They’re usually unhealthy, minimally to poorly effective, and frankly there are better ways to handle the smells that build up inside a home. For people with conditions such as asthma, it can be vital to avoid many of the usual commercial air fresheners.

Remove the Source

You won’t always be able to do this, but if you can get the source of the smell out of your home, that’s the best way to get the smell to dissipate. That could be taking out the trash, cleaning the cat litter, and so forth.

Open the Windows

Weather permitting, opening the windows is the simplest way to make a home smell fresh. It lets the air circulate. The smells floating in the air in your home have a way to get out rather than continuing to build up.

It’s important to open your windows in your home when you can. Indoor air can be more polluted than outdoor air, especially if you use a lot of conventional cleaning supplies.

Use Natural Air Fresheners

Natural air fresheners may not work as quickly as the ones you buy at the store and spray around, but they’re better for you and I think they smell better.

Baking soda is a classic odor absorber. Place bowls of it out where smells are an issue. Sprinkle it on carpets that are having odor problems and let it sit for a little or even overnight before vacuuming it up. It doesn’t have a pretty scent, but that’s not the point of using baking soda.

Vinegar isn’t a favorite scent for most people, but it does help to control odors. Put a bowl of it out or spray it into the air. As it dissipates, the vinegar smell and the problem smell will go away. Add in a drop or two of a favorite essential oil if you want to cover the vinegar smell right from the start.

Different herbs can help make a room smell nice too. Sprigs of rosemary or lavender are good choices, especially if you grow them fresh yourself. If not, dried versions smell good as well.

Boiling herbs and spices works also. Many people like the scent of cinnamon boiled in water. Boiling a sliced lemon or lemon juice is another good smell. Vanilla, orange, peppermint, cloves and nutmeg also smell good when boiled.

Your favorite essential oils can be used on their own to make a room smell good. Drop a little on a cotton ball and place it in the room. You can use a drop each from a couple different types of essential oils if you like.

Growing plants indoors also helps with air quality. Different plants clean air in different ways, but they’re generally good at what they do. Don’t overwater any plants or you may have scent issues relating to standing water or overly wet soil.

What do you look for?

There area few clues, and labels proclaiming that the product is “all natural,” “green” and so forth really aren’t it. Too many of these claims are not regulated and are in fact meaningless.

Clearly Marked Ingredients

The ingredients in general should be clearly marked. There are a lot of ingredients to look out for, such as anything derived from petroleum. There are a lot of ways these can be listed, such as mineral oil, propylene glycol, isopropyl alcohol, parabens, and many synthetic fragrances.

If you don’t know what’s in the cleaner, you don’t know what you’re using. A partial list isn’t enough.

Calling a product chemical free is misleading. While most of us would assume they mean dangerous chemicals, the simple truth is that nothing in this world is chemical free. Water is a chemical, for example. So is baking soda. Don’t let a label mislead you with this term.

Good Terms to See on the Label

There are several terms you do want to see on the labels of cleaning products. These include phosphate free, ammonia free, plant based, biodegradable, chlorine free, certified USDA organic, solvent free,  fragrance free, and dye or artificial color free.

Terms to Beware of

Some terms are there specifically to tell you that the product is dangerous to ingest or get on your skin. Even some natural products can have problems, such as essential oils that are better for you when diluted into a carrier oil. Natural does not equal safe, after all.

Poison and danger are the strongest terms. These are the products you most want to avoid, and doubly so want to keep away from your children.

Next come caution and warning. These have hazards, but not as bad as those labeled poison or danger. Still not thing you want to have around your home when you can avoid them.

Finally, if the package tells you to wear gloves or use in a well ventilated space, pay attention. These are hard on your skin or can make breathing difficult. They certainly aren’t healthy for you to have significant contact with.

Packaging

You can’t avoid packaging, even if you make your own cleaning supplies. But you can do your best to buy cleaning products in packages that can be reused, refilled or recycled. Reusable and refillable are of course the best.

Many genuinely eco friendly companies try hard to have refillable containers. It’s a part of their work to be kinder to the planet. Non-eco friendly companies can do this as well, so it’s not a real indicator.

Refills should be in either larger containers or in a concentrated form so that they use less packaging than the original container. Ideally these containers should also be recyclable, although the lack of available recycling facilities is a reality many of us have to deal with.

