environment. If you, like millions of other Americans, experience “green guilt” when you unleash toxic chemicals into your home’s atmosphere, read on.
First a big disclaimer: do not mix chemicals unless you are sure they are harmless together! I once spent the evening hooked up to an oxygen machine at Edmond Medical Center because nobody ever told me this. In my case, it was an ugly, stained toilet that inspired me to mix up a deadly cleaning cocktail of bleach and toilet bowl cleaner. When my lips turned purple and I started seeing three filthy toilets where once there was one, I knew something was amiss.
That said, let’s talk baking soda. What other natural chemical compound is gentle enough that you can brush your teeth with it but strong enough that you can scrub your toilet bowl with it? I mean, I guess you could scrub your toilet bowl with toothpaste, but forget about brushing your teeth with toilet bowl cleaner.
Baking soda is a great alternative cleaning agent that kills odors, is environmentally friendly and easy on your allergies and chemical sensitivities, and costs about 70 cents a box. In the book, “How Clean Is Your House,” Aggie MacKenzie shares her recipe for a winning baking soda scouring mix. She adds a little bleach to the baking soda, just enough to form a paste.
Bleach is not as environmentally benign as baking soda, so you can substitute vinegar or lemon juice if you want to avoid the bleach.
Baking soda cleans, deodorizes, scours, polishes, removes stains and softens fabrics. It can be used on practically every surface, and it even has qualities that whiten and brighten your teeth. You can mix some baking soda with lemon juice, and it will remove stains from plastic and rubber utensils. A scrub brush dipped in baking soda removes black scuff marks from your floors.
Baking soda even helps prevent clogs in your drains. You can pour a half cup of it down the drain alone or mixed with some white vinegar to clean it and keep the drain smelling fresh. Be sure and rinse it down with hot water.
And, as many of us have known for years, an open box of baking soda in your refrigerator absorbs odors for several months. When it’s no longer working in the fridge, use it for your other household cleaning tasks.
Here are a few more handy uses for baking soda around the house:
Mix a little with water and wash your fruits and veggies with it.
Let it eat through any oily mess, such as the oil in a cruet, by shaking baking soda inside it and rinsing.
Sprinkle it in your trash can to remove trashy odors.
A paste of baking soda and bleach will clean the grout on your bathtub tiles and floor tiles alike.
Put some in the cat’s litter box to remove odors.
Mix it with water to shine your silverware.
Sprinkle baking soda down the garbage disposal to kill odors from last night’s dinner.
Use baking soda to coat a pan that has baked-on grime, and witness a miracle 15 minutes later.
OK, you get it. There might be millions of uses for baking soda. If you can dream it, baking soda can probably do it.
For more ideas for using baking soda as a cleaner, check out these Web sites: www.greenlivingtips.com and www.wackyuses.com.
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