It Isn't Easy Being Green

So just the other day we ran out of everything. You know, the moment when you realize you need laundry detergent, dish soap, toilet bowl cleaner, bath tub cleaner, and all purpose cleaner? It sucks because you know you need it but it's going to break the bank. Then I got to thinking (watch out) and I asked myself, "why do we need so many different cleaners when they are all supposed to...wait for it...clean things?" And is it normal to want to fumigate the house after you clean the tub? I don't think so. So before we went out to go buy 5 or more different cleaners I did a little research and prioritizing. I've been wanting to simplify and downsize a lot of things in our life so I figured now would be a really great time to try and start the process.

First I made a sort of head count of what needs cleaned in our house and what we currently use to clean it and then decided what part of that I could/should/wanted to change.

Here is a small rundown:

Bathrooms: 

Scrubbing Bubbles Bath and Tub Cleaner

Lysol Toilet Bowl Cleaner

Homemade mixture of Lavender Pledge + water in spray bottle for counters

Windex for mirrors

Kitchen:

Homemade mixture of Lavender Pledge + water in spray bottle for counters/cabinets

Homemade mixture of vinegar + water in spray bottle for floors/appliances

Bar Keepers Friend for the sink

Living Room:

Homemade mixture of vinegar + water with reusable cloth to mop wood floors

Swiffer with scented Swiffer pads to sweep

Swiffer duster with spray 

Laundry Room:

Variety of detergents (usually whatever is on sale)

Dryer Sheets (usually walmart brand)

As you can tell we kind of sort of already started a little bit of homemade cleaning supplies with our spray bottle concoctions. But I still felt like we were getting cleaners that were too specialized, cleaning products that were redundant and plus we weren't really thinking eco-friendly thoughts when purchasing certain cleaners (whether it be the ingredients and/or the packaging). So finally, off to the store we went. I had this idea of starting off with using Seventh Generation products. I had read great things about them online and I was ready to justify a little pricier item for a safer environment for our house. Until I actually saw the price tags. Seriously a 50 oz bottle of laundry detergent (which is the same size we usually get on sale that typically runs around $5) was $16! That's crazy! Their handheld cleaners run anywhere from $4-$10 more than others. Now I'm not saying they aren't worth it and they aren't great for the environment and that if you can afford it then great go with eco-friendly convenience in a bottle. I will say that I think companies try and sucker some people in to the 'eco-friendly' phase we are all in and price things higher but sell it by pulling on our mother earth conscience. ANWAYS, that's my rant. 

We ended up picking up Mrs. Meyer's for our new bathroom cleaner to replace the scrubby bubbles and it's lavender scented so it will also replace the pledge + water concoction we were using for the counters. I'm going to start using the same vinegar + water mixture we use for the floors for our mirrors and cabinets because did you know you could use vinegar + water for almost anything? We also picked up Clorox 'green works' toilet bowl cleaner. Both of these items are 99% naturally derived   and both contain citric acid, water and essential oils - the toilet cleaner has a thickening agent which I'm sure is what helps it stick to the sides of the bowl longer in order to clean it better. This is why I don't think we could use all purpose cleaner to clean the inside of our toilets so that's why we will have two cleaners for the bathroom. Next item, laundry detergent. 

Instead of going broke trying to clean our house and our clothes I remembered a post I had seen a while ago about how to make your own laundry detergent that just so happened to also be eco-friendly.  It needed three ingredients (all of which we picked up for around $15) and would make 5 batches with 40+ loads per batch. We also needed to get a container to put the detergent in once we had it all mixed (we are now using powder detergent instead of liquid). 

Here is a shot of all of the ingredients plus the bottle of detergent we just finished up. 

All you have to do is grate one bar of soap per batch (these soaps were $1.07 and smell nice and lemony and say they are extra stain booster to laundry loads, but you can use any bar of soap). 

Then mix in one cup of Borax and one cup of the Super Washing Soda. This only requires one tablespoon per load so I dropped in an old measuring spoon so we wouldn't use too much. 

The photo above is with only one batch made up, I still have four bars that I can grate to add to it. But with all the batches combined that gets us 200+ loads. I did the math on our average loads and that will get us through an entire year. That not only saves us around .8 cents per load, but it also saves us 4 additional trips to the store, nice! These products are also super eco-friendly (without even trying) - their boxes are recycled paper and they only include one ingredient each. The box of Borax also has a huge list of other things you can use it for. I also did a small load of laundry just for you guys so I can see if only one tablespoon can do the trick (really, we were using a capful of the liquid, maybe a half cup, before). So the verdict is in and....

...the clothes are clean! The lemon scent is gone, but what's left is just a nice 'clean' smell. 

So I think this is just the beginning and there might be some tweaking here and there with what we end up liking or what ends up not working well. We also still need to figure out our dusting/swiffer/sweeping issue...But I think this is a good start...I'll keep you updated.