There’s been a big global consciousness that’s been growing within society that made people more aware of their environmental footprints. They are starting to realize that their individual actions have a lot of effects on the health of our environment.
This is the reason people are making the switch to a more eco-friendly lifestyle.
With that said, one of the simplest yet most effective changes you can make in your lifestyle is changing the way you clean your home. You don’t have to incorporate any fancy techniques to start becoming more eco-friendly when cleaning.
Below are eight simple and eco-friendly cleaning tips you can try to help you start creating a more sustainable home.
Start with the basics
To be able to clean your home sustainably, you should start by using eco-friendly cleaning products.
That doesn’t mean that you should buy commercial cleaning products that advertise themselves as being green. Why buy something that you can make yourself with everyday household items?
If you start creating your cleaning solutions, you’ll find that natural cleaning solutions use the same types of ingredients all the time. Therefore, you only need to keep certain ingredients in your home.
Baking soda is an all-purpose cleaner that you should keep. White vinegar, lemon, hydrogen peroxide, borax, and some rock salt are also great natural ingredients. You can use these to concoct your all-natural, eco-friendly, and even homemade cleaning solution.
Quit using air fresheners
If you want your home to smell nice while at the same time live sustainably, then you need to quit using air fresheners to do it.
There are plenty of other alternatives out there that will still leave your home smelling fantastic. One way to leave your room smelling awesome without adding more chemicals from air fresheners into it is by making your own potpourri.
Cinnamon and orange is a scent combination that works well so you can try that out. When you use potpourri to create an aromatic home, it also has the additional perk of giving you a cute decor piece.
According to Maid Sailors, baking soda also makes for a great alternative air freshener for small storage spaces like cabinets or cupboards. Put baking soda in a jar and your scent of choice.
Remove mold and mildew naturally
For harder to remove stains, you might be tempted to go back to the old ways and start relying on harsh chemicals to get rid of mold and mildew quickly.
However, other natural alternatives can give you results the same way as these harsh chemicals will.
All you need to do is soak the ones that are infected by mold and mildew with white vinegar. Wait a few moments to let it seep through, and then use good old elbow grease and scrub away at it to get rid of it.
If it didn’t work for you, then you make a cleaning scrub out of baking soda and water. Apply it on the parts that have mold and mildew and then scrub, scrub, scrub away until it’s gone.
Use vinegar as an all-purpose cleaner
Again, as mentioned before, there are plenty of ways you can keep a clean home, and one of them is by using natural cleaners.
All of these cleaning solutions can be made with simple household items. One of the things you can use for a variety of cleaning problems is white vinegar.
You can put it in a spray bottle, spray it on your windows, and use old newspapers to help wipe them. You can use it to soak household items that you want to disinfect. Mixing vinegar and water can also make for a great floor cleaning solution that you can use when you’re mopping.
The versatility of white vinegar as a cleaning product is definitely one of the top reasons you should keep some at home at all times.
Keep your metals shiny and spotless with lemon
Aside from helping you create a cleaner home, some of the natural ingredients listed above can also help you polish up your cutlery.
With lemon, you don’t only get a deodorizing agent and a brightening solution. You are also able to use it with metals (stainless steel or chrome, in particular) like spoons, forks, knives and help polish them up to be shiny.
You can even use them on a variety of metal fixtures in the home that need a good polishing up. All you need is half a slice of lemon and salt fixed in the pulp. Use the abrasive surface to polish the metal. Rinse it off after buffing, and then wipe it away with a soft cloth and you’ll find a shine that will make it look good as new.
Try commercial green cleaning products
If push comes to shove and you really can’t be bothered to go through Pinterest to find the perfect formula for the cleaning solution that you want, then you can consider using commercial green cleaning products instead.
Although homemade cleaning solutions are good enough — they can get the job done and at the same time are usually cheaper than commercial green cleaning products. They usually need more effort on your part to get the job to a hundred percent.
If you do your research right, then you can find a green cleaning product that is true and is actually eco-friendly. Once you find one, then you can use it as a quick solution to shifting towards sustainable and eco-friendly cleaning.
Ditch wasteful paper towels
A lot of homes think of paper towels as staple household items. But if you want it to be more sustainable, then you have to reduce the unnecessary waste that you are making.
One of the wasteful practices that you have is keeping paper towels in your home to clean up spills and messes. You can instead use towels or used cloths to wipe away these spills and messes you find in your household.
You won’t have to throw them away after each use, unlike paper towels. Instead, you can throw them in the wash and replace them with another one, so you’re not always throwing away paper.
You can even recycle old shirts and create rags out of them by cutting them out into pieces and using them to replace paper towels.
Try green dry cleaning methods
Dry cleaning methods aren’t the most eco-friendly methods to do because it involves the use of Perchloroethylene or Perc for short.
It’s an industrial-level strength solvent that is not safe for nature and is hazardous to people’s health.
There are other alternatives to the usual dry cleaning methods that don’t damage your health as well as the health of the environment. You can use liquid carbon dioxide cleaning, which is what you use as a solvent alongside a detergent. Another alternative is the use of wet cleaning methods instead.
Wet cleaning is when you use water and mild detergents to help you clean your clothes. Both of these options aren’t toxic to humans and are not bad for the environment.
Wrap up
With these eight cleaning tips that you can try out for your home, you are making huge leaps towards a more sustainable lifestyle. A sustainable lifestyle is not only good for the environment, but it also benefits your overall health. So, making the shift towards sustainability is always a good idea.