Cleaning Secret Weapons

I never fail to come home from ladies’ night without a pocketful of new ideas! Last week we were over at Judy’s house for our ladies’ night and she started out the evening by serving up jello wedges in orange peels. We were all amazed at this cute way of serving jello. Turns out it’s a snap to do. First of all you cut oranges in half and carefully scoop out the orange parts without breaking the peel. Next you place the hollowed out orange peels in a muffin tin which helps balance the peel. Then you fill the peels up with jello and refrigerate.

When the jello has set you just cut the halves into quarters or thirds and serve. (Don’t try to make the wedges too thin or your jello will fall out as you are cutting the wedges.)

The ladies were thoroughly impressed, but Judy complained that she had spilled some jello juice on her shirt when she was making them and she was afraid that it would stain.

Helen told her to use hydrogen peroxide and so Judy got her blouse out right then and there to try it. Fortunately, she had had it soaking in cold water so the stain couldn’t dry, and sure enough, the hydrogen peroxide took the stain right out. Helen told us she regularly uses hydrogen peroxide on protein-based stains including blood.

Well, that led to some other revelations of ways to use other common things we have around the house.

Judy told us her one of her favourite secret weapons is toothpaste. She says she always keeps a tube of regular, (not gel) toothpaste for emergencies like cleaning up water spots on wood furniture. She says she uses a dry cloth and polishes the water stain out with toothpaste. She also uses toothpaste to keep her bathroom mirror from fogging up when she’s in the shower. She says she just uses a small amount and a dry rag and polishes the mirror with that to keep it fog-free. Judy says that toothpaste can even help polish out a scratch from a CD or DVD if it’s skipping. (Rinse the off the toothpaste and let airdry before putting it back in the machine.) The other thing she uses it for is cleaning her jewellery. She says nothing makes her rings sparkle like cleaning them with an old toothbrush and toothpaste and rinsing in hot water.

Ellen said that for years she’s used her hairspray to remove ink stains from her husband’s shirts, although apparently it doesn’t work as good as it use to... probably because hairspray doesn’t contain the same amount of alcohol as before. Her second choice is nail polish remover.

Alice said her issue is with scuff marks on her floors and she always keeps a white pencil eraser handy for taking those off. She said it’s also worked great for taking off sticky price tag glue. (Wash off the eraser before using on something else.)

Velda, who has a whole crop of grandchildren says that she always keeps a can of WD -40 around to take off crayon marks from the walls and furniture and also for sticker adhesive removal. I guess she also probably doesn’t have squeaky doors either.

My mother-in-law confessed that she uses her denture cleaning tablets to give her toilet a good cleaning. She says she drops a couple in the toilet, and comes back in half an hour and it takes away any staining. She says she’s also dropped them down the drain when she thinks her pipes are getting a little sluggish along with a cup of vinegar and again, she lets it sit for half an hour before running the water again.

Aside from learning an ingenious new way to serve jello, we also all ended the evening with a few more cleaning tricks in our arsenal  to try at home.