{31 Days} Back to Basics Day 10

This month I am participating in the nester’s {31 Days} challenge.
 My topic for the month is Back to Basics.  If you would like to
follow along,  you can find all of my posts here.

Yesterday I talked about chemicals in our cleaning products. 
But, if I don’t use a commercial cleaner, what do I use?  Well, I am glad you asked!  The main things that I use to clean are white
vinegar, lemon juice, salt, and baking soda. 
Imagine; all things that can be found in your kitchen, I use to clean my
house.

I think a lot of people associate the smell of bleach and
other cleaning agents as being “clean.”  I
know that my husband certainly does – he is not a fan of the vinegar
smell.  Unfortunately, a lot of those
smells are the result of phthalates in the cleaning products.  Those phthalates have been widely
acknowledged as endocrine disrupters. 
Endocrine disrupters interfere with the hormone system in mammals.  These endocrine disrupters can cause birth
defects as well as developmental disorders and even cancerous tumors. 

Now, instead of smelling those chemicals, we can change our
thinking in what smells clean.  I know a
lot of people will say that the smell of vinegar is not attractive when
cleaning your house.  But, if it does the
same job, wouldn’t you rather your house smell like salad for a bit rather than
the alternative?

I think that the main issue is that people do not view things as clean if you
are not using a commercial cleaner.  And
perhaps it is not as clean.  But, I think
that sometimes we feel we need to live in a sanitized environment, and that is
not the case.  Obviously we want our
homes to be clean, but to have them sterile is not realistic, and not
healthy.  People should be aware of all
the superbugs that are out there now, which are a direct result of trying to
keep everything so sanitized. 
Antibacterial cleaning agents, instead of killing all germs, have left
some to become more resilient.

When I clean my kitchen, I like to use lemons.  Cleaning in the bathroom we mainly use baking
soda, salt and vinegar.  The salt works
wonderfully to scrub off soap scum or to polish up the sink.  And I think that every time I decide to clean
the bathroom by sprinkling baking soda everywhere and then spraying distilled white
vinegar to get that fun bubbling chemical reaction, my kids run in and want to
help.  I also have a basic all purpose
spray cleaner that I use – and you can find that recipe here.

And some other resources:

Cleaning with lemon juice
Cleaning with vinegar

What do you use to
clean your house?  Have you thought about
changing from commercial cleaners?