Do DIY Cleaning Products Really Work?

I like to think I hit a healthy medium when it comes to being "green." I drive an SUV (not even a hybrid one), but I get on my husband's case a bit for wasting paper towels and foil. So when it comes to cleaning, I'm all about DIY cleaning products because they're cheap and the ingredients are readily available. The whole "non-toxic" thing is an added bonus. But more important to me is cleanliness. After all, if you're not getting your house clean, does it really matter how much money you're saving?

Somehow, I stumbled onto Melissa Maker's blog over at CleanMySpace.com. And lemme tell ya. This lady knows her stuff. She actually owns a cleaning company in Toronto, but decided to put her expertise on the web where everyone can benefit. I trusted the cleaning maven to tell me that DIY products were the bee's knees, but also wanted to try it out for myself.

The "recipes" she lists on her blog are very straightforward and simple; and I've had a couple of weeks to put them to good use. This is what I made:

All-Purpose Cleanser

1 Tbsp liquid dish soap

8 oz. water

Kitchen Degreaser / Bathroom Scrub (In my bathroom, I actually put this mixture into a dish wand like this one and leave it in my shower. Super simple scrub-downs.)

1 part liquid dish soap

1 part vinegar

Glass Cleaner

1 part vinegar

1 part water
(Update: I switched to straight vinegar and I'm still not 100% impressed. It does a good enough job, but there's another recipe on Pinterest that I'd like to try. One that involves vinegar, rubbing alcohol, and cornstarch. I'm intrigued....)

Disinfectant

1 part rubbing alcohol

1 part water
(Update: I now use straight rubbing alcohol with a couple of drops of essential oil. No water to dilute the disinfecting power.)

I picked up a few spray bottles from the trial-size section of Target and mixed up a few bottles of different cleansers to store in different areas of my house (kitchen and bathrooms). You can add 20-30 drops of essential oils to any one of these to make them smell a little fresher. (I used lavender, rosemary, and mint.) I also made simple masking tape labels with the recipe and usage of each one and stuck them in my various cleaning caddies so they would be easy to grab.

I got the cheapest microfiber cloths at the dollar store (in the car care aisle), but found some great ones at Publix that are much better quality. I even found some cloths with a scouring-pad-type fabric on the back that are great for scraping food particles off my granite counters. The best part about microfiber cloths is the re-usability. Even when I used the scouring cloths to scrape up biscuit dough, it washed right out.

So how did everything work? 

This is how the kitchen degreaser took on the burnt-on, greasy, dusty mess that was my tea kettle:

These are undoctored photos, you guys.

I wish I had taken a before and after picture of the bottom as well, because it looks just as good. And all I used was the Kitchen Degreaser listed above, a non-scratch sponge (the blue ones), an old toothbrush (to get in the crevices), and some elbow grease. I've tried washing this kettle before, but I think the extra power of vinegar really helped cut through the grime. 

Another DIY tip is hydrogen peroxide to get stains out of carpet. It's as simple as it sounds. You just blot/scrub at your stain with a rag soaked in a little hydrogen peroxide and the stain comes right out. No discoloration. No more stain. I WISH I had taken a picture of our carpet because I was flabbergasted at how well it took out my (months-old) stains.

So...what's my verdict on DIY cleaning products? I love them!

They clean just as well as the store-bought stuff and I can be confident that there's nothing in those bottles that I wouldn't mind putting directly on my dog's skin (and she's my baby, so if I'm that confident, you should be, too). They're mad cheap, too.

I'm still on the lookout for a green toilet bowl cleaner that really gets the stains out (our house was vacant for months before we moved in and there's certain rings that just never come out, no matter how hard I scrub). But, if I can save this much money on the rest of my cleaning supplies, maybe I won't feel as bad paying $7 a bottle for the Seventh Generation stuff. Maybe. I'm still my mother's daughter, after all.