Clean & Green: 101 Hints and Tips for a More Eco-Friendly Home

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Great British Bake Off winner Nancy has plenty of sustainable tips to share (Picture: Elizabeth Clarke) Nancy reveals that her simple fuss-free way to remove bobbles from a jumper is to gently cut them off with scissors and then place the garment in the washing machine. She says: 'This is my favourite jumper and although it's quite new, it's starting to bobble under the arms due to friction.'

CLEAN AND GREEN WITH NANCY BIRTWHISTLE [106] CLEAN AND GREEN WITH NANCY BIRTWHISTLE

I have been posting ‘Hints and Tips’ and Recipes daily on social media platforms for over 2 years and this book contains many of those daily posts. I have included around 100 recipes within the book, among those recipes is a whole section on ‘free from recipes’ such as gluten free, fat free, low sugar, dairy free, vegetarian and vegan options. Here, Nancy shares some natural swaps to boost your budget and banish harmful toxins from your home. Toilet cleaner Inspired to protect the planet for her ten grandchildren, Nancy decided to change how she used single-use plastic and chemicals in her home and began to share her environmentally friendly, innovative ideas and time-saving swaps with her followers. The next day, pour the water off the jumper and gently squeeze it to remove the excess. Do not rinse, wring or spin. Lay a large clean towel onto a flat surface and on top place the very wet jumper. Gently pull at it lengthways and sideways, stretching the fibres as you go. Take your time in gently remoulding your favourite jumper to its original size and shape. Now Nancy is sharing her tried and tested tips in her books Clean & Green and Green Living Made Easy. Clean & Green is full of natural cleaning ideas and home-made eco-friendly cleaning products, many of which are faster and easier than the go-to products and methods most of us use now. Green Living Made Easy contains 100+ tips on how to live a more eco-friendly life without giving up on any home comforts.I hope you enjoy listening to this as much as I enjoyed recording it – do let me know if you’re tempted to have a go at some homemade cleaning products, or if you’re now going to make the switch to an eco version of one your usual products! We all want to do our best for our homes and the planet, but it's often hard to find the time and energy to think of alternatives. Nancy Birtwhistle makes it easy with 101 indispensable tips, ideas and recipes that will help you to live a more eco-friendly life without giving up on any home comforts.

Nancy Birtwhistle: 8 Secrets For A Sparkling Clean Home Nancy Birtwhistle: 8 Secrets For A Sparkling Clean Home

Once you are satisfied that it looks as it used to, take the towel and start rolling from the bottom, nice and tight, until the jumper is concealed in a huge towel and jumper sausage. Rolling tightly will extract much of the remaining moisture. When the towel feels quite wet, unroll and transfer the jumper to the second towel, which again has been laid out on a flat surface. Nancy Birtwhistle’s plant feed with added benefitWorks a treat on my pine kitchen table, cleans silver and also removed red wine stains from tile grouting – just add a blob of my cream cleaner directly to the stain, rub in with an old toothbrush, leave for a minute or two then wipe off! Learn how easy it is to make simple swaps in your cleaning and tidying methods for a more eco-friendly home. What are you paying for your laundry detergent? Eco-friendly options are up to 72p a wash, supermarket own (not friendly) cost 10 - 13p a wash and my own "eco-blend" is just 10p a wash! I've put it through it's paces,' Nancy says, as she gives her followers a step-by-step guide to making their own. Birtwhistle says citric acid will “dissolve limescale and kill germs. When you move away from bleach, you find all these stains appearing, because all you’ve been doing is bleaching them out, but the limescale is still there. Use citric acid to get rid of that.” She makes her own loo cleaner using 200g citric acid and 150ml water, emulsified with a squirt of eco-friendly washing-up liquid. “The only downside is you need to rinse your nozzle afterwards. Otherwise, it does crystallise there.” Restore shower screens Another one of Nancy's clever tips revealed how she makes her own toilet cleaner. To make her solution, she adds 250g citric acid in a small pan with 125ml water. Then, she stirs it together to form a clear, thin syrup. Once it has been left to cool, Nancy then adds 10-20 drops of lemon or tea tree oil and transfers it into a spray bottle. Take a look at her video to see how it's done...

Recipes – Nancy Birtwhistle Recipes – Nancy Birtwhistle

This is what Birtwhistle uses in her iron, rather than buying expensive distilled “ironing water” or using hard tap water, which can fur up an iron with limescale. She takes it from her water butt a litre at a time. “Boil it and, when it’s cold, add two or three drops of lily of the valley essential oil.” Make an all-purpose cleaner The bicarbonate of soda cleans and gently rubs away stains, the washing-up liquid, while assisting with the clean, also emulsifies the ingredients, and the vegetable glycerine, as well as having gentle cleaning properties (it is used in many skin products), treats and feeds. Going green in the garden has never been easier with Nancy's sustainable, eco-friendly tips that will help you make the most of your space, and what it can grow.

I’m still having to pinch myself a little but I got to spend an hour hanging out and having a chinwag with a past winer of the Great British Bake Off! I met Nancy Birtwhistle, the 2014 winner of my very favourite TV show, virtually, for an event we did together for Glasgow's Aye Write Festival earlier on this year. Nancy has got a book out called Clean and Green, and we were paired up for a talk on Eco Tips for your Home and Family.

cleaning products for your home How to make cheap, non-toxic cleaning products for your home

But Nancy’s approach is really refreshing, and even I have been tempted to have another go, and I was more than a little over-excited to whup up a batch of Nancy’s toilet magic at the weekend and have been delightedly spraying it willy nilly around our looks all this week. It was super easy and seems to be coping with my kids spraying something else willy nilly around our loos well. In a bowl large enough to take the woollen jumper when folded, give 2–3 squirts of hair conditioner and add the vinegar then fill with lukewarm water. Lay the folded jumper onto the bowl of water. No need to submerge it – leave it to absorb the water in its own time and sink to the bottom of the bowl, then leave overnight. The vinegar and hair conditioner will soften the woollen fibres, making them lax and pliable. The next day, pour the water off the jumper and gently squeeze it to remove the excess. Do not rinse, wring or spin. We are all aware now that the chemical-laden cleaning products encased in excess plastic and lurking under our sinks are not just bad for our health and the environment, they also often cost a fortune to boot. The complete guide to growing your own veg from former Bake Off winner and Sunday Times bestselling author Nancy Birtwhistle.Most importantly, I feel, are those little hits and tips which make such a difference in the kitchen and within the home. These nuggets of knowledge have proved super popular amongst my followers and I have weaved them in throughout the book. I learned many of these hints and tips from my grandmother, but I have also found other little gems hidden away in very old 19th century literature. Stir until the liquid is clear and the crystals have dissolved, then simply add the eco-friendly washing-up liquid and tea tree oil and mix well using a small whisk. Note: If your oven shelves have been sprayed or coated with ‘self-clean’ substances, do not use this method. The chemical coating can be damaged by soaking. This method is not suitable for aluminium trays or shelves. Aluminium can be cleaned using bicarb or washing soda, but long soaks cause oxidization. As ever, please do leave a rating and review wherever you get your podcasts – it helps it to climb the charts and more importantly boosts my poor fragile ego no end….