Sometimes it just helps to have a little help

With the holiday season fast approaching, and with many events happening at my house this year, including Christmas dinner, I need to find a way to get my house in order.  Overall, it hasn't been horrible, but sometimes, as mentioned in a previous post, you can't get to everything and some stuff starts to slide.

Lately, in my house, that's been the laundry.  Just when I thought I had been doing a pretty good job of keeping it up, I realized that all three hampers in my room were full.  I guess I had just been on top of the kids clothes.  Darn.

So yesterday, while I was out at a football game, my wonderful husband did all the laundry.  Man did it ever feel good to come home to that!  Now I can get back to focusing on other areas of the house.



Like the rest of the house!

The real answer

Just a quick post to share this picture.  A few friends on Facebook shared it and I thought it was perfect.  We all know that I struggle to keep a clean house, and we also know that I struggle to stay sane.  And it's true.  Sometimes when I feel like I have a clean house and a good balance, I realize that I haven't been spending as much time with the kids as I should have.  So without further ado, here's the reason why my house is a disaster.  

Although I should also add that I just CLEANED my kitchen, like CLEANED it, swept floors and vacuumed the playroom/living/dining rooms.  About to go mop the kitchen and then cleaning is DONE for the day.  All thanks to nap time and educational websites.  I feel for anyone with a child who doesn't sleep.

Shower Cleaning

Thought I'd post another natural method that I'm still using.

When we moved into our house, you might remember that we got the bad news that we had possible water damage behind the shower in our ensuite.  And you might also remember that we had that EXACT same issue in the townhouse.  That we fixed RIGHT before we moved, so we never got to enjoy our brand new renovated bathroom.  Well, we partially renovated our new bathroom before we actually moved in and I LOVE my new tile and my fancy glass enclosed shower.

But I HATE watermarks.  You might remember from the Norwex Product Review, some pictures I posted.  And I said that the Norwex Antibac Microfiber Cloth did a great job of cleaning the glass.  But I did have to put in some elbow grease.

Well, my faithful followers, I've found an all natural and EASY way to clean your glass showers.  Get a bowl from the kitchen and add some baking soda.  Take that into your shower and keep it as dry as you can.  Run the water and get comfortable.  Then take your wet fingers and get some baking soda on them.  Rub that onto the glass.  Seriously, THAT easy!  You can literally FEEL the residue coming off of your shower.  I have a hanging shower caddy and can leave a little bowl of baking soda in there for a few days.  As long as it doesn't get wet and rinse it down the drain.  Most of the time, I'll do this about once/week and rinse the baking soda off with my Norwex cloth, but even rinsing with water works great.  It takes me about one minute at the beginning of my shower.  And if one section still has residue, I can just clean that the next time.  No bleach down the drain.  No bleach in my shower.  No awkward trying to clean the shower while dressed and not getting bleach everywhere.  Easy peasy!

Sometimes I feel like I have two ways to clean my house.  Norwex cloths and baking soda!  Oh and sometimes vinegar!


Happy Cleaning!

Ashleigh

The sun is shining....

and it's raining.  And WOW I need to clean my windows.

Since I'm apparently not very good at keeping up this blog, I'm going to do a quick review of which methods I'm still using.

Cleaning windows/mirrors: I'm still using my Norwex Anti-bac Microfiber and window cleaning cloths.  This combination works great, no chemicals, super fast and super clean.

Countertops/tubs/dusting: Still using the Norwex Anti-bac Microfiber cloth.  This is a great multi-purpose cloth for cleaning jobs all over the house.

And now it's hailing....and sunny.

Toilets: I use baking soda and vinegar.  You might remember I tried a few of those 'new and improved' toilet cleaning products but they just don't work as well as baking soda and vinegar.

Carpets: I also use baking soda and vinegar.  I recently bought (or redeemed with points) a Bissel Green Machine.  After mixing up the solution, I thought why am I using this in here, I could just fill the tank with my 50/50 vinegar/water solution.  So sprinkle your stain with baking soda and spray with the vinegar/water.  Let your kids help, they love the bubbles!  If you don't have a carpet cleaner, let it dry, remove as much of the baking soda as you can, then blot out the rest.  If you do have a carpet cleaner, use the brush/vacuum to remove the baking soda and the stain along with it.  I love this, so easy and fast and SAFE!

I have a few reviews coming up to do and have had some trouble finding time, but will get to it now that my store stuff isn't as crazy, and is just steady.

Happy cleaning!

I'm baaaaack-and how to clean your make up brushes!

This summer was rough.  It was hard to get into a good schedule with both kids when we really didn't have to.  Sleeping in, doing whatever we wanted all day, gymnastics camp, vacation, it was hard, made even harder by the fact that we had a pretty crappy summer and hubs took the car to work.  So I was very excited for school to start up again so we could get back into a good routine.  I was even more excited when hubs decided that he would start taking the bus to work so I could have the car.  The kids are on a good schedule, the house is relatively clean and I have time to get work done without staying up past midnight every night.

So with all that said, I'm back!  I'm researching new cleaning products, apps and other products and systems to make life easier.

But first, I'm going to tell you all about something I found yesterday.  The EASIEST way to clean your make up brushes.

I've become very careful over the past two years about the products that I use, mostly cleaning and personal care products.  So as I'm in my bathroom last night soaking my brushes in make up remover, and using quite a bit of it, I see, and start thinking about, the handmade bar of soap I have on the side of my sink.  So I think...why not?

And boy did it work!  The problem with the make up remover was that I couldn't get the make up from the inside of the brush.  But with the bar, I could lather the brush right on it, and make sure that it got the bristles in the middle.

You can see the make up coming of of the brush and onto the soap, and can see how you can really get the soap right into the middle of the brush.  And I know that the soap is gentle, since that's why I bought it.

When you've worked the soap into it a bit, you can literally just rinse the make up down the drain and keep going.  

My brushes are all so soft now.  No more foundation residue or sticky greasy brushes.  I wouldn't do this with my eyeshadow or powder brushes, only the concealer/foundation ones.  The dry brushes I just   clean with a tissue or a paper towel, although I could use soap if they got really dirty, but I haven't needed to yet. 

So there you have it.  Clean house, clean brushes.

And I have more posts coming, product reviews and maybe some giveaways, so keep checking in, and tell your friends!

Just what my bathroom needed

After our massive house clean overhaul last weekend, my ensuite needed some love. As a contact wearer, I always have my solution, case and glasses on the counter. And some other random necessities. So I did a search on pinterest, took a trip to IKEA and this is the result.

Sorry for the lack of before shot. All I got was two short glasses, one tall one and two tealight holders. Oh and the flowers and vase. So much easier to put stuff away and it looks so much cleaner.


Now to figure out which room to do next.

Fresh Start....again

All it took was a weekend.  A long weekend, in fact.  And was it ever long.  In between trying to celebrate Canada Day, we did a HUGE clean up in the whole house.  Re-organized almost the entire upstairs.  And there are still a few little areas that need to be finished up, but it looks a TON better.

Sometimes I just need to power through it, get it all done, and then the maintenance on it is much easier.  I've also set up my new app and if I can remember to check it everyday, or perhaps a few times per day, and can take a few minutes to get those tasks done, then I should be able to stay on track.

Here's hoping that I have a clutter free summer.  And some good weather.