5 Ways to Clean with Olive Oil

Delicious, rich and healthy olive oil. When you think of that gorgeous, green-tinted oil you likely think of whipping up some fresh vinaigrette - not cleaning with the stuff. But, olive oil is a useful cleaner for nearly every room in the house. Here are five of my favorite ways to use olive oil to clean your home:

1. Remove fingerprints and smudges from stainless steel. Just a tiny amount of olive oil (any type - light, extra virgin, etc.) on a soft cloth will buff out any fingerprints, smudges or marks on stainless steel. Just literally a few drops will do the trick. Don't use too much oil or you'll be left with an oily residue.
2. Polish wood. I like a combination of olive oil and a little squeeze of lemon to polish wooden furniture or surfaces - but even a wee bit of olive oil alone will give you a lovely, shiny clean wooden surface. Adding the lemon also  makes it smell wonderful.
3. Polish leather furniture. Whether it's leather chairs at the dining room table, or leather sofas or couches, a tiny bit of olive oil on a soft cloth will buff that surface up beautifully.
4. Add moisture to wooden utensils. Especially in dry climates, wooden utensils, spoons and wooden cutting boards need a little love and attention. Rub some olive oil into the wood and watch the wood soak it up like a thirsty little sponge!
5. Remove glue and other sticky stuff. A bit of olive oil left to sit on sticky residue (such as leftover goo from a price tag or sticker) will make it easy to gently scrape it off.

Those are my favorite uses - now, do you have a secret way to clean with olive oil? Share it in a comment!

5 Ways to Use Q-Tips to Clean

No, not your ears! (Did you know that you're not supposed to use Q-tips to clean out those gunky ears? I still do...but I've heard that using a watered down concoction of hydrogen peroxide or even slightly warmed olive oil will do the trick more safely.)

Q-tips are handy little cleaners for around the house. Here are 5 ways to use Q-tips to clean things OTHER than your ears:

1. Clean jewelry - those little grooves and edges can be a nightmare to clean! Use some jewelry cleaning solution and a Q-tip swab to clean out even the tightest areas of your favorite jewellery.


2. Clean around the edges of sinks - Ewwww...looked at that edging around your sinks lately? It's gunkville! A soft Q-tip dislodges the dirt, and then a clean cloth will just wipe it all away.


3. Clean between keyboard keys - Another disgusting area for dirt, grime and certainly germs to gather. Use a Q-tip to get to hard to reach areas of your keyboard. The tapered end type of cotton swabs would be especially useful to get into those really tricky spots.


4. Use Q-tips to polish silver. No, not Grandma's old and overly large platter! Those little areas on tiny trinkets that are otherwise hard to reach will do very well with a bit of polish smeared on a Q-tip. And yes, I think this might be the first time ever on this blog that I've ever mentioned polishing silver. (I'm not a polishing silver type, you might say. Oh, or an owning silver type either.)


5. Use Q-tips to clean up oopsies with nail polish. This is more a cleaning up YOU tip than a cleaning your home tip. When applying nail polish, it's so frustrating when you get that gorgeous bright red smeared messily beyond your nail. A cotton swab dipped in nail polish remover is a quick and easy solution for this messy situation.

Have another Q-tip cleaning tip to share? Comment!