Generally Good Brands

While I can’t promise that every product offered by these companies will be good, these companies tend to sell cleaning products that are more eco friendly than others you will see on store shelves.

Simple Green Naturals
Dr. Bronner’s
Method
Seventh Generation

Here are some of the many ways you can use vinegar around the house. Please feel free to share any further ideas you have.

1. Clean the microwave

Water can do this pretty well too, but it lacks the deodorizing capabilities of vinegar. Just heat a cloth that you have dampened with vinegar for 15 seconds or so. Once it’s cool enough to touch again, wipe the inside of the microwave clean with the cloth. The moisture should have helped to loosen some of the splatters.

2. Clean and unplug a showerhead.

Especially if you have hard water, your showerhead may get somewhat gunked up at times. Vinegar can do a slow but good job of cleaning it up.

Fill a plastic bag with vinegar. Put it over the showerhead and attach with a twist tie. Allow to soak for at least 15 minutes.

The vinegar may still be used after for other cleaning projects. Might be a good time to finish off cleaning the bathroom while you have it there!

3. Kill weeds

This can be a bit slow, as it kills the leaves but doesn’t touch roots. Spray it on the leaves and repeat as necessary. Eventually the plant will stop regrowing if it can’t get energy from its leaves.

4. Make soil more acid

On a gentler note, vinegar is good for adding a bit of acid to garden soil for plants that love acid soil.

5. Clean up pet urine

After cleaning up the mess by soaking up the liquid and then cleaning with water, pour vinegar on the area, blot out the excess and allow to dry.

6. Hair rinse

Rinse your hair with vinegar after shampooing. It removes the last of the shampoo nicely. Some say it helps with dandruff also.

7. In the laundry

Vinegar also helps to get the soap out from the laundry. Add 1/2 cup of vinegar to the rinse cycle.

8. Afraid colors might run?

Soak brightly colored clothing in a mix of vinegar and warm water before washing. You’ll soon see if dye bleeding might have been a problem. I don’t know if this works with all dye types, but it’s been amazing what comes out of some red clothes.

9. Tenderize meat

There’s a reason why vinegar is so often used in marinades. The acid in it help to make the meat more tender.

10. Clear a drain

This one takes baking soda too, but it’s wonderful! Pour a half cup of baking soda down the drain, follow with a half cup of vinegar. Allow to work for 5-10 minutes, then pour boiling water down the drain. Repeat if necessary, but I’ve never had it be needed.

11. Deodorize the air

Spray vinegar in the air to control odors, or set a small pot of vinegar and water to boil. The vinegar smell will fade away.

12. Clean windows

Use vinegar as you would any other glass cleaner. Wiping with newspaper is highly effective too.

13. Use in the carpet cleaner

Vinegar can be used mixed with water at about 1 cup of vinegar to a gallon of water. Not terribly strong, but nice for a general cleaning.

14. Remove water rings from wood furniture

A mix of olive oil and vinegar can be rubbed on wood furniture to get rid of the white rings caused by leaving a wet glass on the wood.

15. Clean the garbage disposal

Make a few vinegar ice cubes. Put down the garbage disposal and run it while running cold water down the disposal as well.

16. Clean the dishwasher

Pour a cup of vinegar into the empty dishwasher, and run it.

17. Clean the coffeemaker

Your owner’s manual may even tell you about this. Pour a cup of vinegar into the reservoir and run the coffeemaker. Run it twice more with just water in the reservoir to rinse.

18. Soothe a sunburn

Apply vinegar to the sunburned areas with a cloth.

19. General cleaning

Use vinegar to clean hard surfaces in the bathroom and kitchen. It works well on tile and many other hard surfaces. You can dilute it with water for mopping as well.

20. Toilet bowl cleaner

That includes the toilet bowl. Pour 1 cup into the toilet and allow to sit for at least 5 minutes before flushing. This won’t get the areas out of the water, of course.

Let’s see… cleaning my floors with steam rather than chemicals or even plain vinegar. Reusing something she doesn’t want. Yes, I’ll try!

