Responsible cleaning

I don't know about you, but nothing makes me roll my eyes higher than cleaning product commercials on TV promoting their disposable (gah! pet peeve numero uno!) and expensive antibacterial products laden with chemicals. I think Mr. Clean oughta be retired.

Organic products and environmental responsibility have gone mainstream and I’m choosing to me optimistic about that. You can now purchase everything from apple sauce to T-shirts to garden fertilizer with the organic label and I think that’s cool. As a consumer, the words “healthy,” “non-toxic,” “organic,” “natural,” “biodegradable,” “cruelty free,” and “recyclable” go a long way with me and I’m libel to snap up and purchase anything that I think will contribute to the health of our household because, darn it, I want to live as long as possible and be in reasonable enough shape to enjoy that long life. There could be a whole other post on the impact of consumerism and how I've been sucked into it, but let's put that aside for now.

Using harsh chemicals to “clean” our house seems, well, counterproductive. For a while now, we’ve been using plain ole (and effective!) vinegar, baking soda, salt and boiling water to clean a wide variety of surfaces in our house as well as some Nature Cleanproducts. And now there’s a new kid in town. They are American, but Method’s products are available at Shopper’s Drug Mart here in Canada and I’m willing to give them a whirl. The products are derived from natural ingredients (which are listed on the label!), toxic-free, biodegradable and the packaging is recyclable. Design gurus may also be interested to know that the bottles and packages where designed by industrial designer Karim Rashid, who has a Canadian connection. Yeah it's a gimmick, but if it gets more people to dump their allegiance to the strong man with an earring, I'm all for it.