Baking Soda cleans Tub Scum and home made wood polish

I am increasingly skeptical of using chemicals in cleaning and caring for my home. Something about the idea that the chemical being used can cause suffocation, severe burns, completely remove pigmentation, and kill germs, mold amd mildew with just a touch, indicates it should be used with prudence. (This is bleach i'm talking about, something I bought today under great hesitation, but my shower floor was horrific). So I understand the purposes of chemicals, but I am all for it if there's a more simple, more cost effective, less toxic, less hazardous, and more natural way to go about things.

So I decided to post my two favorite discoveries in the realm of natural housekeeping.


I have heard that Baking Soda is a wonder-all. People use it to wash their hair (it's called the No-Poo method). It's used to wash faces, and all sorts of things.

So out of desperation and a really minging ring of tub scum around my bath tub, that even the scrubbing bubbles don't touch, and the Magic Eraser will do, but it takes an ENTIRE magic eraser and a whole heck of a lot of elbow grease (And really what's in the magic eraser to make it magic? I'm a little scared..) I figured what the heck for the baking soda.

So I slapped some dry Arm and Hammer baking soda on the wall, rubbed it in kind of, and noticed that that the black ring started to come off. It was almost melting off.

Encouraged, I did this with the entire ring around the tub. I put some baking soda in my hand, rubbed my hand over the tub ring, gave it not even a minute, before I started rubbing it off, and it basically melted away.

Then I added warm water to the mix. (I imagine cold water would work fine. The warm water tap is closer to me when I am leaning over the tub). I splashed and rubbed some water on the ring, and it really did just come right off.

No elbow grease. No weird funky chemicals or fumes. No damage to the tub.

Just dry Baking Soda, lightly rubbed into the tub.

Now, on to the home made wood polish.

I grew up on Pledge, that great aerosol lemony smelling spray. I loved to dust just because i got to use the spray can.

But as I have gotten older, I have become more skeptical when it comes to the chemicals in things. And I don't dust nearly as often as I should. My grandmother would be mortified I think to see how often, or how infrequently her former home gets dusted.

But today I stumbled across a recipe for home made wood polish.

What you need:

squirt bottle

Olive oil

lemon juice.

Fill the squirt bottle up about two thirds of the way with olive oil. Add lemon juice the rest of the way. Screw on top. Voila.

Spray squirt solution on the wood you wish to polish. Use a dry rag or cloth to spread it around and absorb excess. There you go.

I just did this, including the dusting/polishing. And I have to say my wood furniture looks great. The oil absorbs really nicely. I forget what the lemon juice is for in the solution, but it is there for something. Maybe to break down grease, as it is a citrus?

But I feel better now about dusting my house, and polishing the wood. And although it's not the Pledge scented stuff, and the aerosol can isn't being used, it still feels fun to use the spray gun and pretend I'm shooting something with a water pistol.