The Shark steam mop is really easy to use. You have to push down to get steam, but that happens quite naturally when pushing the mop. I haven’t found that to be a problem. That’s a good thing because I long since gave the chore of cleaning the kitchen floors mostly to my kids. It’s easy enough they can use it, with appropriate supervision, of course. It’s hot steam but so far they show no inclination to test the heat out on themselves or each other.

They love that it picks up the many sticky spills they make on the floor so easily. And believe me, they do leave some messes about, and they had to really scrub in the past with the old mop. It may take several passes with the steam mop, but that’s still easier than the scrubbing they had to do with the other one.

They use washable cloth pads, which is another great feature. They also let me know just how much yeeech was on the floor. They don’t generally come back perfectly white for me after a wash, but hey, they’re just for cleaning the floor.

The water container is kind of small, but so is our kitchen, so that works for us. Just about everything else in our house is carpeted so we don’t have a lot of tile or other hard floor surfaces to worry about.

Reading some of the steam mop reviews on Amazon, it’s clear that many steam mops get hotter than the Shark, and that can be important. If you have a lot of hard surface floors, you’re probably going to want one with a bigger tank. But for our situation the Shark is quite good.

Then I found out how much of an advantage there is to buying laundry detergent online through Amazon.com.

There’s a trick to it, you see. If you subscribe to the product you know you’re going to need regularly, you get a discount and free shipping. But if you decide to cancel the subscription, even after the first shipment, there’s no penalty. If you delay the shipment, no penalty. If you request it sooner, no penalty. You still get a great price and free shipping.

It amazed me just how much that came out to with my Country Save. They ship in it a box of 4 – 10 lb. boxes of detergent. It works in HE and regular washing machines and is very popular with people who are cloth diapering.

I’ve been using it a while now, to see how it works, rather than reviewing it after just one round. You don’t really know a detergent after the first load unless it’s an utter disaster, after all. But I started out pleased and remain pleased. So far as I can tell it is cleaning as well as any other detergent I’ve used.

And I love that it uses such a small amount. The scoop is so tiny! You’re supposed to only use a quarter scoop for cloth diapers, otherwise follow the instructions for your machine.

There are a lot of products you can subscribe to through Amazon, so it can be worth a look to figure out if having it shipped directly to your home will save you money and errands.

They’re some of the big reason why I love making my own floor cleaner rather than buying it. No nasty chemicals, cheap, and I can even make my kids use it if they mess things up too quickly.

Here’s my basic formula for tile. Just as easy as mixing something bought at the store.

Basic Vinegar Floor Cleaner

Add about a half cup of white vinegar per gallon of water. My husband hates the smell of vinegar, so I add a bit of lavender essential oil to cut the vinegar scent until it dries. Mop as usual.

This mix is generally safe for tile and wood floors; just make sure that you don’t get the wood excessively wet. Your mop should be just damp. Some people like to add some vegetable oil to give wood floors a bit more of a shine.

Like most kids their age, my kids can make a rather horrendous mess in the bathroom. The biggest part of it lately has been due to their rediscovery of the process by which dirt becomes mud.

Lots and lots of mud. To dig in or even smear on their skin.

I’ve had to haul the hose out a few times to get them clean enough to even be allowed in the house. Yep, it’s pretty cute and the times I’ve taken the camera out for it has made for some great pictures.

But it sure leaves a mess in the bathroom when they’re washing up from being just slightly dirty.

This lead to a quick decision by my husband and I. They get to clean their own bathroom from now on.

It’s a nice help. They both make quite a mess in there, and my son creates the additional messes that little boys are prone to creating. They’re old enough to do it. And vinegar is so safe I don’t have to worry about their health as they clean.

It’s a pretty easy skill to teach if you don’t expect perfection. I presented my kids with paper towels and a spray bottle of vinegar. I plan on moving to microfiber towels one of these days, but haven’t quite made it yet.

Then I showed them what I wanted done, helping them figure out how to do it and how to notice where dirt was still clinging to surfaces. That was actually one of the bigger challenges. My kids aren’t much worried about dirt these days.

Results were pretty good. Sure, it took longer to supervise and help them than to do it myself, but it’s a way to help them learn to be responsible. And it’s nice to have them cleaning with something that they won’t be hurting themselves with.

You can’t beat the smell for one thing. An area cleaned with lemon juice smells good!

