1 teaspoon Borax ½ tsp washing soda 2 tablespoons white vinegar or lemon juice 1 liquid soap (vegetable oil based if possible)
Combine with 2 cups very hot water and use in a spray bottle. If you want a bucketful, use 1/8 cup each of borax, washing soda, and vinegar and combine with 1 tablespoon liquid soap and 2 gallons of water.
To make a better grease cutter, double the vinegar.
I use this mixture for everything, even floors. Washing soda can be slightly caustic so use rubber gloves if you will get any on your skin.
The very best scrubber I've used is Baking Soda. You can use it on just about anything, and it absorbs odors. If you don't like the results after using it, you didn't use enough. It's also great for removing chemical smells. For instance, if you've used a carpet cleaner on a spot and it still smells, douse the area with baking soda until it's totally white and leave it 24 hours then vacumn. The smell is gone.
One of the best all-purpose carpet spot cleaners is club soda! Just rub it into the spot and clean it up with a sponge. For a really tough stain try club soda and sprinkle salt on the soda. Wait a few minutes and then wipe up with a damp sponge.
Window Cleaner
½ teaspoon liquid soap (vegetable-oil based soap recommended) 3 tablespoons vinegar or lemon juice 2 cups of water spray bottle
Mix together and use! This is my favorite window cleaner. Though I love the smell of lemon juice, if I'm not going to use this up quickly I use vinegar because the lemon juice can go rancid within a week or so. For my particularly gukky windows after we built our home, I made a paste of this with cornstarch and rubbed the windows with the paste and continued to wipe until the window was absolutely spotless. Beautiful results!
If you have mineral buildup on your glass, use 1 teaspoon alum (spice aisle in grocery stores) 1/4 cup vinegar or lemon juice, saturate a wipe with the mixture and rub it on the stain. Works great!
I have heard that club soda is another great cleaner. Some people use it on their floors for a brilliant shine. I was going to try that on my shower stall this morning but realized I had none. However, I did have 7up and put that in a spray bottle and spritzed my shower walls. With only a green scrubber (one for use on Teflon) I simply wiped the walls and the built up residue came right off easily! I have had family try several commercial cleaners to get that stuff off when I wasn't going to be home for a few days. Nothing worked until now. I then used it on the fingerprints on my fridge and they came right off too! I'll definitely use it again.
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