Category Archives: living

How to safely get the mold smell out of towels

Scenario:

You’re wanting to safely get the mold and mildew smell out of your towels or other clothing items.

Solution:

Luckly, there is a very effective safe solution to this.  Vinegar.  White Vinegar is both cheap and safe (you can use it in salad dressingings).  It’s also a very effective cleaner especially when you need to kill mold and mildew.  Put the affected towels or clothing items into the washer and use a quarter gallon of vinegar soaked onto the clothing items (that may seem like a lot but it’s always worked well for me).  Now, run the washer once on warm or hot.  When done with the first run your clothes will likely smell a little like vinegar.  You’re going to run then a second time with your regular laundry detergent.  When this is done, throw them in the drier and they should be as good as new (at least smell wise).

Safe way to clean your dishwasher

Scenario:

You want to clean your dishwasher, how are you going to do it?

Solution:  Vinegar

Simply add one cup of vinegar to the dishwasher and run it on the heavy cycle.  This will help disinfect any bacteria that maybe laying in the dishwasher causing any smells.  Vinegar is one of the safest disinfects we can use when it comes to cleaning in places where our food/plates go. 

 

How to easily clean a humidifier

What you need:

  1. Humidifier
  2. White vinegar
  3. Water

Steps:

  1. Take the humidifier apart and pour out any water from the base and the holding tank. (Check the instructions/manual that came with your humidifier for specific instructions on taking your unit apart)
  2. Put vinegar in both the base and the tank. Most bases can be cleaned then with a toothbrush. If there is mildew buildup you may want to let the vinegar sit overnight and then rinse it and let it dry and air out the next day. A longer sit time with the vinegar will kill a vast majority more of the mold and mildew.

Additional Notes:

Some humdifiers have removeable pieces that can be put in the dishwasher. Check your manual and if yours is one those pieces can then be easily cleaned going that route (or have that as an added step after the vinegar is removed to more quickly let the smell of vinegar disapate). Don’t worry, the smell of vinegar will disapate just by sitting in the air.