Pinterest Shower Cleaner

I've seen several pins on this amazing shower cleaner. All the posts on it are the same, but this one from Fabulously Frugal has a good explanation on how to make it.

My friend at One and One Eighth Danish also posted about how this cleaner makes an unpleasant chore (scrubbing the shower) a little less unpleasant.

Now, I live in an older house. And as is sometimes the case in older homes, I have "old shower/tub syndrome". Ok I just made that up as I was typing. But, you know, old showers that just look dingy? No matter how much I scrub, our painfully tiny (that's a separate issue) shower never looks clean. The grout is dirty, there are stains, rust, who knows, stuff that just never comes off no matter what cleaner I use.

So, when I saw all these amazing reviews of this magical stuff, I had to give it a try.

Something I also noticed is that of all the people raving about this cleaner, no one posts before and after pics. Now, Fabulously Frugal did post a before and after. However, her before looked like something a washcloth and some water could've easily cleaned. So, it's well, not that impressive.

I know, it's not everyone's fault that they don't have "old shower syndrome".

So, here I go showing you my nasty old shower. I have no shame.

Here is the before of a corner of our shower where this black - I don't know what it is - stuff has always been. I've tried bleach, baking soda and vinegar, various types of all purpose cleaner, this really expensive "miracle" cleaner I bought from a door-to-door salesman (yes, I did fall for the sales pitch) and anything else I thought might remove this black stuff. None of it worked.

It's sort of just become another part of the awesome 80's tile pattern that our shower is clearly rockin'.

Here it is after. I did not intentionally take the "after" picture further away :) It is not completely gone, but it is much better than any of the aforementioned cleaners.

Here is another wall:

I know what you're thinking. "I can't believe she is showing us all her dirty shower" and "these pictures are terrible" and "that tile is truly an amazing work of art, like straight out of a time capsule".

It's true. I am slightly mortified at sharing how gross my shower looks, but it's for the greater good, people. How else would you know exactly how well (or not so well) this cleaner works? The pictures are bad because, like I said before, my shower is teeny, tiny. Like, I can barely stand in it and turn around, tiny. There is no natural light in our bathroom and I was using my phone camera. This is not a photography blog, people. And, lastly, don't go thinking about getting some tile put in to replicate this masterpiece. It's an original. Let's keep it that way.

Here is the same wall all covered in the cleaner:

I let the cleaner sit while I cleaned other areas of the bathroom. Some have said they let it sit overnight, others say they wipe it off right away. Now, let me just say that I did not merely wipe this stuff off. It was full on scrubbing. Lots and lots of scrubbing. I even had a small knuckle injury that I contemplated taking a picture of to show how much I really did scrub (even some of the skin off my knuckle), but decided that was kind of weak. And, well, I'm no weenie. But, just know, this was hard work.

Here it is after:

My review of this cleaner:

1. I had way too high of expectations for it (i.e. it won't give me new tile and new grout and it won't prevent me from having to scrub)

2. It worked better than all of the other cleaners I have tried over the 8+ yrs we've lived in this house.

3. While, it didn't get the grout as clean as I would've liked, there was some nice sparkle to those tiles (not sure if you can tell in the pic) and that required very little scrubbing.

4. I also used it on the sinks and counters and other areas and liked the results.

5. I hear it works on shower doors (we have a curtain, not a door) really well, getting off the build up that seems so hard to get rid of.

So.....

I like it.

It's good.

I'll keep using it.

If you don't have "old shower syndrome", you may love it a whole lot more than me :)




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