Keeping a household clean is no small feat, no matter how big a space you live in. Even if you keep up with cleaning every week, the mess always seems like too much to handle with what little time you have for it.
While it may seem like a daunting task to keep your home tidy, there are a few tricks that will greatly shorten the time and effort you put into it. Instead of spending hours of your precious time cleaning the old-fashioned way, try these absolutely genius time and money saving house cleaning hacks for every area of your home.
These are guaranteed to work, so you’ll have more time to spend on what’s important.
Keep Your Garbage Disposal Smelling Fresh And Working Right
Garbage disposals are heaven-sent, especially when you have a big family to feed and you don’t want all of the leftover food scraps stinking up the trash can. But eventually, your garbage disposal can start smelling too, and you can’t just take it out to the bins outside.
Cut up a lemon into a few thick slices and add a few ice cubes. Then, run them through the garbage disposal, and watch the smell disappear.
Get Grease Stains Out Of Your Carpets With Baking Soda
It’s expensive to hire a carpet-cleaning service, but with young kids or pets around, those grease and dirt stains can quickly take over what used to be a nice, clean floor.
Instead of shelling out hundreds, sprinkle your whole carpet with baking soda and let it sit for an hour or two. Then, vacuum it all up. It will soak up grease and your vacuum will easily pull everything out of the carpet.
Clean Your Toilet With Kool-Aid
Even if you don’t drink it yourself, having some packs of Kool-Aid around can really come in hand for cleaning your toilet.
Simply pour in a pack (any flavor works, though we like lemon best), brush it all around the bowl, and leave it overnight to soak. The citric acid actually breaks down mineral deposits and bacteria.
Make Yourself A Lost-And-Found Bin
No matter how many times you pick up after your kids, their toys always seem to be strewn all over the floor. Instead of putting each one back in its place, here’s a much easier way and all you’ll need is a laundry basket.
Use the basket as a lost-and-found and throw any and all toys found not in their places right into it. Once a week, get your kids to go through the box and put everybody back in their homes.
Get Finger Prints Off Of Your Stainless Steel
All of the members of your household get hungry throughout the day, and depending on how much each one of them eats, you can bet that there are hands grabbing the handles and doors every few hours.
To get all of those fingerprints off of your stainless steel refrigerator and other appliances, is all you need is a soft cloth with a little rubbing alcohol. One wipe should do it and the fingerprints are gone (the fridge is disinfected too).
Add Dryer Sheets At The Bottom Of The Diaper Pail To Keep The Smell At Bay
A few days’ worth of dirty diapers stacked on top of each other is eventually going to start smelling awful, there’s not much anyone can do about that.
However, adding 2-3 clean dryer sheets at the bottom of the pail, beneath the bag, will allow you to go a few more days without taking the bag out to the trash.
Get Sticker Residue Off Of Bottles
It’s a great initiative to try reusing glass and plastic containers you bought, instead of throwing them out. But it’s hard to get the sticker residue from the labels off of them.
Once you’ve peeled the sticker, rub some mayonnaise around the bottle to cover all of the residue. Wait 5 minutes, and then gently rub off with a cloth and it will come off easily.
Reduce Clothes Drying Time Significantly With A Towel
Not only does your dryer have a heavy hand in raising your electric bill, but it also takes quite a bit of time to dry large loads of clothing.
Save yourself tons of waiting time by adding an already-dry towel to the load of wet clothes. It will help absorb a lot of the moisture and therefore shorten the drying time significantly. You’ll pay less for electricity and you’ll be able to get the next load in there a lot faster. It’s a win-win!
Clean Hard To Reach Fan Blades With A Pillow Case
Just because we can’t see the tops of our ceiling fan blades, doesn’t mean we should ignore them. The blades of high ceiling fans collect mountains of dirt and dust, which gets blown around the room and breathed in every time you turn them on.
Keep your lungs (and your furniture) safe and clean by swinging a pillowcase over the fan blade and pulling it through to wipe off all the dust in one go.
Remove Mold While You Sleep With This Bleach Hack
Mold is both ugly and dangerous, and can easily grow in places around your house that don’t get enough ventilation (like the bathroom or the attic). But instead of scrubbing with dangerous chemicals, use this hack to do the work for you while you sleep.
Soak some cotton balls in bleach and set them down in the moldy spot overnight. When you wake up, the mold will be dead and you can easily wipe off any residue that’s left.
Clean Out Your Drain With Only A Wire Hanger
If you don’t own a professional drain snake, but you do own a wire clothes hanger, you’ll be able to clean out a clogged drain just as easily.
Simply straighten out the wire hanger leaving a small hook at one of the ends. Once you’ve got it deep in your drain, give it a few twists and pull it out. You’ll get a good amount of hair clumps and grime.
Get Rid Of Glitter With A Lint Roller
Glitter is the common enemy of every person who loves to do arts and crafts. It may look pretty, but it gets absolutely everywhere and seems to stay forever.
A clean lint roller will pick up glitter from any surface, carpet, bedspreads, hardwood, etc. So you never have to find little flecks of it months after the art project was completed.
Get Bits Of Old Food Out Of Your Cheese Grater With A Potato
It seems impossible to fully clean out your cheese grater, especially that side with the tiny little holes. But fret not!
After you’ve given it your best shot at cleaning, grate a potato on each side for a minute of so. You’ll see all of the extra bits of food slide right out. Rinse it once more when you’re done.
Freshen Up Your Smelly Fridge With Newspaper
Maybe you’ve left some food in your fridge for a little too long, or you had some smelly cheese that stank up the whole machine. Either way, getting smells out of the fridge is easier said than done…unless you use a newspaper.
Crumple up a few pieces of newspaper and leave them in your closed refrigerator. The paper will absorb any lingering smells, leaving it fresh.
