For new parents or large families, a clean bathroom (mirrors too!) and windows can sometimes feel like a luxury. When all sorts of stains and gunk are building up and there’s little time to clean, you want what little cleaning time you have to be used efficiently and effectively. Fortunately, we have some killer tips on how to keep your bathrooms clean and your mirrors and windows shining using natural ingredients and convenient cleaning hacks!

If you’re worried about having to attack the mess in your bathroom with industrial strength cleaners and highly toxic solutions, don’t be! Kristin Marr of Live Simply has an excellent all-natural DIY bathroom cleaner that’s easy to make (and probably smells fantastic with the tea tree and sweet orange essential oils) and makes short work of tough messes. This solution can be used to clean the tub, sink, toilet, tile and floor of a bathroom, and can even be used as a stain remover for carpets and rugs. For best results, you’ll want to spray the solution on the area that needs cleaning, allow 30 seconds for the solution to settle and then wipe it clean with a microfiber cloth.

With the help of www.bookingmaideasy.com, we got input into another equally effective old-school solution which is creating a 50-50 mix of vinegar and water that will be able to handle the majority of your bathroom’s surfaces (mirrors and windows included). A paste of baking soda and water can be used to tackle tougher stains or gunk (sub water for vinegar if you’re still having trouble). Lastly, grout between tiles can be cleaned with a sprinkle of baking soda and a spritz of undiluted hydrogen peroxide, though be cautious not to use too much. Again, a microfiber cloth is recommended as the cleaning cloth of choice. They’re extremely easy to wash, are great for tackling tough stains and absorb all manner of liquid.

Lastly, to keep windows and mirrors sparkling, try using a newspaper instead of a traditional cleaning cloth. The 50/50 water mix mentioned earlier is again a great glass cleaner but for more stubborn streaks or stains, 2 cups of boiled water, a ¼ cup of vinegar and ½ a teaspoon of castile soap should do the trick. The neat thing about using a newspaper to clean glass is that the rough nature of newsprint paper and the ink on the pages combine to act as a light abrasive and will destroy stains without damaging the surface. To clean, start by dipping the newspaper in the cleaning solution or spraying it on the surface. Begin with a circular pattern to get all the spots and marks, and switch to vertical and horizontal strokes as needed to remove remaining cleaning solution until the surface is streak free. Viola! There you have a sparkling, streak-free glass surface.

Any questions or feedback? Don’t hesitate to contact Maidstr, Toronto’s and Guelph’s trusted on-demand home cleaning service.