Showing posts with label eco friendly. Show all posts
Showing posts with label eco friendly. Show all posts

Friday, August 28, 2026

Underdog Kitchen Review — Spongemail Eco Sponges



Underdog Kitchen is a small, sustainability‑focused brand that’s already earned multiple awards for these products. Their mission is simple: make everyday cleaning products eco‑friendly, plastic‑free, and enjoyable to us, and they’re doing it with style.

I had the chance to try out three of the Spongemail eco kitchen sponges from Underdog Kitchen, and these might be the cutest, most creative cleaning products I’ve ever reviewed. The company has a really fun concept: each sponge is designed to look like a USA landmark, pets, and fine‑art illustrations. Mine featured Michigan themes — Great Lakes, Lake Michigan, and Lakehouse Memories.


What Makes These Sponges Different

These aren’t your typical kitchen sponges. They’re made from 100% plastic‑free compressed cellulose, which means:

  • They’re biodegradable

  • They’re naturally absorbent

  • They expand to full size when wet

  • They don’t shed microplastics into your sink or the environment

When you first open them, they’re thin and postcard‑flat, but as soon as you run them under water, they puff up into full‑size, sturdy kitchen sponges.

The printed artwork is a limited‑edition feature, and it’s not just decorative. It’s functional. The designs fade over time, acting as a built‑in reminder that it’s time to replace your sponge. No guessing or sniff‑tests.


The three designs I received were:

  • Great Lakes

  • Lake Michigan U.S.A.

  • Lakehouse Memories

They look like vintage travel stamps, with bold colors, nostalgic artwork, and a really charming aesthetic. If you’re someone who loves themed décor or cute kitchen accessories, these are an instant win. Check out my short video of the sponges expanding to see how they go from flat to squishy in seconds.


Performance & Use

Once expanded, the sponges are:

  • Soft but durable

  • Great for everyday dishwashing

  • Strong enough for counters and stovetops

  • Easy to rinse clean

  • Quick‑drying

They don’t get slimy, they don’t crumble, and they don’t have that weird synthetic smell some sponges get after a few uses. They’re also gentle enough for nonstick cookware. These designs are part of their limited‑edition patriotic and regional collections, and they release new themes regularly, so check back often to see what they have available.

Final Thoughts

These sponges are adorable, functional, and genuinely eco‑friendly which is a rare combination. I love that they start as flat “stamps,” expand in water, and slowly fade as a reminder to replace them. The Michigan designs are beautiful, and the quality is excellent. If you’re looking to reduce plastic in your home or just want kitchen tools that make you smile, Underdog Kitchen is worth checking out.

Connect with Underdog Kitchen

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Tuesday, July 28, 2026

Bar & Bar Shampoo Bars


Bar & Bar is a small, eco‑focused haircare company known for their solid shampoo and conditioner bars. Their mission centers around reducing plastic waste, using clean ingredients, and creating salon‑quality formulas without the environmental footprint of traditional bottled products. Their bars come in recyclable, low‑waste packaging and are designed to last far longer than a standard bottle of shampoo, making them a favorite among people looking to switch to greener haircare options.


Unboxing & First Look

In my unboxing video, you’ll see my first reaction to the bars. Let me tell you, the scent hit me as soon as I opened the box. The fragrance I received was Cashmere & Shea Flower, which has this earthy‑fresh blend that feels both cozy and clean at the same time. The bars themselves are a nice size, solid and substantial. The packaging is eco‑friendly, simple, and recyclable. Exactly what you want from a sustainable brand.

The scent alone made me excited to try them, but the texture and weight of the bars also gave me confidence that they’d hold up well in the shower without crumbling or melting too fast. If you want to compare scents or formulas, check out Bar & Bar product options.