Clean Up Broken Glass With A Soft Piece Of Bread
Accidents happen, but some accidents are more dangerous than others. So if someone knocks over a glass flower pot or coffee mug, it’s important to make sure you’ve cleaned up all the tiny pieces completely.
Use a soft piece of bread to press down onto the area with the glass shatters, and they will all get picked up. This is a more complete method than just sweeping the area.
Get Your Cast Iron Pans Looking Like New With A Potato
Cooking with cast iron pans is not only healthy, but it’s also safer than using non-stick pans (especially those with harmful coatings and chemicals). But if you happen to burn your food, getting it clean can be a nightmare.
Sprinkle some coarse salt on the bottom of the pan, and then used a halved potato as your “sponge” to scrape off some of the residue. Then, season the pan with cooking oil, and stick it in a preheated oven for about an hour.
Don’t Scrub Your Microwave, Steam-Clean It Instead
Microwaves are the best friends of anyone trying to warm up yesterday’s leftovers and get them on the table quickly. But using them so often means they get dirty, fast.
Instead of scrubbing away at all the dried on food, stick a microwave-safe glass bowl full of white vinegar in there on high for 3 minutes and watch the old food come right off with a single wipe.
Use Flour To Quickly Clean Up Spills
Have you ever tried cleaning up a gallon of spilled milk? The liquid seems to spread faster than your paper towels can absorb.
Instead of using massive amounts of paper, quickly sprinkle flour on top of the spill. It will soak everything up, without letting it spread to other areas of the floor. And then you can sweep the solid flour into the dustpan easily.
Swap The Swiffer Sweeper Pads For Fuzzy Socks
For anyone who owns a Swiffer Sweeper, you know it’s a great tool for hassle-free, quick mopping. But those pads cost a pretty penny and seem to run out pretty quickly.
Instead, go for some cheap fuzzy socks and stretch them over your Swiffer, just like you would an official pad. They work exactly the same, and they can be washed and reused a few times as well.
Ditch The Windex For Black Tea
If you’re looking to get rid of harmful cleaning agents but still want nice, clean windows and mirrors, go for black tea instead.
Boil water and add a few teabags. Once they’ve steeped for a few minutes, you can wipe down glass surfaces with a soft cloth soaked in the tea. It will even be less streaky than typical glass cleaners.
Get Crayon Off The Walls Safely With A Baking Soda Solution
We all want our children to be artists…that is, until they decide your wall is their canvas. Getting crayon marks off the wall can be tricky, as they are oil based and the grease tends to stain the paint on the wall.
Use a solution of baking soda and water to suck out the grease and completely clean the marks.
Remove Water Rings From Your Wooden Tables
Even if you provide coasters for your guests, not all of them will remember to use them. A cold drinks on your wooden coffee table will almost certainly lead to ugly water rings that seem impossible to get out.
But what these stains are, really, are just liquid trapped in the wood. Use a blow dryer on low heat to evaporate them water and make the rings disappear.
Salvage your Car’s Upholstery Underneath The Car Seat
Have you ever taken your child’s car seat out and seen what your car’s cloth upholstery looks like after years of spilled juice and crushed up Cheerios? It’s not a pretty sight.
But never fear. You can use club soda to completely restore your car’s fabric seats. Spray it on, wait a few minutes, and wipe all of the dirt away with a soft towel.
Dust Your Blinds By Hand With A Sock
It takes forever to go blind by blind and dust each surface, but blinds collect so much dust that a clean house isn’t possible without clean blinds.
Instead of trying to manuever a feature duster or mop in between each blind, just put a fuzzy sock on your hand like a glove and swipe over each blind. It’s super quick and you can actually grab the dust in your hand so it doesn’t fly all over the place.
Uncloud Your Clean Glasses With White Vinegar
There’s nothing more frustrating than taking your clean glasses out of the dishwasher only to see them looking opaque, cloudy, and dirtier than before.
Add a cup of white vinegar to a bucket of water and let your cloudy dish ware soak for 10 minutes. When you take them out, they will be crystal clear.
Clean Your Cutting Boards With A Lemon
Both plastic and wooden cutting boards tend to absorb a lot of food residue the longer you use them for, and washing them alone doesn’t get all of it out.
Instead, sprinkle some coarse salt all over it, and scrub it with a halved lemon. Let the lemon and salt solution sit for 30 minutes, and rinse it all off.
Gather Up Small Toys With A Dustpan
Toys that have many small pieces (like Legos, for example) can be a huge pain to pick up from the floor.
Instead of picking them up one by one (and inevitably stepping on a few in the process), use a big dustpan to sweep them all up in and then dump them all out back into their box, all in one go.
Bulk-Clean Plastic Toys In The Dishwasher
Toys belonging to your kids and/or pets are some of the dirtiest items you have in your house, between the chewing and throwing onto the floor and collecting dust. But cleaning them one by one can take forever.
Instead, load up a dishwasher full of toys (make sure they are safe to put in there), and run a wash. Instant clean toys with almost no effort.
Freshen Up Your Mattress With This Baking Soda Hack
Even you if use a mattress cover and fitted sheets, your mattress still gets a little musty after years of use.
Mix together some baking soda with a couple drops of your favorite essential oil (lavender is great for sleep support). Sprinkle it all over your mattress and leave it for an hour or two. Then, just vacuum it up along with all the impurities it has soaked up.
Use A Toy Rotation System To Keep The Clutter Down
This is a win-win for you if you happen to have young children. Rotate your child’s toys so that they only have access to a few of them at a time.
This way, it won’t be possible to take up your entire floor with hundreds of toys, and your kids won’t get bored of all of their stuff. By rotating the toys they can play with, each week they get something “new”.
