For those who have switched from commercial cleaners to vinegar & BS...

Based on internet research, vinegar kills about 99% of molds and a majority of cold and germ viruses. The addition of essential oils not only make the mixture smell pretty, but they add to the germ-killing abilities.

Baking soda is a scouring agent. Because it's a mild alkali (pH 8.0, compared to 7.0 which is the neutral pH of water), it turns grease into soap from saponification and gets rid of dirts and oils. It kills yeast, but it doesn't kill much of any other bacteria. You can combine it with vinegar or essential oils to boost the anti-bacterial/anti-fungal properties.

I've read ingredients of other cleaners and found that sodium bicarbonate (baking soda) and sodium carbonate (washing soda) is the basis of most commercial cleaners. The manufacturers add detergents, colors, fragrances, and other proprietary materials to appeal to certain wants in the public.

Some of it is doing the research and seeing that homemade cleaners can clean effectively without overly-sanitizing your house (which is a problem).

Triclosan is in a lot of soaps and cleaners and though it is a great pesticide and fungicide, it can result in virulent strains of bacteria (super bacteria). If you kill off weaker bacteria, leaving only the biggest, baddest bacteria, you will have the worst strains of bacteria left in your house, causing more illness and allergies. Triclosan may also have some potential environmental and health issues, though I can't think if that is true or not (I can't remember my research).

Anyway, some of the worry is justified and if you truly have something that 's a serious bacteria filled super duty - you can use commercial cleaners. The point is to use natural cleaners as much as possible for health and environmental reasons. If you had an entire house full of poop, it may help to have commercial cleaners to make sure everything is cleaned up quickly and everything is sanitized, but it's not necessary.

If it helps you, you can put a drop or two of food coloring to make your homemade mixtures feel more 'real,' or purchase pretty bottles and essential oils to make everything look and smell better.

For me, it's the whole "wow, it works --- wait, I don't have a huge headache" thing that got me hooked to baking soda, vinegar, and essential oils. My homemade wood furniture and leather polish works SO well and smells so good that I don't even want to use Pledge anymore, not to mention that I usually get contact dermatitis from the Pledge (little blisters all over my hands).

So to sum up, it's about educating yourself, making homemade products that suit YOUR lifestyle, using commercial products when you really need to, and just using homemade stuff enough that you get used to it and you see that it's working.

Try cleaning your fridge with vinegar and when you see your fridge sparkle and all the moldy junk gone (and stay gone), you may be a believer

Perhaps a side by side test with fruit mold in a plastic dish would help??

The only thing that is in commercial cleaners that may help in the ILLUSION of clean is bleach and optical brighteners. Once bacteria is killed by a product, the bacteria is killed but mold and stuff leaves a stain. The bleach takes care of the staining. Vinegar does that to a degree, but Oxygen bleaches or hydrogen peroxide can bleach out the stain (if there is staining).

These links may be of further information and help:

Less Toxic Guide
http://www.lesstoxicguide.ca/index.asp?

Homemade Cleaners
http://www.louisvillecleaning.com/ho...e_cleaners.htm

http://eartheasy.com/live_nontoxic_solutions.htm

How's & Why's of chemicals in cleaning products
http://www.deliciousorganics.com/Con...#Baking%20Soda

Homemade recipes - not all of them are nontoxic (has ammonia or borax sometimes. Bleach is not earth friendly)
http://www.recipegoldmine.com/house/house.html

Potent Peroxide
http://www.stretcher.com/stories/03/03jan06j.cfm

Vinegar stats on mold/bacteria.
Ok, I'm wrong, but it's better than I said. It kills 99% of bacteria, 82% mold, 80% viruses
http://www.care2.com/channels/solutions/home/164

Baking soda pages - this page has even more links within them, check them out
http://frugalliving.about.com/od/bak...ultimatebs.htm

http://frugalliving.about.com/cs/tip...akingsoda1.htm

Learn about the basics of baking soda and why it works for cleaning
www.armandhammer.com

Baking soda and vinegar
http://frugalliving.about.com/cs/tips/a/blbsodavin.htm

Vinegar Pages
http://frugalliving.about.com/cs/tips/a/vinegar.htm

I had some nasty spills and rotten mold spots from spoiled veggie skins, sticky bottoms of condiment bottles, and dripping oil from Chinese hot oil. I used full strength white vinegar for the inside of my fridge, but you can use diluted too.

