You know, I never really considered the importance of natural cleaning or “green cleaning” in my home until after I had my son, Eli.  I always thought, the stronger the chemical...the better.  A few years ago, I had come to the realization that my mother, grandmother, and her mother knew back then what I would eventually realize as an adult running a household.  They used natural, chemical-free cleaning products, like vinegar for a reason!

I remember my mom and grandma filling the kitchen and bathroom sinks with warm water and vinegar.  I never understood the reason, actually, I never even gave it much thought at all…until I was a mom!  Vinegar is a miraculous liquid.  Really, if you think about it, it is.  You can drink it, you can make salad dressing with it, you can pickle and can foods with it.  You can mop the floors with it, you can sanitize with it, it deodorizes stinky places, and eat through hard water deposits, ohh – and it cuts through grease and grime like nobody’s business!  It’s the most versatile thing ever and makes for healthy cleaning!

Because it’s all natural and because it does such a fantastic job at cleaning…it’s the perfect all purpose cleaner to have especially if you have children and pets because it won’t harm them – at all!  I actually put vinegar in my dogs food daily to help protect her from fleas!  It works…promise!

Heinz has recently launched a NEW product called Heinz Cleaning Vinegar!  Don’t let the word “cleaning” scare you from using it.  It has no soap or chemicals in it at all!  It’s just vinegar, only less diluted than regular vinegar so that it does a better job at all things related to cleaning.  As a matter of fact, right on the bottle it says, “Safe for cooking, perfect for cleaning”. You can find it at Walmart in the grocery department.

*Look for it in the grocery section, right beside the other vinegar products…in the same aisle as the pickles and salad dressing.

I had never tried it until now and I bought some to give it a whirl.  It does work harder and quicker than regular vinegar and it was only $2.98 for a big ole’ jug!

Some things I personally like to clean with vinegar, and other uses:

• Mopping wood floors, especially if you have older hardwood floors that need TLC.
• Stove, countertops, cabinets, fridge, microwave, other appliances (makes the fridge smell fresh and clean)
• Bathroom; toilets, showers, tubs, sinks (cuts through hard water deposits)
• Toys and Eli’s Thomas the Tank table where he sits to eat
• Mirrors (leaves no streaks!!)
• Sticky stuff – removes anything sticky (stickers, glue, gum)
• Coffee Pot – We get hard water buildup inside the coffee pot and I run a couple pots of vinegar through to clean it out
• Give the dog a squirt or 2 from a spray bottle mixed with a little water before going outside to keep fleas from jumping on him/her
• Vinegar makes a great weed-killer in flower beds/gardens

I tested a few of the tough spots in the kitchen with the new Heinz Cleaning Vinegar.  Here are some before/after photos.

I don’t know about you, but I could clean the refrigerator door handle 10 times a day.  That’s what happens I guess when you have a 6 year old who won’t stay outta the fridge!  There’s peanut butter on there to prove it! The Heinz Cleaning Vinegar cleaned it up in a snap, and even some of the stuck on stuff…plus it made it nice and shiny!

Then I opened the inside of the fridge.  I had noticed a “blob” of stuff in there earlier before.  With it being higher up in the fridge, I think this was something that my older 43 year old man-child did!  He’s good for that kind of stuff!  Whatever it was, was sticky and kinda stuck on.  Without the vinegar, I probably would have taken a butter knife to scrape it off.  Yes, I’m one of “those” who uses butter knives for things other than spreading butter!  With the vinegar though, it came off easily!

Remember the 43 year old man-child I just spoke of?  That would be my husband.  Said husband is also the cook of our humble abode.  When he cooks, he doesn’t care who or what is in his path!  He’s like a tornado in the kitchen.  The stove photo above, is the after effects of his night of “chili makin”.  Grease splatters from frying ground beef and then tomato sauce splatters from letting the chili boil too hard.  Utter chaos!  We made a pact years ago when we got married, he cooks and I clean!  So, within just 4 minutes of using the Heinz Cleaning Vinegar, the stove was sparkling clean!  It cut through the grease and splatters as if they were just drops of water!

You can see my complete trip to Walmart to pick it up, plus everything else I cleaned using the vinegar in my Google+ Going Green #HeinzVinegar Cleaning album.

Vinegar has always been a major cleaning supply of mine, well, at least since I’ve been a mom.  I’m happy with this new Heinz Cleaning Vinegar and it will remain the main cleaning supply in our household.  Make sure you give it a try and let us know what you think!  What other natural cleaning solutions do you use?  We’d love to hear those too!

I am a member of the Collective Bias Social Fabric Community.  This shop has been compensated as part of a social shopper insights study for Collective Bias and HEINZ #CBias #SocialFabric.  All opinions are 100% my own, and honest as always.