10 Tough Cleaning Solutions

It's that time of year when many of you are starting to work on your spring cleaning lists. I recently took an unscientific poll of my friends to gather up some of their most dreaded chores around the house. Boy did they have some tough ones! Lucky for you and for them, I've rounded up all the solutions here in one place.

1. Cleaning Baseboards

These seem to be one of the worst places in the house to collect dust and grime and for those with bad backs, one of the hardest to clean. I've found a great solution! If you have a Swiffer mop, it becomes an easy task.

I attached a Clorox wipe (since I didn't have any Swiffer wet cloths on hand) to the mop and wiped down the baseboards to get of the really tough grime. Then followed up by attaching a dryer sheet to the Swiffer mop and wiped them down again. This gets off the remaining dust and is supposed to help repel dust.

It takes some time to do all the baseboards but was much easier than the bucket and rag that I used to do.You can do this with out the Swiffer mop too, just use the wipes and dryer sheets by themselves.

2. Cleaning Candles

Candles are another place in the house that collect all kinds of dust and seem impossible to clean. There is a quick and easy way to get all the gross stuff off of them. If you have an old pair of pantyhose or knee highs, go ahead and grab them.

Take your dirty candle and gently rub the pantyhose across the candle to remove the dust and dirt. Be careful not to break the wick. A bit of mine broke off but it was just the excess burnt part at the top. You'll be left with a super dirty pair of pantyhose and a nice clean candle! Plus all that black mess on the glass was easy to wipe off too!

3. Cleaning Grout

There are a few great solutions for cleaning dirty grout. My favorite way and probably the best solution I have to getting it sparkling clean is Clorox Clean-up with Bleach. You just spray it on, let it sit for a few minutes and the rinse it off. It works like magic. Just be sure to wear something you don't mind getting bleach on - that's how I ended up bleaching my husband's black sweatshirt! I didn't tell him I was borrowing it when I did it either!

Another of my favorite methods is Comet or Bar Keepers Friend both in the powdered form. You can make a nice paste out of them and scrub it into the parts of the grout that need cleaning. Then rinse it off. You just have to be sure to rinse really well to get all of the paste off.

4. Removing Mildew

After a damp winter, it's very common to find mildew and mold along windows and walls, as well as in stored clothing and bathrooms.

Thrifty Living gives great solutions for how to remove mold and mildew from just about every situation.

If you have mildew on your curtains or other fabric, DIY Life offers a variety of solutions to remove it.

5. Cleaning Linoleum

Linoleum is a bear to get clean, especially if you have a white or light colored floor. It seems that all the little grooves seem to pick up dirt and never let it go. The best solution I've used for this is Awesome Orange cleaner from the Dollar Store. I mixed up a big bucket in warm water following the directions and mopped the floor in small sections. Then used a plastic scrub brush (also from the Dollar Store) to scrub those sections clean. I followed this by rinsing the floor with water and then used Pledge Floor Care Finish to seal it all up. The floors have stayed much, much cleaner and I have only had to do light moppings since.

6. Cleaning & Restoring Leather Furniture

I love the look and feel of leather furniture. I dream of having an office in my house with all my bookcases and some nice leather chairs to read on. Oh it would be nice! But cleaning them, that's a whole other story. If something spilled on them, it's not like you can just pick up the chair and take it in to the dry cleaners. 


If your leather furniture is showing signs of wear and age, you will love what The Boatwright Family shows us how to do.

And for a general guide on cleaning all sorts of stains on leather check out How to Clean Stuff.

7. Removing the Toilet Ring

The dreaded toilet ring! So unsightly and to matter how much scrubbing you do with the toilet brush, it just won't come out. Well there is a simple, chemical-free solution - Pumie Scouring Stick. I can usually find it at Walmart in the cleaning department.

This stick is amazing! It scrubs away hard water stains on porcelain without scratching or damaging the surface. You can also use it on sinks, tubs and so many household things.

8. Cleaning Stove Burners

This is an amazing trick! To get your stove burners nice and clean, Easy Off Oven Cleaner is your best friend. Be sure to use gloves and then spray your stove top and burners with Easy Off. Follow the directions on the package as far as how long to leave it on your stove. Then rinse. It may take a bit of scrubbing to get the tough parts off but in the end, you will have a sparkling clean stove.

9. Household Drains

It seems to be a regular occurrence that the drains in my bathroom get backed up. I swear I lose more hair in a day than my sister's cats but somehow still seem to have SO MUCH hair! We always keep a bottle of Drano in the cupboard and it works like magic.

