Here is one more money saving idea for your frugal household budget.
Household cleaners and solutions make up a sizable portion of your household expenses. This is particularly true if you use them regularly; and in large quantities, you’d be going through your chemicals pretty fast.
However, there are a lot of drawbacks to using chemicals. One is that they are obviously toxic. Some of these chemicals are industrial-strength, formulated to ensure the elimination of some of the most persistent pests. Even some brands of dishwashing liquid can have toxicity. That’s why you shouldn’t be mindful of your budget alone when choosing household products; you should also be aware of how they affect the environment and your family’s health.
Of course, you can always turn to green cleaning products for your household. And among them, you’ll find one benign product that may be able to replace most of your household cleaning agents: baking soda. Baking soda is actually very versatile. You can use it as air freshener, as an environmentally-friendly cleaning agent, and even as a roach killer that beats industrial-strength anti-roach solutions.
The Many Uses of Baking Soda, A Cheap Household Cleaner
Here are some of the ways to use baking soda around your home, with recipes included:
- To make baking soda-based air freshener, all you need to do is to combine 1 teaspoon of baking soda, 1 teaspoon of lemon juice without the pulp, and add these to 2 cups of water. Keep in a sprayer, and you’re all set. This solution has proven to get rid of musty odors, at more than 1/16th of the price of Lysol.
- As a cleaning agent, you can use baking soda on its own. Instead of regular chemical cleanser, use baking soda on household surfaces, like sinks, bathroom floors, and bathroom tiles to scrub out stains. You may use it with a bit of water, or even lemon juice. Baking soda reacts with lemon juice, and the chemical reaction helps work out the stains.
- As a roach killer, this is something I’ve discovered for myself. In my search for solutions to a roach problem, I came across this article and tried the suggestion there: mix 1 part baking soda with 1 part sugar, then add a bit of water to work the mixture into a paste-like consistency. Scoop the mix into a disposable plate. According to the article, the roaches won’t be able to resist the sugar, while the baking soda reacts with their acidic digestive systems, which proves to be fatal to the critters.
There are other uses for baking soda. Adding it to your toothpaste or the water you use for brushing will make your breath fresher. You may also use the baking soda as a fridge, bathroom, or closet deodorizer. Just open a box of baking soda and set it in your fridge, your bathroom, or your closet.
Try Baking Soda To Get Rid of Pests!
The best part is that baking soda costs you only $7.99 for a four-pound box, which could probably last you a whole year, if you’re only going to use it on roaches. On the other hand, Raid’s Double Control Roach Baits and Egg Stoppers could cost up to $49.00 for a 6-pack box, which lasts only 3 to 6 months. You’d have to put two baits or traps in the kitchen, bathroom and other areas where you usually spot them, which means you’d probably have to buy more than one pack.
One big difference with these two systems is that the roach bait system does not make the roaches weak or diminish their population effectively enough, compared to the baking soda and sugar mix. One thing that I noticed when I used the baking soda and sugar mix was that the roaches walked more slowly and eventually died. Admittedly, the number of roaches diminished noticeably when I used the Raid system. However, I still needed to buy roach spray because the roaches were still as agile as they were without the baits. That would cost another $3.85 to $6.29 for a 17.5 oz. bottle. But with the baking soda mixture, there was a remarkable absence of roaches in my apartment, which only goes to show that the mixture was absolutely effective.
As you can see, there are environmentally-friendly, not to mention markedly cheaper alternatives to the household chemicals we normally use. It’s only a matter of using the right eco-friendly alternatives! Think about how much you’ll save when you shop for your next box of baking soda! For more tips on going green, try these eco-friendly tips.