Taking the
@authorlauradeluca Take a peek 👀 at the unboxing I did last week for Bar and Bar shampoo bars and check back tonight for my full blog review! #unboxing #BeautyEssentials #HairCare #shampoobars ♬ original sound - Laura Deluca
Hair Quiz

Before choosing my bars, I took the Bar & Bar hair quiz, which helps match you with the right shampoo and conditioner based on your hair type, concerns, and styling habits. Since I dye my hair, the quiz recommended the Bond & Repair set, a formula designed for damaged hair, split ends, and color‑treated strands. The Bond & Repair bars are meant to strengthen hair, reduce breakage, and improve overall texture. They also smell amazing, which is always a bonus.


One‑Week Test & Results

I used the Bond & Repair shampoo and conditioner bars for one full week, and I noticed a difference almost immediately. My hair had more volume, looked shinier, and felt lighter, without that waxy or coated feeling some bar shampoos leave behind. A few things worth noting for anyone new to shampoo bars:

  • They lather really well. Some bars barely foam, but Bar & Bar creates a rich, creamy lather that feels like traditional shampoo.
  • They rinse clean. No residue, no heaviness, no weird film.
  • They’re concentrated. A little goes a long way, so the bar lasts much longer than a bottle.
  • They’re travel‑friendly. No spills, no TSA issues, no bulky bottles.
  • They smell incredible. The Cashmere & Shea Flower scent stays subtle in your hair without being overpowering.

By the end of the week, my hair looked healthier and felt smoother, especially at the ends which is always the hardest part when you color your hair regularly. If you’re curious about formulas for color‑treated hair, explore Bond & Repair options.


Final Thoughts

If you’ve been thinking about switching to bar shampoo, Bar & Bar is a fantastic brand to start with. Their bars are long‑lasting, eco‑friendly, beautifully scented, and genuinely effective, especially if you struggle with damage or dryness from coloring your hair. The Bond & Repair set gave me noticeable results in just a week, and I’m excited to keep using it. For anyone wanting a greener haircare routine without sacrificing performance, these bars are absolutely worth trying.

Connect with Bar and Bar

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Friday, May 25, 2018

SoapStandle




SoapStandle, the NEW handy and eco-friendly tool that is changing the bar soap industry!

For many people, bar soap is a thing of the past. Most of us have switched over to liquid soap to avoid the soap goo that is left behind when you finish using a bar of soap. But if the goo is eliminated, bar soap becomes a viable option for many people – and that’s where SoapStandle steps in!

Made of recyclable acrylic, SoapStandle sinks its “teeth” into bar soap to create a platform on which the soap is elevated. Since air can circulate 360° around the soap when it is not being used, the soap is able to shed water and dry properly so that that pesky soap goo never develops.

Ergonomically designed as an oval to act as a handle so soap doesn’t slip out of your hand, SoapStandle helps extend the life of bar soap by 30%! SoapStandle comes in a pack of 2, for $8.00.

My Thoughts:

Ironically I discovered SoapStandle right after I had purchased a brand new soap dish for the bathroom. One thing that runs out quickly at home is soap. Whether it is melting, oozing, or falling down the drain, we are constantly buying new bars and liquid soap all the time. That can make up a large bill at the end of the month, as well as produce a lot of waste. 

SoapStandle is not only an innovative product, but one that helps us take into consideration our carbon footprint. It allows soap to last longer, requiring us to purchase less soap and plastic. Use it anywhere soap is needed from the bathroom, shower, kitchen, anywhere! 

If you're looking for a creative and inventive new product to make your life and budget easier, get a SoapStandle today! 

Connect with SoapStandle:



Thursday, April 6, 2017

BUMP IT OFF



Bump it Off is a reusable silicone sleeve that fits on your hand in four different configurations, enabling you to concentrate scrubbing power in the palm of your hand or on your fingertips. With gentle silicone bristles on one side and smooth bumps on the other, Bump it Off has endless cleaning applications in every room of your home!

Laundry — Use with laundry liquid or stain remover to loosen and lift stains. Gentle on fabrics!

Kitchen — Safely scrub dishes, pots and pans without scratching. Won’t mildew like kitchen sponges!

Pet
— Groom pets, and lift pet hair off upholstered furniture like magic!

Body
— Cleans, massages and exfoliates in the shower or bath, and kids love it too!

