How do you clean a bathroom? Who does it naturally? - Page 2

[MsFortune]

Originally Posted by L J 

My one big no-no is bleaching the shower curtain a couple of times a year. I fill the tub up as far as it will go, put the curtain (just the bottom part, I leave it hanging normally on the rod) in the tub and pour in a bit of bleach. I wish I knew a comparable way to clean it would bleach, but I haven't found anything else that really gets the bottom part looking new again.

Are you talking about the external curtain (the pretty part) or the inside curtain (liner)?  We got a cloth liner and it stays pretty mildew free.  I just throw it in the laundry a few times a year.  And then you don't have a (potentially off gassing) vinyl liner.  

[nathansmum]

Originally Posted by clutterwarrior 

I'm surprised that some of you don't have much bathroom rubbish.

We invariably have rubbish in the bathroom bin including:

tissues

makeup wipes

cotton buds

nail clippings

hairs from my long haired daughters that I am always pulling out of the drain

dental floss..we all floss daily

used razor blades occasionally

Toilet rolls are recycled with paper

empty bottles are recycled.

Here's our bathroom rubbish:

Tissues - Hardly use tissues, but if we do I'd just drop it into the toilet for flushing the next time (or into the compost bin or fireplace)

Makeup wipes - I just wash my face at the end of the day in the basin

Nail clippings - compost or just thrown out the window into the garden

Hair - compost bin

Dental floss - yep into the bin

Razor blades - I'm an infrequent shaver, so maybe only one every 3-4mths

Toilet rolls are used as fire starters

Empty bottles recycled.

[Alyantavid]

What I do weekly:

change the trash

wash the mirror (my mom makes some glass cleaner, I have no idea what's in it)

wipe down the counter with my usual vinegar/water cleaner

wipe down and scrub the toilet with the cleaner

sweep and mop

During the week, I sweep and wipe down the counter and toilet as needed.

Dh does the bathtub whenever he thinks it needs done.

[weliveintheforest]

I use Simple Green to clean the bathroom, and if I want something for scouring the tub I use baking soda and it works pretty well.  When we had tiles I used baking soda and a stiff brush, on our current plastic (fiberglass?) shower surround I just use a sponge with a green scrubby side.  We have a glass shower door right now, and I hate cleaning those, nothing seems to work except elbow grease and a scrubby sponge.  I use a regular toilet brush and try to give the toilet a swish every day so it doesn't get too bad, and once in a while I get in there and scrub it by hand.  We don't use a bag in the garbage but I am going to for the next couple months so I don't have to think about cleaning it out while I have a nb.

[doubledutch]

for the rest of the house, i use a spray bottle with vinegar, dish soap, borax and water (and essential oils).  for the bathroom, i use method.  i just really love the way it smells.  there's a spray that i use on the shower, sink and outside of the toilet.  i use the toilet bowl cleaner (or sometimes i use borax or baking soda in there if i want it to be super awesome).  occasionally i use the scrub for the bathtub, but generally just use the spray.

so:

the very first thing i do is put the cleaner into the toilet, and then spray every surface (except the floor)

trash

sweep the floor

wipe down the shower/tub with a rag

wipe down the sink with a rag

scrub inside the toilet with a brush (occasionally i bleach the brush and its little stand/holder)

wipe down the outside of the toilet with toilet paper and flush it

spray and wipe the floor with one of the rags i already used

i tend to clean the mirror at other random times, and i use my vinegar solution for that.

[Jayray]

My husband recently bought some "natural" scrubbing bubbles shower spray and it worked really well on soap scum!  Before that I mostly just used elbow grease and whatever random soap was laying around. Sometimes I'd use baking soda, too, but I didn't notice a lot of difference than just using a green scrubby pad.

I use whatever I have laying around to scrub the toilet--baby shampoo, Dr. Bronners, hand soap. 

I wipe the outside of the tub and the sink with a wet microfiber cloth--no cleaner.  Microfiber is supposed to be antibacterial on its own.  Don't know if it really is, but it gets things clean.  They also clean mirrors really well (if it's just slightly damp).

