Essential oils are the key to these sweet-smelling (and highly effective!) homemade cleaners.
If you get light-headed just reading the ingredients on your cleaning products, take heart: There’s another way. These make-in-minutes, super-cheap recipes create potions that use sweet-smelling essential oils that won’t fumigate your home, while having superpowers to fight grime and bacteria.
And much like a food recipe you may try, you can modify the oils to suit your own olfactory senses.
Citrusy All-Purpose Cleaner
Why Use Filtered Water?
It doesn’t leave a residue like regular tap water can. Distilled works, too. filtered water Funnel all these ingredients into a spray bottle, seal, and gently shake. There’ll be a battle of odors here, with the acidic vinegar likely winning out against the sweet-smelling oils, but don’t let this deter you.
The vinegar scent disappears quickly, but that citrusy, herby zing lingers on. And these oils aren’t just there for their scent alone. Lemon oil is a natural disinfectant, orange oil busts grease, and rosemary oil has some antibacterial and antiseptic qualities.
Lemon-Scented Window Cleaner
Mix all these ingredients in a Invest in Dark Glass Spray Bottles It’ll protect the oils from breaking down. Plus, plastic bottles can leach chemicals into your potions.
spray bottle. Spray on any glass surface and polish in with a microfiber cloth. You’ll have sparkling panes and mirrors in no time, and that wondrous essential oil of lemon will kill off the bacteria left behind by mucky fingerprints.
Eucalyptus Toilet Bowl Cleaner
Fill a squeeze bottle with the water, baking soda, and eucalyptus oil. Aside from having a deliciously fresh aroma, eucalyptus is a natural germicide. Seal the bottle and shake. Next, add the Castile soap. Shake again. Squeeze around the bowl. Leave for 15 minutes, then scrub with a toilet brush, flush, and you’re done.
Lavender-Thyme Dish Cleaner
This one does require some stovetop time: Bring the water to a boil, then mix in the oils (thyme and tea tree goes to war on salmonella while emitting a pleasant aroma along with lavender). Add the rest of the ingredients slowly, and remove from heat and allow to cool. Once cooled, pour into a squeeze bottle. Shake gently before using.
Peppermint-Lavender Floor Cleaner
Pour the vinegar into a bucket, fill that bucket up with hot water and add the oils. Works on stone, tile, and wooden floors. Not only is peppermint oil anti-bacterial, many believe it can deter mice and other pests.
Tea tree oil is antibacterial, an antiseptic, and antifungal. And, not only is lavender oil antibacterial, its aroma has soothing properties to calm your whole household.
Lavender Linen Spray
Fill a spray bottle with the witch hazel and lavender, shake, top up with water, shake again, and spray. Cinnamon and Sandalwood Air Freshener
A spritz of this subtle-but-effective scent erases stinks in seconds. Fill a spray bottle with the water and the oils. Cinnamon scent boosts brain power and sandalwood is calming, perfect for a hardworking, stressed out home!
Essential oils do mix, so if any of the scents in these recipes don’t appeal, you can play around with other oils. Just keep the quantities the same. So if you switched sandalwood for essential oil of orange in this air freshener, stick to the 10 drops specified in the recipe.
Visit HouseLogic.com for more articles like this. Reprinted from HouseLogic.com with permission of the NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF REALTORS®.
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