Clean Shower Anyone?

Wednesday, March 28, 2012

So I have a conundrum.
I love having clean showers/bathrooms.
I hate cleaning them, especially the shower/tubs. Usually I end up all wet and covered in Comet and tired from scrubbing.
Arizona is synonymous with Hard Water and soap scum.
When we moved back to AZ from Seattle, I asked my husband if we could just pipe the water from Seattle down to AZ.
He said we could, but....
So until then, I'm willing to try different things to clean my shower.  I found one solution on Pinterest.  I just looked for it and it has magically disappeared, but I followed the instructions and I was FLOORED to say the least.
My showers literally looked like new with minimal effort.  No scrubbing.  I promise.

Here's the before pic. Usually I squeegie the glass and it helps alot, but still the AZ water does it's worst.
 Lovely Soap scum on the chrome.  SO nice.

How do I fix this you ask?

It's simple.

Equal parts of Regular White Vinegar, heated up in the microwave until about boiling - 2 minutes; and Blue Dawn diswashing liquid.

That's it.

Put the hot vinegar and dawn in a spray bottle, shake slightly and go to town.

I did 3/4 cups of each and had enough to liberally do my glass shower, including the marble walls and floor.

Note: The vinegar smell is really strong.  Turn on the bathroom fans and open the windows if you are highly sensitive to smell.  My kids asked what that smell was and I told them it's the smell of clean showers!

 When I first tried it, I was worried that the blue Dawn would stain the white marble and fiberglass.  Nope!  So awesome!

Now let it sit for  a few hours.  Longer if you have really bad scum.  Then get a regular kitchen sponge, and a bucket of water and wipe down the walls.  It does take a lot of water since you're using Dawn and it gets all bubbly.
 Here's some after shots.

 It beautifully took all the soap scum off the fixtures too.  My bathroom seriously looks brand new.
I didn't want to use the shower this morning because I didn't want to mess it up.  Nope.  I'm clean and so is my shower.  BONUS!

I was so excited I decided to try a few other things.

Here's what I tried and the verdict:

Marble and Glass showers: Awesome.  Definitely do again and again.

Fiberglass tub/shower: Awesome. Do again and again.

Toilet bowl: It worked well and I was very happy with the results. I will do it again.

Bathroom Counters/Sinks/Fixtures: I was happy with the results.  They definitely look brand new, but it takes a lot of water to clean up the dawn, not scrubbing mind you, but wiping away all the bubbles.  My 4 year old asked if I was making bubble pies in the sinks.  I had to use paper towels to finish up the job.  I may do this again, but it's much easier just to spray everything with 409.  I will probably use the vinegar/dawn on occation but not regularly.

Stainless Steel Kitchen sink: It's clean but doesn't look brand new. I'm on the fence about using it again.

Glasstop Stove: Again it's clean, but it was a lot of wiping, rinsing, and wiping to get all the soap gone.  I probably won't use it again.

I don't know how this will work for Tile showers since I don't have any.  I'd love to hear how it works if you have tile.

I also won't use it on my floors.  Too much water for clean up.  My kids would love sliding around on soapy floors but I definitely won't love cleaning up all the soapy water.  Maybe if I had a drain in the center of the kitchen I might consider it.  But since that would be weird and I don't want to put one it... there you go.

Honestly I've never been excited about cleaning showers until now.
Weird I know but hey... I have clean bathrooms.
Do you? ;)

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