Available in blue, orange, green and purple — buy one for laundry, kitchen, pet and body! 
Easy to clean, dishwasher safe (top rack).

  • 100% silicone
  • Resists stains and odors
  • Non-stick
  • Patent pending
  • Made in China
About Goddess of Gadgets
The self-proclaimed “Goddess of Gadgets” Lisa Ximenez specializes in inventing and producing innovative products that provide everyone with faster solutions to everyday home, health, and family challenges. With over 25 years of executive experience in product brand development, 15 years as founder and CEO of RT Marketing, Lisa has amassed knowledge in how to successfully target a client’s needs, develop a solution, and promote to the correct audience. Her clients include popular, luxury and entertainment brands such as Avon, Kellogg’s, Disney, Nike Golf, Chicago Bulls, Aston Martin, Coke, Activision and Swarovski.



Purchase BUMP IT OFF at www.goddessofgadgets.com.
Instagram @GoddessOfGadgets
Twitter @GoddessOfGadgets



Tuesday, February 21, 2017

Review: Solavore TR-86 High Performance Reflector



Solavore TR-86 High Performance Reflector
 
NEW!

Bring on the heat with Solavore’s powerful new TR-86 Reflector. Its mirror-like surface – 86% Total Reflectance - means faster preheat, higher oven temperatures, and increased range for partial-sun days.



  • Great for baking. Cook year-round - even up north, far from the sunbelt
  • Weather and tarnish resistant surface, a finish that will stay looking new for years, thanks to anodizing that hardens and coats the aluminum
  • Detachable, folds flat. Includes carry case for safe storage when not in use
  • Made in the USA
  • Save $17 and get free shipping when purchased with your Solavore Sport

Visit Solavore:
www.solavore.com
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Shop:
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Our Thoughts
I reviewed the Solavore Sport Solar Oven a few months ago (read my original review here) and I have to say, I still love it and continue to use it - it will definitely see the most use in the summer so I don't have to use my traditional oven and heat up the house! 

It has been frustrating though, to not be able to use it in the winter months - for about a month before, and a month after, the winter solstice.  Not the fault of the solar oven by any means, just a sad combination of our specific location in town with surrounding buildings, trees, and the low position of the sun in the sky.  Our backyard gets plenty of ambient light during the day, but not enough direct sun so there's not enough time to cook foods for the longer periods the solar oven requires.  So as you can imagine, when Solavore offered me the chance to try out the new TR-86 high performance reflectors I jumped at it because the new reflectors capture more of the sun's rays for winter performance.

So this beautiful shiny thing arrives . . . and I kid you not, we then had like 2 weeks of overcast days, snow, and fog.  The news said at one point 51 straight hours of FOG.  That wasn't even the end of the fog though. Ridiculous. And certainly not conducive to solar cooking!

For a comparison, this is the "old" reflector that came with my Solavore Sport - definitely reflective and helpful for solar cooking.



Now compare the new TR-86 Reflector - much shinier; a higher reflective surface:




Finally the weather cooperated and we had a day of SUN! Awesome.  Great, now what to cook?  Hmm.  Let's try some muffins. This recipe is straight out of my own paleo cookbook which I believe you can read about in my profile on Blogger (if you wish!). It's a nut flour based recipe since we are grain-free, and the base recipe is very versatile and has served me well over the years - one I know to work well with a variety of different added ingredients.  For this one, I made a cinnamon spice muffin with dried fruits.  I started pre-heating the oven at about 9:30am, when the first sliver of morning sun came up over the house and hit the far west side of our backyard.  The outside temp was 9F.  The muffins went in the oven about 10:30am.  I did have to move the oven a couple of times to keep it in direct sunlight but it's not heavy, and the smooth bottom slides nicely over the snow.

The oven temp with the TR-86 Reflector was about the normal temp I'd expect during the warmer months without using a reflector, about 225F. 


The recommended baking time is 90 minutes, and the temp inside the oven was steady. You can see the condensation building up in this photo.


