not my shower, just an image from home-designs.net, but it sure is pretty

My younger kids are off with their father for a bit so I'm cleaning the house.

Deep cleaning.

In four days my oldest daughter and I have filled three garbage cans with trash and have a van full of stuff to donate. And that's just the beginning. There are rooms to go and dust to sweep before I sleep.

One task was to clean the master bathroom shower. Like many of us I've been "pinning" cleaning ideas on Pinterest and thought this was the ideal time to try a few of them out.

My shower has glass on two walls with white tile and white grout on the remainder. That glass drives me crazy trying to keep it clean, and I've tried every solution I've come across over the years. Thanks to Pinterest I'm finding more to try.

I was super excited when I saw this pin to clean a shower with salt and lemon:



I put some Kosher salt into a bowl, dipped a lemon half into it, and scrubbed.

It smelled so nice. I get frustrated with bathroom cleaners that burn your throat - a bathroom is typically a small area, manufacturers should know to tame the fumes.

How it worked ... it did a really nice job on the grout. The grout came out nice and white clean. However, it really didn't tackle the soap scum or water stains on the tile or glass. A few of the tiles near the floor were stained from the soap scum and this concoction didn't touch them.

Cost: 2 lemons $1, salt was already on hand

Score: B-

I haven't tried any of the other cleaning suggestions on that pin, but many of them are very intriguing.


Day 2 I moved on to this idea, also from Pinterest:

The recommended directions were to take 1 cup household vinegar and 1 cup Dawn dish liquid and mix in a spray bottle. Spray all the walls of the shower and let sit for an hour. I didn't have a spray bottle so I mixed the two in a bucket and sopped it onto the walls and floor with a terrycloth towel.  Application was very easy.

The vinegar did cause an odor, but nothing that smelled toxic. The Dawn masked a lot of the odor, so really it wasn't bad. Once all was said and done and the project completed the bathroom smelled very nice.

The results - After waiting an hour I came in with a scrub brush and water and scrubbed. The tile came clean, all the soap scum came off. The glass also came clean. I was very happy with the results.

The only problem I had was that I also cleaned the separate tub with the mixture and it was really, really, really, really hard to get all the dish detergent and bubbles out of the tub.

Cost: Dawn $1, vinegar was already on hand

Score: A

The strangest thing was that my sister called right after I finished the Dawn/vinegar cleaning. When I told her I was cleaning the shower she immediately asked if I'd used Dawn and vinegar. Apparently she'd had a friend recommend this method to her just last week ... I certainly hadn't mentioned it to her.

So there you have it, I'll be cleaning with Dawn and vinegar on a regular basis, but not lemons and salt.

Do you have any great money or greener cleaning tips to share?