Cleaning your house may sound like the most difficult task in the world. Not wanting to clean may stem from pure laziness or even lack of knowledge, but in any case, these are not excuses for having a dirty home. Thankfully, there are endless cleaning hacks easy, cheap, and handy. These are 30 cleaning hacks that will literally change your life forever.
Windows and mirrors
We’ve all been there— you find yourself going over the same spot that is so stubborn it won’t come off. One clever way that will help you remove those stains is by spraying black tea over your mirror.
Take 3-4 black tea bags, let them steep for about an hour, pour the tea into a spray bottle and spray those dirty windows. Just don’t forget to wipe later with a clean towel.
The dishwasher
If you own a dishwasher, that means you’ve already upgraded our living situation. Even though you’re excited, you do need to remember that even your dishwasher needs a little cleaning from time to time.
All you need is a cup of white vinegar to place on the upper rack of your dishwasher and sprinkle some baking soda on the bottom. Next, run the dishwasher like you usually would with the hot cycle program. This will get it grease and odor free in no time.
The microwave
Whether you’re a big microwave user or not, you must know that it can get grimy from time to time, especially when we forget to place the plate cover when we warm our food. What do you do when you want to clean that heated electronic box?
You take a bowl, fill it with a cup of water and a cup of vinegar and microwave it for two minutes. It will get your microwave all steamed up and will clean it from the inside. Then, just take a towel and wipe off those grimy spots easily.
Washing machine
Your washing machine needs a little scrub from time to time, especially if it’s purpose is to clean your clothes. If you own a top-loading washing machine, here’s what you do.
Start the hot-cycle program, and while it fills with water, add a quart of white vinegar, then add a cup of baking soda. Let it mix around, then open the machine and let the solution rest for an hour. When your hour is up, run another cycle, with just vinegar in order to wash those remainders. It’s worth the trouble.
Cast iron pans
Your iron pan is probably one of the most used kitchen tools you probably own. You can pretty much make everything in there from scrambled eggs to pasta sauce, so it only makes sense that it would get dirty and greasy all so often.
To clean it, all you need is kosher salt, a potato cut in half and vegetable oil. Sprinkle some salt, take the potato with the cut side and place it down on the salted pan and just start scrubbing. Repeat until you get those rusty pans all nice and clean.
Pet hair
Sure, we adore our pets, and they are our best four-legged friends, but we simple cannot stand their hair that just keeps surprising us at every corner of the house. Despite what you might think, getting rid of all of Fido’s fuzz is actually easier than it seems.
Simply take a pair of damp rubber gloves and run them over the piece of furniture, then rinse the gunk off and repeat. You will be surprised how much of your pet’s hair will come off. This trick works best on upholstered furniture.
Paintings
We know what you’re thinking, there’s no way you’ll rub a bagel over your favorite piece of art! But as weird as it may sound you, if you want to keep those paintings clean and dust-free, you can simply take a bagel, cut in half and go over the painting gently.
Later, take a dry towel to remove those breadcrumbs. What do you do with the other half? Put your favorite spread or topping and enjoy it!
Upholstered furniture
Baking soda is known to be an excellent and a very natural neutralizer for all kinds of bad odors, as it acts as an absorbent. Take your upholstered furniture for example, they have a tendency to absorb different smells that can be left off from food being left over, perts or just other human odors.
What you can do is take a nice portion of baking soda, leave it on the piece of furniture and let it sit for a few hours. Later vacuum where you placed the powder and you’ll get nice and fresh furnitures.
Scrub blinds
Blinds are just one of those things in the house we tend to neglect when it comes to cleaning. Since we don’t see the dust clearly, it’s not hard to forget about it. In addition, it can also be a pain to clean them.
If you feel like you are in the mood for cleaning those blinds, you can take a sock, dip it in a bowl that contains equal parts of water and vinegar and start running it over those blinds. Then take the other sock to go over and dry it off.
Toilet
There’s nothing more frightening than having guests coming over and while you remember to get your house all cleaned up and ready for hosting, there’s always one thing you forget about, and that’s cleaning the toilets. Let’s face it, there is nothing more embarrassing than a dirty toilet.
