Another Cleaning Pin

Well, I've finally had time to use another cleaning pin. I must make a couple of statements before I tell you if it worked or not. First, the floor in the picture that I'm going to post is in no way a reflection on the cleanliness of the rest of my house. This section of floor is where the dog's water bowls sit, and I don't know what the funky mess is that they leave behind, but nothing I have tried has gotten it off. I have used bleach and a toothbrush, Soft Scrub, you name it. Second, I don't know whose idea it was to put the white tile floors in the kitchen, but when I find out, they're gonna hear about it. At least they had the decency to use dark grout.

This is the culprit. We have two dogs, 

but he's the messy drinker. 

Ok... so this pin says that a mixture of ammonia, vinegar, baking soda and water is the "best" grout cleaner. It's simple, and the ingredients are cheap, so I had to try it. I mixed it all up as is said to in an old coffee container. I poured it on the area and waited a few minutes. Then I had to get a towel and chase the mixture across the floor. After I did that, I went back to what I was doing. I got one of those green Scotch Brite scrub pads and went to work. To my amazement, it was actually working. The junk was coming off of the floor. For good measure, I got a toothbrush and went over the stubborn spots again. 

Before

After

For the most part, it all came off. There are a couple of spots along the grout line that wouldn't give, but it's a vast improvement. I think I'm going to get a placemat to put under the bowls from now on. 

Fritattas

I have just recently discovered that I like eggs (after 34 years). I am especially fond of breakfast burritos and breakfast that is portable. I saw this pin and had to try it. 

These are my results.

The original recipe called for 1/2 tsp of salt. I found that this was a little much. I ended up making two batches. One was the original recipe, and the other was with just a sprinkle of salt. I put ham, hashbrowns and cheddar cheese in one row, and sausage, hashbrowns and cheddar cheese in the rest. My oven tends to cook unevenly, so I had to turn the pan around and add another 5 minutes to the 25 minute cooking time.


I tried a little piece of one of the ham ones, and it was really good. I'm going to bag these up and take a couple with me to work in the morning, along with a small bowl of salsa.

My first "official" trial...

I have actually pinned and tried several things before, but didn't take pictures of them. This is the first time I have actually remembered to take pictures of my project.


I really hate cleaning. I hate it so much that if I ever win the lotto, the first thing I'm doing is getting a maid. I think I hate cleaning the bathroom the most. Today I finally had time and motivation at the same time, so I tackled the despised chore. I had a couple of pins that I wanted to try, so armed with my supplies I got started.


The first pin was for the tub. I love baths, so my tub gets it's fair share of use. We also use this tub to bathe the little one, and she adores tub crayons. Needless to say, this fixture was in need of some TLC. I saw this pin and couldn't believe my eyes. Her grimy tub (made me feel better about mine) was white where she had used the mixture. I set about mixing up the dawn and vinegar, squirted it on and went about my other cleaning chores. After waiting and hour as the post said, I didn't see any change. Even rinsing the tub out didn't help. I ended up having to go back my tried and true Soft Scrub. In fact, I had to use a Mr. Clean eraser to get some of the crayon off. I even tried this one out in my shower, to no avail. I apologize for the lighting in the pictures.

The shower before. Sadly, also the shower after.

 

The tub before. Again, also the tub after.

The second pin was for the sink. The drains always get nasty black junk that builds up. I don't even want to know what it is. This pin* says that baking soda and boiling water is the answer. While I was waiting to see how the tub solution was going to work, I boiled water and poured baking soda down the drain. I followed the baking soda with the boiling water. It foamed up and sizzled. Ten minutes later, I poured some bleach down the drain as the post instructed. Unfortunately this didn't work either. It did get rid of some of the black goo, but some of it was still there, just lighter in color. I will try this one again later on to see if there was just too much goo for one treatment.

This is the sink before. I wiped the inside of the
drain with a  Q-tip to show the goo.

This is the sink after.

I am still on a search for something that will clean the floor of my shower. If there are any good ones out there, please let me know.


Craftin' Mama

And so it begins...

We had a family gathering for our parent's 50th anniversary this past weekend and the subject of Pinterest came up. My sister, my niece and I all have tons of things pinned that we want to try.

We decided that it would be fun to blog about the things that we have tried and how they turned out. Hopefully this is the beginning of a wonderful thing! Come back often and see what we've created.

Craftin' Mama