Homemade Dusting Spray

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Part of the Three Rivers challenge for us was to get rid of more of the toxins in our house. As our cleaners started to run out I was going to replace them with some toxin-free versions to help the overall health of our home. Pledge is full of toxins so I knew homemade dusting spray was going to be at the top of that list.

Fertility and Toxins

As our journey with fertility has evolved I started to realize just how many toxins are in our environment. In 2019 I had a Grove membership but then I learned more about the products that they were selling. Some of them were great and worth making the switch. On the downside, there were a lot of brands that were greenwashed and I was naive and bought them. I even did a post all about greenwashing because it’s so hard to navigate! I still recommend them as a better option for people but they aren’t the best option out there.

Unfortunately, most of the best options in the market are also pricey too. If you know anything about me and this blog you will know that I’m all about frugality. I want to get the job done but I also want to save money wherever possible. One of the best ways that I have found to do this is to make our own cleaners. 

One of the first cleaners I decided to make was dusting spray. Prior to making our own I had used Pledge. I loved the smell of it- so lemony fresh! Plus, it was just what my mom used while we were growing up so I was used to it and knew the brand well. I foolishly trusted that these cleaners were safe because people had been using them for years.

Non-Toxic Journey

When I started researching fertility and the things that could help us conceive I incidentally fell into a non-toxic journey. I had a friend that had just joined an essential oils company and my sister was also stumbling down the same path with me. Amongst the three of us the information we were able to share was incredibly eye opening. 2020 was truly the tipping point for me. I even added a goal for 2021 as simply cleaning out the rest of the toxins in our home. I realize we can’t get out of everything because our furniture is sprayed with chemicals, there may be medicines that we need to take, and we do still eat out so it’s still part of our world but we’re going to do the best we can to get make our house as non-toxic as possible. 

Having two dogs means lots of dusting in our house and, to be honest, I did some extra dusting just to try to get to the bottom of my cleaners. It was a win-win scenario, we had a much cleaner house and we were also working towards being toxin free without wasting anything. I will reiterate, I do not recommend that you go throw out all of your chemicals. That’s not practical and I wouldn’t want you to feel like you should go broke just because you want to live a more non-toxic lifestyle. That is also why I will be teaching you how to make your own homemade dusting spray today! 

Fragrance

The one thing that you hear about the most when you start to take a non-toxic journey is fragrance. Think of your favorite cleaners and candles- they’re generally your favorite because they have a scent that is so great. With Pledge we got that fresh lemon scent that just made me feel like everything was clean. The truth about fragrance is that it generally contains phthalates, which is a carcinogen, that can cause decreased sperm counts, diabetes, and breast cancer. Just one little fragrance can actually contain 14 different chemicals that the manufacturer doesn’t have to list on the label.

Just this one ingredient was enough for me to step back and look at the things that I had in my house. Even after a couple months of swapping out toxins I could tell the difference. My husband made the mistake of putting one of those super cheap air freshener trees in his truck and I could barely ride in it. The scent gave me such a headache that I was completely miserable. When you start removing these things from your life, don’t be surprised if you all of the sudden feel like you have a super sniffer. Every fragrance is much stronger when you aren’t use to smelling any of them any of the time. Essential oils are the very best way to make your cleaners smell good without the harmful chemicals. The other way is to use infused vinegar which helps reuse some waste too!

Supplies needed:

Glass Spray Bottle (this is something to “splurge” on because plastic can also have a lot of chemicals in it that you don’t want in your home)

Olive Oil

Vinegar (this can be infused for extra scent)

Water

Essential Oil (you can use any scent that you want, I chose lemongrass because it has that fresh clean smell to it)

Funnel (this is optional but I find that it’s worth having one around)

The Recipe for Homemade Dusting Spray:

1 cup water

¼ cup vinegar

2 tbsp olive oil

10-15 drops essential oil

Simply add all of the ingredients in this order to your spray bottle. That’s it! They don’t have to be in any certain order either. I actually did one and a half of this batch to fill my spray bottle and it worked very well. You will definitely want to shake the bottle before you spray each time. The olive oil always settles up at the top but after you shake it up you are good to spray a little and clean a little. Some might find that annoying but I think it’s worth it to save me a little money and also have a toxin free cleaner. 

Happy cleaning, friends. May your home always stay dust free!