Thankfully, you can take care of it easily with a can of Coke. You take the can, pour it into the toilet and let it stay there for about an hour. After the hour is up, flush the toilet and you’ll get a clean lavatory.
Iron
Whether you are used to ironing on a daily basis, or whether you’re one of those who have one shirt to iron every few months, remember that even your iron needs a little of maintenance every once in a while.
Gunk can build up from the fabric, so if you just run the iron with a sheet of paper that has been sprinkled with some salt, you’ll get an iron that’s as good as new.
Toys
It doesn’t take a crazy parent to want to clean your kids’ toys, whether they are new from the box or whether they have been lying in that box of toys for quite some time. Because when it comes to your kids, you can never be too hygienic.
Instead of washing each toy separately, though, just throw them all into the dishwasher and run a short cycle. Make sure that the material isn’t insubstantial or too weak.
Sponges
Contrary to what some people might think, there’s actually no need to replace or throw away your sponges after each time you clean the house. After all, that can get quite expensive, especially if you’re a neat freak.
If you want to get clean kitchen sponges, you can simply microwave them for a couple of minutes. The steams will kill the microbes and bacteria. Just make sure you put the sponges inside when they are wet before nuking them.
Cabinets
When we cook, a lot of times grease can build up on top of our wooden cabinets and when we let it sit like that for a while, it can turn up looking greasy and nasty.
In order to clean those cabinet doors, you can make your own baking soda paste by mixing a little bit baking soda powder with some vegetable oil to make it a pasty texture. Then, apply the mixture on the doors and rub them gently with a toothbrush. Don’t forget to go over with a towel after you clean them.
Oven
Ovens are everything for anyone who loves to cook and especially bake. However, they do get dirty quite easily and many times, people just give up on cleaning them because it might seem like an impossible task.
It doesn’t have to be such a difficult task, all you need is baking soda, vinegar, water, a bowl to mix it all up an a sponge. Apply the mixture in proper dish on top of the oven rack. Heat up your over for 45 minutes and mop up all that gunk.
Glass lighting fixtures
We’ve already mentioned that owning a dishwasher is seriously a life changer. You can pretty much throw almost anything in that bad boy to get it clean. While it might be odd to consider, your glass ceiling fixtures are actually no exception.
If you don’t feel like climbing up on a ladder in order to clean those dusty fixtures, and who does really, just place them in the dishwasher and you’ll get sparkly glass units in just 30 minutes.
Mattress stains
Just because they are covered with bed sheets, it doesn’t mean your mattress isn’t dirty. In fact, it an get dirtier than you imagine. From sweat to food stains, everything seems to stick to those mattresses.
Besides vacuuming those dust areas, if you want to remove hard stains you can make your own mixture by mixing baking soda, liquid dish soap and hydrogen peroxide and place everything in a spray can. Then, spray the solution on the stained areas and rub them with a towel.
Drying clothes
This cleaning hack isn’t the most direct one, but it certainly can be counted as a way to make your house workload that much easier. How many times have you found yourself in a hurry because you threw your clothes in the dryer at the last minute?
If we had a dollar for every time that happened, we’d just buy an entirely new wardrobe. If you want to speed up that drying process, just throw in a dry towel and it will pretty much soak up that extra moisture.
Blender
The blender is probably one of the most annoying appliances to clean around the kitchen. The good news are that it can literally clean itself, if you know what you’re doing. What to do?
Simple – when you’re done with those mixtures and smoothies, just add warm water and some liquid dish soap and turn on your blender. After a couple of minutes that it’s left to run, you’ll find a clean blender that is ready for another round of drinks.
Faucets
It may sound funny that people want to keep their faucets clean, but if you’re already in the process of cleaning everything else in the crib to make your house sparkly, why not clean those steel faucets as well?
Especially when the procedure is as simple as it gets. Just take a piece of wax paper and go over the water and finger stains and in no time your faucet will be all clean and shiny, like the ones they show in the commercials.
