Spring Cleaning...in November?

I was reading somewhere recently that 75-90% of dust in your home is made up of dead skin cells.  That's nasty.  What does this have to do with free living, though, you might ask.

Well, our skin is our biggest organ, and it does a bunch of stuff, from keeping bad things out, to helping us eliminate the bad stuff when it sloughs off too.  That's where I get concerned.  While I am actively working to get rid of different harmful chemicals by limiting or even eliminating different chemicals from any kind of consumption, I realized that there is still some in my body due to bio-accumulation.  This is not great, but as time goes on many different chemicals will exit my system and by sloughing off, create the dust that's in our homes. We tend to breathe in that dust, and so those chemicals just cycle through.

Ew.  THIS! Is why I'm cleaning today. This, I'm starting to be convinced, is why in some part, our family gets sick more often in the winter months. This is why I'm starting a transformation of my home routine habits.

Here, I have to make a confession.  I dislike cleaning.  Always have. There was a time in high school where I was super meticulous about how my room looked and hand washed the floors weekly and stuff like that, but it was a control issue.  Even since I've been married, the only times I EVER did a really deep clean was when I was upset (read: angry at something) or when I wanted to surprise my more neat-freak husband. Let me tell you, this wasn't exactly all that often.  My home was presentable, mind you, but not Mariana Trench deep cleaned.

I started cleaning things a bit more when I was pregnant. - Gotta love those hormones that lead to nesting! I washed all of our couch cushion covers by hand. I dusted well. I did as much as my pregnant body could handle.  We even got one of those little green vacuums put out by Bissell.  Okay, so we didn't get the vacuum because I was nesting, it was more because of the Little Mister needing to be potty trained.

So, now, I'm learning to think through my whole routine, not just what goes on or in my body, but what is around my body as well. 

I'm trying to figure out some different tips to share, but maybe that's where you can come in, since I've only recently had this epiphany about cleaning. 
How do YOU keep your house spic and or span?

Some things I'm learning
-when you dust, make sure you vacuum after to make sure all that you've pushed on to the floor gets sucked out
-invest in good dusting cloths instead of just rags or else you might as well not dust at all (except for appearance sake)
-vacuum regularly - it keeps floor dust down
-get a good microfibre dry mop...again with the keeping dust in its place


I clean when I can with two little ones. Sometimes it's when they sleep, other times it's when Hubby is home. I'm learning to take time.

have a clean day!
XO,
Bliss

Editing

So, I've touted different natural things in the last little while. Let me tell you my experience with some of them.

Castille Soap for dishes:
This lasted about 3 or 4 days, as long as it took us to go get conventional dish detergent again. Sadly, though the dishes got clean, there seemed to be a film left on them, which was less than desirable. I looked up many different "cures" for it, but none of them worked for us. Once our bottle of dish detergent runs out, though, we're going to be purchasing a biodegradable version from the natural section of our local Superstore.

Homemade dishwasher soap:
This lasted about a week. I really liked it at first, but then our dishes got a lovely deposit of hard water stains. It was awful. I do think this would work in a place where there wasn't as many minerals in the water. However, if you live near us, don't use this unless you don't mind crazy milky glass. I'm not sure how to rectify this one. Some say put a package of lemon koolaide in with the soap, but I'm skeptical.

homemade laundry soap:
So far, we're still using it. It's getting our clothes clean, but I am noticing that somethings still seem stained. BUT! a caveat: we generally forget to pre-treat things unless they are EXTREMELY dirty. So, my son's clothes have a few food stains on them.


I have to admit I haven't been using our homemade all purpose cleaners all that much. I've used the bathroom spray a few times and it's worked like a charm, but with wiping down my kitchen counters as often as I do, I don't find I need anything else.


Have you tried anything and found it not working, or has exceeded your expectations?


XO,
Bliss