For those that like to use natural cleaners as opposed to things like Drano when tubs and sinks get horribly backed up, The Manly Housekeeper has some of the best tips to keep your drains flowing freely that I have ever seen.

10. Cleaning Window & Sliding Door Tracks

These always seem to collect so much gunk and are so hard to wipe out! I found a great trick for getting all that stuff out. Use a flat head screwdriver to scrape as much of the dirt and grime loose as you can. Then use the brush attachment on the vacuum cleaner to clean it out. You may need to repeat this step a few times. Once all the dirt is out of the track, wipe it clean with a rag or Clorox wipe. Let it dry and lubricate the track with a bit of WD-40.

Now go take a nap or have a cocktail! That was a lot of cleaning!

DIY: Diaper Cake and Cupcake Washcloths

My sister is well known for her beautiful diaper cakes, so I knew that I had to make one for her shower. The only problem was that I had never made a diaper cake before! It was going to be a big challenge. My mother and I came up with the idea of making a diaper cake and matching washcloth cupcakes.

As a base, I used a dollar store platter, then taped a paper towel roll standing up in the center to have something sturdy to build the cake around. The shower theme was pink and black so I wrapped each layer of diapers with coordinating fabric to hide the white and yellow diapers.

I didn't want to glue anything to the cake so that all the diapers would still be useable. So to attach the Gerber daisies, I left the stems about 2 - 3 inches long and carefully stuck them down into the diapers. The lace on the bottom of the cake is glued to the platter itself. The ribbons around the layers of the cake are carefully tucked into the diapers to hold them in place.

I made a large bow out of the ribbon to decorate the top of the cake and secured it with sewing pins. Then as a finishing touch I added rhinestones to several of the flowers and to the bow on top.

I was glad my husband was home to give me a hand with it because it took more than my two hands to hold things in place and get the diapers assembled into a cake!

The washcloths were a much easier job. We used the tutorial over at The Scrap Shoppe Blog and they turned out perfectly!

The best part was the comments I got when I walked into the shower with the cake! Lots of oohs and ahhs but some people didn't realized it was a diaper cake and I could overhear the puzzled comments. My favorite was, "How do you eat it?"

I'm linking up at my favorite parties.

Happy Easter

I hope you are all having a wonderful day with family and friends. We had a wonderful morning at church and will be going to a big family dinner with an egg hunt of course for all the kiddos.

Enjoy your Sunday! It's going to be nice and sunny for us today.

Any volunteers?

Maybe I will get some cleaning done tomorrow. Maybe.

DIY: Spring Wreath

It's been such a busy past few weeks! We had my sister's first baby shower, followed by my mother-in-law's birthday party, then the second baby shower. I've spent a lot of time over at my sister's house helping her sort through all the baby goodies and get them organized and put away. So much to do before a baby gets here! I really had no idea! I will get more posts up about all those fun happenings soon.

I actually had a bit of time to do a project around my house, which was a nice break from all the running around.

Confession - I had my Valentine's Day wreath up until about mid-March and realized that I should put up my St. Patrick's Day wreath. The only reason it got taken down is because we had a huge wind storm and the bells on the wreath were driving me crazy banging against the door. I decided this time instead of making an Easter wreath that may end up getting left up until Fourth of July, I would make a nice spring wreath.

It's super simple to make. I got an embroidery hoop and painted the outside ring white with regular acrylic paint. Then added a coat of  Krylon Matte Finish. The chipboard bird is from Michael's and spray painted in Krylon Blue Ocean Breeze and then finished with the Krylon sealer. The wood sign is also from Michael's and is spray painted in Krylon Raspberry and also finished with the Krylon sealer.

When the sign was dry, I added lettering with my Silhouette. I used Expressions Outdoor Vinyl in Lime Tree Green. The "Welcome" is in the LD Oz font and and the "Spring" is from the Silhouette store.

My sister made the crocheted flowers for me since I am totally incapable of crocheting. The cute flower fabric is from Joann's.

To assemble:
I started by putting the fabric in the hoop. Place a square of fabric centered over the small hoop and then slide the large part of the embroidery hoop over it. Tighten the screw on top of large hoop and stretch the fabric to fit inside. Then trim the excess fabric off of the back.

I arranged the flowers and wood sign where I liked them and then hot glued them in place. Then I used green ric-rac to tie the bird to the hoop and added a dab of hot glue to the back of the bird to keep it in place. To finish, I tied a wide pink polka dot ribbon to the top to hang it on the door.

Hopefully spring will last awhile so I can leave this up without looking like the tacky neighbor!

I'm linking up at my favorite parties.