A classic use is as furniture polish. There’s a reason why so many store bought furniture polishes are lemon scented. You can put two parts of olive oil to one part lemon juice to make your own hardwood furniture polish.

Plain lemon juice is also good for cleaning wooden cutting boards.

Mixed with baking soda into a paste, it can polish chrome or copper. Salt can work in place of the baking soda, as it provides grit for scrubbing. I like baking soda in most cases, although it is less gritty.

Lemon juice is also good for your laundry, as it can help with natural bleaching. Hanging clothes out to dry in the sun can help with stains too, but sometimes you want that boost from lemon juice. Just add a half cup of lemon juice to the rinse cycle, then dry in the sunlight. A small amount of lemon juice also just makes clothes smell good when they dry, but honestly I’ve never found the need to worry about how my clothes smell after washing.

You can also soak clothes in a mix of vinegar and lemon juice to get a stain out. Just soak for a half hour before washing.

Lemon juice is a pretty flexible cleaner, and delightful for those times you don’t want the smell of vinegar when you clean. Sometimes scent matters.

But that doesn’t mean you can’t go green with your cleaning supplies.

There are a number of greener cleansers out there. Clorox may have a name for itself as the producer of some really nasty, toxic chemicals, but if you can get past that they have their Green Works line of products. You can get these locally at Home Depot and other stores. I’ve tried them, and they work fine.

If you’re buying products, do at least consider buying concentrated versions that you have to water down before use. This will at least cut down on the packaging and weight of shipping. It also saves you quite a bit of money. One of the Green Works products I bought, an all-purpose cleanser, can be diluted to 1:24 a bit and is still effective.

There are other products you can buy as well, such as the old, reliable Simple Green. I used that one for a long time before starting to make my own products.

When in doubt, look at the labels.

The very first thing I don’t want in a product is for it to be antibacterial. These can leave residues, encouraging resistant bacteria to grow, and don’t do any better a job of cleaning. With the residue left, it may even be doing worse. Just remember that a good soap allows you to wipe those germs right off the counter. Keep your cleaning cloths clean and you won’t be spreading too many germs about.

Besides, a few germs around are good for the immune system. It’s the excess that is far more likely to make you or your family ill.

In addition, look for warning and danger labels. Right off the bat either of these tells you that your cleanser has something toxic in it. You’ll probably want to wear gloves when using such products, or better yet, find an alternative that’s less toxic.

Caution labels are on many products. It’s on my Green Works bottle, for example, because it’s a potential eye irritant. Eyes are very easy to irritate.

I prefer to avoid ammonia, bleach, hydrochloric acid, chlorine, petroleum products and many other ingredients commonly found in cleaning products. I’m also not big on added fragrances, unless it’s an essential oil such as I add when I use vinegar so my husband doesn’t complain about the scent.

A simple rule is that if you can recognize the source of the ingredients in your cleaning product, it’s probably safer. Not always, as nature can come up with some really nasty toxins.

Just remember you don’t need products with special agents to make them foam up, or really harsh chemicals to get the job done. A bit of elbow grease and a natural product can do the job just as well. You won’t have to worry about what you’re sending down the pipes or in the trash if you pick your products more carefully.

Exposure to germs is normal, after all, and within reason a healthy thing for you. You can’t build up immunity to things you aren’t ever exposed to.

Wandering around online, I came across this article from last year on the difference between how regular cleaners work and how antibacterial ones work. The more traditional soaps and such simply loosen up dirt and such so they could easily be wiped away. They don’t tend to leave residues.

Antibacterial products, on the other hand, generally do leave residues. This can encourage the development of resistant bacteria.

I’m sure many of you know that resistant bacterial diseases are a problem already due to overuse and misuse of antibiotics in medicine. Too many parents demand antibiotics when they aren’t the answer, and many people don’t use the full prescription, allowing the more resistant bacteria to survive and reproduce.

Frankly, I’d like to avoid having the same thing happen in my home.

That’s why I don’t use antibacterial products. If regular cleaning can simply get rid of them, what more do I need?

Worse, antibacterial products like triclosan are contaminating the environment already. That’s more chances for bacteria to develop a resistance to these things.

These are very simple reasons to avoid antibacterial products, I think. At the very least they’re good enough reasons for me.