I wanted to kill all the nastiness and any mold/bacteria, so I used full strength. I pretty much use full strength for my kitchen, but I have cheap materials in my apartment, so it likes full strength vinegar. As for the rest of the kitchen, don't use full strength on anything with grout, marble, or special tiles. For insides of fridge, it's okay though. I like vinegar because it doesn't get majorly soapy and so that none of my food is contaminated with any soapy smells, suds, or cleaning chemicals.

For a bin that was nasty that I didn't want to scrub too much, I took it out, put some dishwashing liquid and some vinegar and let that sit a while (few hours to overnight). It wiped clean.

I think it was hard for me at first to believe that my house was getting clean b/c there wasn't the bubbles that are associated w/other cleaners. Kind of like using bs instead of laundry detergent. No bubbles. Made me wonder if they were really clean. Even using the small amount of detergent that's recommended for a front loader I was leary of. I know the salesman told me that when I see one little bubble in my water, that I had enough detergent. I didn't believe it. I wanted SUDS!!!

I had the same experience when I started using Dr. Burt's toothpaste. No foaming. Were my teeth really clean?! It seemed impossible. I know my dad would only use Burt's in the morning but he insisted when his teeth were really dirty at night he needed to use Crest.

I've got over some of my old school feelings. My toilet/sinks/everything looks great. My family hates the vinegar smell too, but it doesn't last long so they suffer!

Well, pesticides and commercial cleaners do get rid of the worst strains of bacteria, including good bacteria, but the point I was trying to make is that you don't want to kill off all the good bacteria that keep the bad ones in check.

The superbacteria is bad since they can mutate and junk, to put it non-scientifically, lol. The whole 'sanitizing phenomenon' has been shown to stunt people's immune systems, especially children. When you kill off all the stuff in your house, your immune system, in essence, becomes lazy. So when you are exposed to anything outside of your home, your antibody and allergy responses go haywire. The overzealousness of trying to get things super sanitized (which is different from just getting things clean), can even lead to things like the widespread food allergies you see, like to nuts, wheat, and other things.

A study has shown to compare the immune system of lab rats versus street/sewer rats. The lab rats had super sanitized conditions to live in (since it's a lab, and all), and had worse immune systems and less antibodies in their system than the sewer rats. The sewer rats were far healthier in comparison, because their bodies had built up the immunity to nasty stuff naturally.

http://www.livescience.com/othernews...lean_rats.html

Another real world example is -- if you've casually noticed in our American society, and even societies in the rest of the world -- the poorer class of citizens are usually healthier than middle to upper class people. You don't see children in the projects sit there and say "I'm allergic to peanuts, soy, wheat, ragweed, any kind of citrus fruit, and all non-cotton clothing."

I'm not saying to wallow around sitting in your own filth, but it's one thing to clean and one thing to sterilize your home and your family. These kinds of sterility can lead to health issues, like asthma, allergies, even fertility issues. Check out the "Less Toxic Guide" link I posted earlier to see how chemicals in commercial cleaners can affect your endocrine system.

The natural cleaners may take a little more elbow grease on really really dirty areas (like a super caked on dirty oven), but the trick is to leave the solution on longer so it will wipe away clean with minimal effort. Once something is clean, do spot cleaning to prevent the huge caked on messes.

http://www.brookscole.com/chemistry_...icrobials.html

I forgot to mention that full strength white vinegar is used in the farming and restaurant industries to clean machinery and food processing parts.

The reason for this is that it's cheap, doesn't contaminate food or hurt the animals, and it doesn't harm the environment or the machinery.

10 tons or so of baking soda (I'm not sure of the correct amount, but it was in tons) was used to clean the Statue of Liberty in the 80's.

I think it's good enough to use these products in my home

I also talked to an organic biologist who works in Atlanta. While chatting, we got on the topic of bacteria and cleaning and when I mentioned I used baking soda and vinegar, she agreed and said those are great at cleaning; vinegar, she said was exceptional and kills a lot of germs. She said these types are products are good to use since it reduces the chance of allergies, headaches, and other ill-effects from using chemical cleaners.