Vacuum rollers
Sometimes it’s the smallest of tips and ideas that can really make a huge change in how your house looks. Take those vacuum rollers for example. They accumulate dust faster than you can imagine, naturally.
If you want to remove hair from the roller brush of your vacuum cleaner, just take a seam ripper to pull those strands of unnecessary hair out. You can also put those cleaner filters inside the dishwasher for even better results. Gosh, dishwashers really can do everything!
Window tracks
How many times have you noticed the dirt that got stuck in those tracks and just completely ignored it because you had no idea how you would clean them? Well, by using this hack, you really won’t need to ignore it any longer.
Before you starts, first clean the dust that is visible with a tooth brush. Then, take a cotton swab to get to those hard-to-reach places. When you’re done, take a clean paper tower that is dipped in vinegar and clean the rest of the dirty area.
Shower head
With this one you can really hit two birds with one stone. When you’re already showering, basically cleaning yourself, you can also take the time to clean that shower head that you probably never thought of.
Simply take a plastic bag and fill it with white vinegar. For an extra spark, add in a couple of lemon drops. Then, tie the plastic bag around the shower head and let it sit for at least 12 hours. Remove the bag and you’ll get a sparkly shower head.
Fan blades
Dusty fan blades are the worst, really. They can get so dusty sometimes, that you might start ignoring them because you can’t be bothered to climb up a ladder to clean them. Then if you turn the fan blades on, all the dust will come flying straight at you.
That’s no bueno, right? What you can do instead is take an old pillowcase and cover a different blade each time and just wipe the dust off straight into the pillowcase.
Tile grout
Tile grouts can easily become dirty, and no, it won’t look some artistic touch that you gave your bathroom. If you want to have you bathroom look clean like when you first saw it, you’ll need 3/4 cups of baking soda mixed with with 1/4 cup of bleach in order to receive a thick paste.
Apply it by using a brush and let it sit for at least 10 minutes. When it’s done sitting, go over more deeply with the brush to get those grouts clean. Next, rinse everything off with clean water.
Coffee grinder
There’s nothing like a good cup of coffee to start off your day with good vibes. But even your coffee grinder needs some cleaning from time to time, to make that coffee taste even better.
You’ll need 1/2 cup of uncooked rice, water and paper towels. Place the rice inside the grinder and grind for a minute. Once you see the rice is pulverized, throw away the rice flour and wipe the grinder out using a paper towel.
Stinky towels
Were you ever surprised by the bad smell that your towels have even after you wash them over and over again? We sure have. The good news are that you can easily get rid of that mildew smell by adding a cup of vinegar into the washer while it’s running on a hot cycle.
If you’re still not happy with the smell, add in a little bit of baking soda. It might sound weird, but trust us, your towels will come out smelling wonderfully.
Stove burner grates
Cooking can be the best and worst experience all at the same time. While it could be fun to cook and try new tastes and things, it can also get very messy, and while it’s part of the process, it can get quite annoying to start cleaning after you.
That grease and spatters of oil all over the place that just won’t come off. If you want to clean those stove burner grates, just place them inside a plastic bag filled with ammonia and put it outside to soak it up for the entire night. The results will be amazing.
The grill
Who knew that cleaning your grill after a good BBQ meal can be so easy? You don’t need to scrap off those left overs that leave your grill all greasy and dirty. All you really need is an onion and a fork.
Stick that fork in an onion that is cut in half and just rub that grill off from all that gunk that was burnt from your previous barbecue session. It’s handy and cheap and it won’t take you long to clean.
Hard to reach spots
The problem with dirt and dust is that it can easily build up in the most annoying and hard-to-reach spots that you might forget even exist. An easy way to remove that unwanted dirt is by simply taking a can of canned air to blow all that dust away.
Once the dust is out and visible, just sweep it off. This way your house will get the best treatment it could possibly get and you’ll be a happier person living in clean home.
Disclaimer: Some photos may be stock images used for illustration purposes only. The people or places in these photos are not to be associated with the article.
