So Ben and I were doing a bit of tidying and cleaning yesterday as we were hosting a game night at our house. I usually clean our bathrooms with a concoction of water, distilled white vinegar and lemon essential oil. Sometimes I use a bit of baking soda separately to get a good scrubbing action going on! But anyway, I momentarily forgot when I was cleaning that there is usually a lingering smell of vinegar, which I don't really want guests smelling. It can be quite an intrusive smell!
After cleaning the guest bathroom, I was in the kitchen putting some items back in a drawer thinking about how I don't have any air freshener or nice smelling candles to help with the smell. When it dawned on me that I could make my own! I bought a 6 pack of very small tupperware boxes in a reduced section a few months back so I thought one of these would be ideal. After asking him if he had anything that I could make holes in the lid with, Ben offered to make some small holes with his knife for me. I will explain the rest below along with what you'll need.
Ingredients and items that you'll need
- A small tub or tupperware with a thin lid to put holes in. I have also seen a mason jar used before with the main part of the lid removed and paper with holes to slot in.
- A utensil for making holes in the lid.
- Baking Soda.
- Any essential oil that you would like to smell. I used lemon this time around, but I also debated using lavender.
How to put it all together
Step one: Start by making evenly spaced holes in the lid. How many will depend on the size of the container. Ben very kindly put in 9 for me*.
Step two: Fill the container about one half to two thirds of the way with baking soda.
Step three: Add drops of your essential oil into the baking soda. Again how much will depend on the size of the tub and also the room you wish to freshen up. Between 10-20 drops should be enough.
Step four: Mix the essential oil into the baking soda using a spoon or I just used my finger.
Step five: Place the lid firmly back onto the tub and give it a gentle side-to-side shake to finish mixing.
Step six: That's it! Place it somewhere in the house where it's not likely to get wet and where you'd like a fresh fragrance. Or you can put one in multiple rooms. I've just put this on the top of our toilet for now but may change this at some point. Just make sure it's out of reach of young children (that much is obvious I guess).
Tip: You'll need to give the container a gentle side-to-side shake every now and then to help re-distribute the smell. You will also need to add an extra drop of essential oil periodically.
So there you go, your own homemade air freshener! I hope you've enjoyed my first DIY post. Mine doesn't exactly look pretty but it's functional. Don't expect instant results or anything (like I did, *ahem*) as it's rather a gentle way to fragrance a room. But in the end, the vinegar smell had pretty much dissipated by the time guests arrived yesterday evening.
If you try this or if you have a different simple way to freshen your home, be sure to let me know in the comments below!
Take care for now everyone.
Kathryn
Note: In the short time of using the air freshener I discovered that the holes were too small to effectively let the fragrance out into the room. So you'd either need to make the holes a lot bigger than I did, or leave the top off completely.