[onetwoten]

Originally Posted by Jayray 

My husband recently bought some "natural" scrubbing bubbles shower spray and it worked really well on soap scum!  Before that I mostly just used elbow grease and whatever random soap was laying around. 

Oooh do you know what brand it was? It would make me to happy to be able to cut this last major chemical out of our house, but right now the alternative is just not ever cleaning the tub. 

[rhianna813]

Originally Posted by laohaire 

 DH uses a different bottle. Also, how can I put this delicately, DH has no hair. (Bald on top and shaves the rest off). And yet he replaces his shampoo more often than I do.

And the begs the question.... what is he shampooing? LOL

Rhianna

[matte]

I find that 1/4 cup of vinegar in the toilet left for about 15 min makes all scrubbing easy. I wonder what would happen if I put a little vinegar in the tank...

[ArtsyMomma]

Does anyone use a hand-held steam cleaner? I've used baking soda, ecover, and vinegar to clean the bathrooms for years. It never really occurred to me to kill germs in there, but those hand held steam cleaners...well they seem neat!

[hopefulfaith]

I LOVE my hand-held steam cleaner, when it comes to cleaning my bathroom.  It is absolutely perfect for steaming the heck out of the space between the toilet and the floor:  you know how little boys tend to miss sometimes and little girls pee right through the seat and it all just dribbles down to the base of the toilet?  The steam cleaner is perfect for this.  Also pretty much everything else in the bathroom, but mostly this.  :)

[weliveintheforest]

I forgot about the steam cleaner!  We have one, and it's not the greatest but at our last place I used it for things like the shower door tracks.  I should see if it's accessible in our storage shed.  When we moved out of our last place we hired professional cleaners and they used a commercial steam cleaner on everything.  Walls, windows, bathroom fixtures, kitchen, window tracks... It was amazing!

[sunnysandiegan]

Supplies (last two are stored under the sink in DD's bathroom; a stack of rags is in the linen closet between our bathrooms; toilet brush is in holder in DD's bathroom):

~ two rags (old, cut-up t-shirts)

~ toilet brush (nothing disposable)

~ spray bottle of vinegar and water (roughly 50/50 mix, usually a tad less vinegar)

~ shaker bottle of baking soda

1. Remove items from bathrooms (I clean both at the same time; they are close). I keep the counter items to a minimum to aid the cleaning process (one cup in each for toothbrushes and tongue cleaners and sulcabrushes -- wands with little brush tips for gumline; one soap dispenser each; one vase with Gerber daisy in DD's bathroom; one glass & reed diffuser in ours). Only two other items in each bathroom to remove (scale and trash can in ours; trash can and toilet brush holder in DD's).

2. Generously spray vinegar in toilets. Let sit.

3. Get one rag damp. Shake baking soda in sinks. Let sit.

4. Use damp rag (folded to size of sponge) to scrub sink and counter and outside rim of toilet bowl, rinsing along the way with HOT water (one bathroom at a time).

5. Rinse rag with HOT water; squeeze, and hang over shower to air-dry...later, when it is dry, it goes into the whites to be washed.

6. Use toilet brush to scrub the insides of the toilets. Leave toilet brush sitting in second toilet cleaned for now.

7. Spray vinegar water on mirrors and faucets (all-in-one faucet and handle) and counter and lightswitch and door knobs and outside of toilet. Use dry rag to wipe clean, which ensures all traces of baking soda are gone and gets the faucets shiny. I use the now-damp rag to clean the toilet paper holder and the fronts of the cabinets (one bathroom at a time).

8. Sweep or vacuum floors, if broom or vacuum are already out. If not, I just move on to #9.

9. Use vinegar water rag to wipe floor working my way out of the bathroom. They're small, but if the floor is unusually dirty, then I grab the first rag from the shower rod to finish. I rinse the rag(s) well with HOT water, squeeze, and hang to dry. Second toilet cleaned gets flushed now and the brush gets rinsed in the fresh water, tapped / shaken inside toilet bowl, and loosely put back in holder.

