I have had a dirty little secret!Everyone always tells me how clean my house is. It's not really. Not since I've had kids. You've seen those cute little signs, Excuse the mess, we are busy making memories or Excuse the mess, we live here? Well that's not really my style. In fact, my house is nothing like the clean it used to be before the kids. I've grown more accustomed to the mess, but so many little things tend to get over looked these days. Many people have exciting goals like running a marathon or skydiving (and I may have just become the biggest loser because I just googled Common goals people have, because I couldn't come up with 2 good ideas), you know what I've always wanted? To put my house on the market and have the ad say, "Mrs. Clean lives here". I'm not kidding, I actually told my realtor I wanted that on my add. She said, your house will sell itself. OK, she was right, but I really wanted that at the time. One thing I've been over-looking lately is my kitchen cabinets. I'm home cleaning today and thought, maybe today's the day to get that grease off the cabinets. Now keep in mind, these are just the cabinets over the stove, and grease is always building up on these cabinets. I wipe down my cabinets frequently, since they are white and show any dirt, but I do tend to "overlook" these top cabinets because I never could seem to get the grime off with much success. I have those god-awful therma-foil and for lack of a better term the surface is "pockey". That means there is a little texture that allows dirt and grease to accumulate. The picture shows best how greasy these cabinets were. I've tried many products before, but today I decided to go for some simple soft scrub and a warm dish rag. I love the lemon scent and use this for a lot of my cleaning. I poured it on my dishcloth and just rubbed it on the grease, and just like that, all of the grease and grime came off. I've tried many other cleaners and de-greasers and seriously never got such great results with barely any elbow grease at all. I might suggest if you are working over your head that you wear some protective eyewear, because trust me when I say, you don't want your break from cleaning to involve trying to get soap out of your eye! Just sayin. Check out the before and afters. It's really pretty amazing!

Supply list:

Perlite, Sphagnum Peat Moss, Portland Cement, Water, Cooking Spray (I used Pam), Large bucket or something to mix your ingredients in, Rubber gloves, Particle mask, Safety glasses, Various plastic or cardboard containers to use as molds

Wear your rubber gloves, particle mask and safety glasses!!! Portland cement can be nasty if inhaled, gets on your skin or in your eyes. Don't make me come over there and put them on you!

Mix equal parts of Perlite, Sphagnum Peat Moss and Portland cement. Add enough water to make it a cottage cheese like consistency.

Spray your containers with cooking spray and then fill the areas between the two items with the mixture.

Wrap your planters-to-be in a plastic garbage bag and patiently wait for them to harden. I let mine dry for 24 hours in the bag and then 4 days outside the bag.

A little more detail can be found on my post, which is linked below, and I also show you how to make a sphere.

Warning - these are sort of addictive to make. You will find yourself making them in all sorts of shapes and sizes.

#OutdoorProjects

and flower pot finials. I added a decorative piece of steel as a topper and put some stepping stones in front of it. This is my "secret" door to nowhere.

kitchen supplies as well as miscellaneous items.

#OrganizedHome

#MyKitchen

#ProudestDIY

my shower doors that's from soap & hard water. I used the safe combination of baking soda and white vinegar to remove the soap scum. Then I applied Rain-X to the shower door glass to prevent this from happening again, or at the very least stop me from having to clean the doors as frequently.

I wanted to share this process because it worked better than I thought it would. You can view the blog post I put together at http://www.homerepairtutor.com/clean-shower-....

If you don't do anything else you should view the video. Not only does it walk you through everything I did it shows you one crucial action I forgot to take-comb my hair before filming! But I don't mind embarrassing myself for the Hometalk community.

#Bestof2012