I did open the oven to check the done-ness of the muffins and decided they weren't quite done yet.  Just be aware that opening the solar oven during a frigid day (remember the outside temp was 9F!), it will lose some heat and need more time for the sun to bring it back up to the required temp.


Overall, the muffins took about 2 hours to bake until they got as done as I like them.  Much longer than the 20 minutes in my (gas) oven, so you know, have patience!  Their consistency/texture was a little different than traditional cooking - wetter, chewier. I will try this again during the warmer months when I can get the oven temp up a little higher.  (Don't let the solar oven get over 300F or warping may occur.)
Next up - with the success of the muffins, I thought I'd try a cake.  Well, it didn't start out as a cake.  Really I just wanted to make a sauce.  But then I kept adding stuff to it and it ended up as a cake. (That's rather how I cook anyway, adding stuff here and there and the end result doesn't always resemble what my first intent was!)
This one failed for three reasons:
1. I think it's because I used my own cooking pot, which has a blue lid, rather than the black lids that come with the pots that come with the solar oven.  I think a black lid would have absorbed more light.
2. While I can throw together a muffin recipe without actually using a recipe - just been doing it long enough I'm used to it - I don't think I got the ratio of ingredients quite right since solar baking involves more moisture during the baking process. Something to work on.
3. Weather.  Granted it was mostly sunny out (there were some clouds), but we also had high winds - in the 20-30mph range.  The solar oven, even with the TR-86 Reflector, had trouble keeping the temps up enough for baking.  It was at about 180F, which will cook your roasts fine if you cook them all day, but trying to bake in the winter, well, not so much.  I ended up scooping out the batter into a muffin tin and finishing it in my gas oven.
I tried to put in some halved acorn squash in the black pots after I gave up on the cake but again, with the high winds, there was not enough warmth and certainly not enough direct sunlight time to get the squash more than lukewarm. 
Seeing what the temps and weather conditions needed to be for successful winter solar cooking, and the time frame we actually have direct sunlight in the backyard - I decided not to try a roast - there just wouldn't be enough time of direct sunlight - not yet.  Soon though . . . another few weeks or so and the sun will be much higher in the sky and I can get back to it.  (As a side note, we are moving to the country this year (building a house) and out at our new property - I won't have to worry about having enough direct sunlight because we aren't surrounded by buildings - plenty of open space to soak up all the sun's rays, all day long.)
The last test I did with the TR-86 Reflector, was chocolate chip cookies (almond flour based).  I knew with the moisture content inside the solar oven the cookies would turn out chewy and soft.  Not crispy, like my husband likes them.  Haha, more for me!
I didn't have a cookie sheet small enough to fit inside the solar oven so I just used the pots (uncovered) it came with. I was able to fit 14 cookies inside the two 10" pots.
Now, our crazy weather had changed enough in the last couple of weeks - we went from frigid temps to, well, nice out. But this gives me an idea on how well the new reflectors perform in warmer temps.

You can see the snow's already melted, that's how nice it was out - in the 40-50F range. 


The cookies really didn't take too long to bake, about 90 minutes. With the combination of the outside weather and the new reflectors, the solar oven temp reached about 275F.  The cookies turned out awesome. Chewy, delicious, perfect, and best of all, I didn't have to share!



Thursday, November 3, 2016

Holiday Gift Guide: Solavore Sport Solar Oven




The Solavore Sport Solar Oven may look like a plain black box, but looks can be deceiving. Years of engineering experience and testing went into designing the Sport’s base, boosting its functionality on multiple levels.

The Solavore™ Sport was purpose-built by solar-cooking experts for maximum efficiency, durability, and ease of use. Weighing 9 pounds and measuring 12 ¼” high by 27 ¼” long by 17” wide, the Sport is lightweight and portable. Oven temperatures typically range from 210º – 260º F, maxing out at 300º F. In other words, hot enough for slow-cooked goodness (food cooks starting at 180º F) but not hot enough to burn dinner. It simmers like a crock pot and bakes like an oven.