10. Take out trash...dumping one into the other to take out just one bag. If it is not full, which it often isn't, then I dump trash from our family office into it and take it outside. Replace the bag. Put everything back into bathrooms. Rest toilet brush across holder to fully air-dry. (When the rags across shower are dry, then the toilet brush is put away properly.)

I do the above far more frequently than we clean the shower with glass doors in our bathroom and the bathtub in DD's bathroom. The above doesn't take long at all when I keep up on it. It took me longer to think about each step and type them out than it would have to just go do it! LOL (It's midnight here, though, so my sleeping family appreciates me typing versus cleaning. ;) )

Every day, I use my hand to wipe off the counter in our bathroom after I brush my teeth (with some water, if need be) and then wash my hands.

I leave a sponge (with a green scrubby on one side) in the shower. DH will use it to scrub the shower floor with his foot pretty often (before rinsing off). I clean the shower walls (fiberglass) with it every so often. We both dread the shower doors, but I take the time to clean them before a shower once a month with the scrubby and baking soda (rinsed with the handheld shower head). We try to use the squeegee suctioned right to the inside door daily, but it usually gets forgotten during the week due to busy mornings. I clean the door track with our 6-foot oral irrigator every so often (it's connected to our shower with a valve).

I take a bath once a month and I scrub the tub with baking soda and a rag beforehand. When DD liked baths, I cleaned it more often. She has very dry skin and hair and can only shower 1-2 times per week, so her bathtub doesn't get that dirty.

For decorative purposes, I have a shower rod and and shower curtain in front of the shower doors in our bathroom. I wash this in the machine once every year or two and hang it back up to dry. (I've owned and used it since the 1990's. It's still in good shape.) In DD's bathroom, there is a hand-sewn shower curtain that has yet to be washed and a plastic liner (that did NOT smell when first opened!) that has yet to be washed. We leave them fully extended all the time, so there is plenty of airflow to dry the liner and prevent mildew/mold.

Edited by sunnysandiegan - 5/27/11 at 1:16am

[Jaxinator]

Originally Posted by MsFortune 

Are you talking about the external curtain (the pretty part) or the inside curtain (liner)?  We got a cloth liner and it stays pretty mildew free.  I just throw it in the laundry a few times a year.  And then you don't have a (potentially off gassing) vinyl liner.  

I second that!

I had a plain white cloth (I think it was bamboo actually) liner and I loved it. It didn't get all nasty at all.

Now we have shower doors, which aren't as pretty, IMO.

For soap scum and mineral buildup I used baking soda paste, or borax, but mostly baking soda. Our shower would get bad, we had really really hard water. I would just scrub it down with the baking soda, rinse really well, then wipe it down with 50/50 vinegar/water and a cloth.

To get the buildup off the shower head I would soak it in pure vinegar in a small bowl (it was the kind of shower head that you could take down) for a few hours and that was that.

For the most part everything else in the bathroom gets the same 50/50 vinegar treatment, I just wipe everything down. My mix has some teatree oil in it.  For the outside of the toilet though I use paper towels. I can't stand the thought of not throwing that away... :P

[Wolfcat]

Originally Posted by MsFortune 

Take out the trash, replace the bag.

**Can you skip the bag and just use the trash can?  Wash it out occasionally?  Or as alternative, reuse plastic grocery bags.  I try to use cloth bags, but somehow (DH - I am looking at you!) we end up with some bags.

Sweep the floor.

**That's pretty green.  Just don't use a swiffer!

Clean the toilet inside with a wand and those disposable blue scrubbers that clip to the wand.

**Get a green cleaner.  Ditch the disposable and get a regular toilet brush.  Bad chemicals and creates waste.

Spray and wipe down outside of toilet (including handle) with disinfectant.

**I just use window cleaner or a mild green cleaner.  

Spray walls of shower with cleaner, wipe and rinse.

**This is hard to get green.  I've tried various shower cleaners and lots of green ones just don't work at cutting through soap scum.  Clorox has a "green" line, which is not really all that green, but it's semi-green and actually cleans.  Otherwise, use a sponge that has a scrubby side on it and a crappy cleaner and scrub.

