OK, so maybe some of you have heard of this already…the wonders of cleaning with “all natural” white vinegar…but, until a week ago – this was news to me!

(If you have other vinegar cleaning ideas you use that I don’t mention here, please add them with a comment at the bottom.)  I never let my 3 year old daughter help clean with any of the cleaning liquids, but, I thought, “this one she could help me with!”

Huge bottle of white distilled vinegar I got to clean with, it was super cheap!

So, I was at a playdate at a friend’s house (the same one who got me inspired into decluttering my house mode!)  She shared with us that she had just cleaned her kitchen floor with vinegar before we arrived.

I was intrigued…why vinegar?  It smells so potent…She explained that it cleans all kinds of surfaces really well and the smell does go away.  She added that you shouldn’t wet a wood surface and let it sit on it, it will make the finish dull, just wipe it off right away.

She then explained that she had completely saturated the cloth seats in her car with white vinegar to kill all germs…and that did take around a week for the smell to dissipate.  (Eeeeek!  I cringed inwardly at this.)

I’m not so brave as to risk my car smelling like distilled white vinegar for a week, but, I am brave enough to try it on a few things, here they are, along with my results:

Cleaning Kitchen Counters with Vinegar – Yes, grease comes off pretty easy.  Also helps with heat-caked on homemade chili relleno casserole sauce on the stovetop, though it needs to sit on it for awhile…and then you really smell it!

Cleaning Spots on the Carpet with Vinegar – I guess the problem is that I don’t know what these spots are exactly…they were just there one day…my little 3 year old daughter helped me with this.  We did carpet magic and she got to spray on the magic solution.

My little sweetie helping mommy do "carpet magic" with white vinegar.

Only, those spots didn’t go away with vinegar or scrubbing…but the smell did dissipate after a few hours and I was happy to have a cleaning liquid my little girl could help with!

Cleaning the Strollers with White Vinegar – It worked great on the fabric of the strollers (all 3 of them!)  I was super pleased here.  Dingyness was removed, and, after drying in the sun, no smell at all remained!  A++++ here!

I plan on cleaning my upholstered dining chairs next, just so I know they are super clean!  Also, bought a nice, cheap, ginormous bottle of ammonia to use to help remove dark wax from the glass on my chalk painted frame, and also to clean with.  More about this one after I test it out.  Must be very careful with ammonia though, NOT child friendly (or nose friendly or eye friendly…)

(A few days after this post, we had fun making sink volcanoes in our house.  We used vinegar and baking soda to unclog our sink drain, and video taped it!):

If you have something interesting you clean with – please share it with me by adding a comment below!

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