The Sport solar oven is very popular among campers, preppers, outdoor enthusiasts, bikers, sailors, and those in the LOHAS demographic, etc. They are used to cook a broad range of delicious food including meat, poultry, vegetables, fish, slow cooked meals and baked goods, without using cooking fuel of any kind other than sunlight. The Solavore Sport oven also pasteurizes water and dehydrates food. 

You can literally "set it and forget it" and go about your busy day. The food will be perfectly cooked when you return. Kids when using it get a science lesson on solar energy while enjoying the many fun children's recipes. They also won't get burnt or get their fingers pinched in the aparatus of this kid friendly solar oven. 

Designed by engineers from 3M, the Solavore Sport is a virtually indestructible, retained-heat box-type solar oven made of rugged, durable, lightweight injection-molded nylon resin. Surround insulation and two-pot capacity enable unattended, family-size year-round cooking. The Sport solar oven is an industry leader in price, performance, family-size capacity and rugged durability.

Every Solavore solar oven purchased in the developed world helps to fund a
Solavore Sport somewhere in the developing world where an open fire is still the main kitchen appliance. Over 20,000 Solavore Sport ovens have been deployed in 60 countries. The benefits that Solavore Works, Solavore's corporate social responsibility program, brings to communities in the developing world include:
  • Respiratory health: freedom from common diseases such as pneumonia, which kills more than 3 million people a year around the world due to indoor cooking fires
  • Water pasteurization and food dehydration
  • The removal of one of the main causes of deforestation in the developing world, the continuous chopping of firewood
  • Savings in energy expenditures, which can range up to 25-50% of a family's budget
  • The ability for girls to attend school rather than spend their days collecting firewood and venturing further and further away from home to do this
  • Increased income generation, enabling a woman to sell the excess food that she bakes or dehydrates in her solar oven 

Mission
Solavore is a women-owned business promoting clean-cooking technology around the world.

The preparation of food using heat is the most elemental of human endeavors. Cooking sustains our bodies, nourishes our souls, unites us around a common hearth. In a world of infinite richness and variety, cooking is a common thread stretching across time and cultures.

At Solavore™, we believe that cooking fuel should be healthy and as abundant as sunlight.

We build ovens that make clean-cooking fun, easy and liberating.

We build ovens that will be game-changers for women who risk their lives every day gathering wood or burning it, simply to feed their families.

Every oven purchased gets us one step closer to putting out a wood-fuel fire somewhere in the world.


Let's get outside and cook.


Visit Solavore:
www.solavore.com
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Shop:
www.solavore.com/shop

Our Thoughts
I have been wanting a solar oven for a long time, so as you can imagine I was (and still am!) ridiculously excited to receive the Solavore Sport Solar Oven (with reflectors) for review.  Our cabin is off grid, and for the house we are planning to build next year we hope to have as much energy savings as we can. 

Summer/early fall has been a perfect time to try out the solar oven - we don't have central air in our current home by choice but during the heat of the summer, cooking indoors just serves to heat up the house further (as well as adding to our energy bill). And of course there are days where I do A LOT of cooking and often wished I had more than one oven.

Here's the setup:

You get the oven + lid, two Granite Ware 10" pots, an oven thermometer, and reflectors. 

  



Easy to assemble - because there really isn't any assembly required: just put the oven in an area that receives full sun during the day, fill a pot or two with yumminess and place inside the oven, place the oven lid on top and use the 6 clips to hold it in place. Add the reflectors if the weather conditions and what you're cooking requires it.  Start your meals in the oven by 9am (I did mine by 10am and it was all good) and then walk away . . . come back hours later and your food is cooked to perfection! Not even kidding about the perfection part . . . no, seriously.  It's PERFECTLY cooked!

Okay, so the first thing I cooked was a fresh ham roast.  It was a fairly good sized chunk of meat, so I cut it in half.  This not only allowed the Solavore Sport Solar Oven to cook it better (small pots cook better than densely filled large pots) but I then also got to cook it two different ways.  The first pot I just did salt and pepper, because sometimes I just want a plain pork roast.  The second pot I added mango-infused cranberries, onion, and some seasonings.

before cooking

fresh out of the solar oven - look at all those meat juices!

sliced and ready to eat
Plated with rutabaga hashbrowns and fresh fruit.  YUM!