Pour AJAX or powdered clorox all over tub, let sit, scrub with sponge, rinse.

**There are green scouring powders, or you can use your shower cleaner and the scrubby.

"Mop" floor - usually just spray and wipe with a rag.

**I use the window cleaner or mild cleaner for this too.  Rag is fine.

I know there are some people on here that make their own cleaners.  Since some of the greener stuff can be pricey, you may want to consider that.  For me though - I just don't have the time.  And there are good options out there.  

I think a lot of the green stuff does not work as well - we developed these toxic cleaners for a reason.  If you clean frequently the green stuff is usually OK.  

Some stuff is grener than others.  7th Generation is a good bet or Mrs Meyers.  Method is fairly cheap and works well, but not always as green.

I found compostable trash bags in the little 3 and 5 gallon sizes... woot! They are guaranteed to compost in 12 months, although the ones we use for the compost bucket inside (that goes into the composter outside) goes away in about a week.

We don't clean the shower at all... it gets used so much and we don't use a lot of soaps, etc. AND we have a water softener... But, I would use a full vinegar solution for mold. If that doesn't kill it completely, sprinkle the area with a little salt, let it set and wipe off (bonus! it acts as a mild scrub).

For the toilet, I use a rubber bristle scrubber (from FlyLady.com) and Clorox or baby wipes for the outside.

For the floor, I got a shark steamer, which cleans with high-heat steam, so it's disinfecting as well.

And we developed the toxic cleaners cuz the chemical companies can convince us they work "better" and get us to spend OMG-amounts of money on poison that we think we can't live without.

For example, my parents (who's house we are now buying) told us we couldn't get away with not using the scrubbing bubbles shower spray thing because it was the only thing that kept away the mold in the bathroom. We promptly threw it away. We haven't seen a single sign of mold and (see above) we don't clean the shower more than an occasional spot-clean.

[Galatea]

I love all BioKleen products - they have a soy scrub that works well on our hard water scum in the tub - I use it with a scrubby sponge.  This is what I do:

-spray toilet, sink, mirror with BioKleen all-purpose spray cleaner and wipe with rag

-scrub toilet bowl with BioKleen toilet cleaner and a brush

-scrub tub/shower with BioKleen soy scrub and a sponge

-vacuum and mop floor with diluted BioKleen all-purpose cleaner

-wash rugs in washer with BioKIeen detergent

I swear I do not work for BioKleen.  :-)

I don't do any disinfecting b/c none of us is immune-compromised so no point fighting bacteria - they're gonna win anyway!

[tccandlsccmom]

This is all so great!  One thing I haven't seen mentioned....does anyone else keep the cat litter pans in the bathroom?

[sunnysandiegan]

We keep our cat litter box in the powder room downstairs...inside the cabinet under the sink (leave one door open at all times). We each have an assigned day of the week to scoop and clean up the surrounding area, so it gets cleaned a minimum of 3 times a week.

[Thing1Thing2]

We have chemical sensitivities- but I cant stand soap scum on the shower walls. I use a metal scouring pad like brillo. :bag

 It's not totally chemical free, but at least you're not breathing in any chemicals. And it leaves my tiles sparkly clean!

[lucifugous]

Awesome suggestions! I always did the mild stuff- wiping down the sink & mirrors regularly, sometimes the toilet and floor as well, and let my ex do the scrubbing! Now it's just DD & I, and she's under three, so not much help.... back to scrubbing for me!! Baking soda does the trick, a spray bottle with vinegar (maybe cut in half, maybe not, depends what kinda dirt I need to tackle!), and rags... but I do want to get some bac out enzyme cleaner again, that was good stuff that I never bothered replacing. We've been in our new place for almost four weeks, so I am ashamed to admit that despite an overall wipedown, the bathroom still has not received the scrubbing it is due. There are spots of some sort of adhesive or something on the tiles, it's so impossible/ discouraging!!! I just give up!