Home made cleaning supplies

Okay, so I have been cleaning houses for a few weeks, now to make a little extra money. I originally got a whole bunch of cleaning supplies, but have since learned that I can make a lot of stuff, myself. Some of it is great, some of it is not as great.

Does anyone make their own cleaning supplies? If so, what do you use and do you love it?

David Sedaris wrote about his gig as a house cleaner in NYC. He said he used a mixture of Bleach and ammonia, which was very effective as long as you kept repeating to yourself

"I want to live, I want to live, I want to live..."

(For the humor impaired: This will not really work and will really kill you. It was a joke. And now back to our genuine cleaning tips)

I use Borax as an alkalinizer. It is awesome for everything.
Baking soda and vinegar.

What are you trying to clean?

I basically clean everything in my house with vinegar/water in a spray bottle, diluted pine-sol in a spray bottle, and Comet.

I also make my own laundry soap, sometimes. It's a huge savings. Goes down to about ten cents a load.

Juniper;636687 wrote:

I basically clean everything in my house with vinegar/water in a spray bottle

::can't think of a good douche joke::

We go to yard sales, especially the big community ones, and buy up all of the left over cleaning supplies for cheap. 1/2 full bottles of name brand cleaning solutions for 50 cent to a dollar, when a full bottle would cost $3-$8. Not bad. Then we top off like cleaning bottles and wallah! We are not strangers to cleaning homes for extra mullah.

It's been noted elsewhere in the Cellar we are pikers. This is just more proof of the same.

I've had good luck with paint thinner getting soap scum off of bathroom tile.

Citra solv is the most absolute dopest of all cleaners.

I have read that cheap vodka was a really good surface cleaner. I would have to look into it more before I could endorse it.

Pete Zicato;636796 wrote:

I've had good luck with paint thinner getting soap scum off of bathroom tile.

I hope you were following the instructions and using in a well ventilated area. Maybe the sparky electric fan will remove those explosive fumes. :eek: White Vinegar works well.

Has anyone attempted to make their own laundry detergent? If so, how were the results and any recommendations on clothes not to use it on or is it pretty versatile? I wear a lot of sweaters in the winter so I don't want to ruin 75% of my winter shirts in one wash.

xoxoxoBruce;636858 wrote:

I hope you were following the instructions and using in a well ventilated area. Maybe the sparky electric fan will remove those explosive fumes. :eek: White Vinegar works well.

yup. Window open and vent fan on.

For my wannabe hardwood floor, I use a third each of white vinegar, alcohol, and water...works pretty well.

piercehawkeye45;636864 wrote:

Has anyone attempted to make their own laundry detergent? If so, how were the results and any recommendations on clothes not to use it on or is it pretty versatile? I wear a lot of sweaters in the winter so I don't want to ruin 75% of my winter shirts in one wash.

Yup. I do. Grate up some kind of bath soap. I usually use Ivory, though most instructions say to use Fels Naptha - it really doesn't matter. You can also just save up bath soap slivers or use whatever is on sale. Dissolve it in 2 quarts of hot water on the stove - but beware - this pot may taste like soap for a while, I found out the hard way by making pasta shortly thereafter. Yuck. I use an old pot now, just for that. Anyway . . . I think then it's 1 cup of Borax and 1 cup of Washing Soda (not baking soda). Mix them all together and let it set up overnight in a bucket (cat litter buckets are good for this). You get a bucket full of weird looking gelatinous glop.

It works fine on everything I've tried so far, but it does work better if you dissolve it first in warm water then add the clothes. Which I guess is how you're supposed to do the wash anyway.

Does it really work out to be cheaper? I don't know what borax goes for these days, or what washing soda goes for. The washing soda sounds like a special order item and sounds fairly expensive. And bars of bath soap aren't free.

Vinegar is a lot cheaper than a bottle of spray cleaner. You can get a gallon of white vinegar for a couple of bucks, and clorox bathroom cleaner will cost maybe 5 bucks for a small bottle. So there's savings there, but some of these things sound like a lot of work for little savings.

The article I got a recipe from compared the price to $0.0225 per load with homemade versus $0.20 a load with Tide. So its around ten times as cheap.

Thanks Juniper.

Here is a link for you to get all you need in one shot.
Bet it isn't as cheap, but there is the convenience factor.

Washing soda is no big deal. You can find it in the aisle with the rest of the laundry stuff. Borax too. I figured it out using what I paid, and I think with the original fels-naptha soap it came up to less than 5 cents a load compared to 25-30 for store brand detergent. Which does add up over time.

I make a very similar detergent, Juni. Then, I use a small amount of that detergent and mix it with a little washing soda, hot water, some drops of tea tree oil and some drops of eucalyptus essential oil. This makes a really nice all-purpose cleaner that I use in everything from bathrooms to kitchen counters.

Here's an article geared toward trimming the household supply budget, including tips on making your own cleaning supplies, from The Simple Dollar:

http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2010/01/21/trimming-the-average-budget-housekeeping-supplies/

I'm LOVING The Simple Dollar--it's a great blog full of wise advice for finances and general self-realization.