The cleanup is incredibly easy, too.  Food DOES NOT burn in the solar oven - the oven temperature when cooking the pork roast topped out at 225F in the heat of the day.

Then cooking agony . . . I had soooo many food plans the first week of having the solar oven but the weather most certainly did not cooperate.  In fact, we got 7" of rain one night (can you say flash flood??  Our streets are STILL flooded 2 weeks later)! The weather remained mostly cloudy for a good week after that and the one sunny day we did have had 40mph winds, gusting up to a recorded 67mph. Not good for solar cooking!  It was SO. HARD. to wait for a good sunny or even mostly-sunny day so I could get back outside with the Solavore Sport Solar Oven!

When the sun finally showed its beautiful warm face again, next up were chicken quarters. I was going to try my medium-sized Granite Ware roaster in the solar oven but it was just a wee bit too tall - touching the oven's lid, so back to the two smaller 10" pots it was. I added apples, freshly foraged chanterelle mushrooms, thyme, rosemary, and some other seasonings.

before

perfectly done!
I'm well used to using a crock pot, and one of the things I really wanted to try in the solar oven was a venison roast.  Venison is a very lean meat and if not cooked correctly, will result in the driest roast you've ever attempted to eat. We eat a lot of venison - it's actually our main meat - so having a new method to try that promises perfectly cooked meat had me itching to try it.

Now, the directions say not to add any water or other oils to your roasts, but knowing that venison cooks better in the crock pot when slathered with unrefined coconut oil, I did the same for the solar oven.  I mixed seasonings in with the coconut oil and coated the entire roast with it, also adding bay leaves and orange slices.  The result? 

Fantastic doesn't even begin to cover it . . . the roast was so tender it just fell apart, which can be hard to achieve for venison.  Using the crock pot, venison is much more tender than using conventional oven roasting, but even the crock pot couldn't compare to the Solavore Sport Solar Oven.

unbelievably tender venison roast. *drool*

Tonight's supper is basically the filling for my own paleo recipe of chicken pot pie, minus the pie crust. Chicken, vegetables, herbs.  With the juices from the chicken quarters, (yes, quarters again! Hey, they were on sale for $3.99/10lb bag!) the added veggies will make for a fabulous thick stew to serve with the meat.

No "after" picture since what's pictured below is currently in the oven roasting away. But trust me, it will be soooooo delicious. :)



I have to say, the solar oven has become my new favorite way to roast meats. I am going to thoroughly enjoy experimenting with many different kinds of dishes!

More recipes can be found at Solavore:
Savory
Sweet
Blog

Some cool things about the Solavore Sport Solar Oven:
  • use the reflectors to help heat the solar oven in less-than-ideal solar conditions - best to use them in the early morning and later afternoon, removing them during the heat of the day. 
  • pasteurize water using the Solavore Sport Solar Oven! Simply fill your pots with water, place the WAPI (water pasteurization indicator) in the center of the pot and let the sun heat up the water to 149F for 10 minutes or longer. When the wax in the WAPI melts, the water is pasteurized.
The company history is quite interesting too - and a big THANK YOU shoutout to Anne Patterson for keeping this solar oven alive and going!

I am a HUGE fan of this thing - if you're looking for a holiday gift for the cook or eco-conscious person in your family, get them a Solavore Sport Solar Oven!  Or just get one for yourself - it's well worth it!

Sunday, July 17, 2016

Review: Kids 'N' Pets Instant All-Purpose Stain & Odor Remover Wipes

Paw prints. Finger prints. Food and drink smudges. In your house, stains and odors are more consistent than the delivery of the newspaper, often appearing out of thin air and trailing your kids and pets wherever they go. That’s why we created a brand new product that combines the effective, non-toxic, enzyme based formula of our most popular spray product with the ease and flexibility of a wipe. KIDS ‘N’ PETS new Instant All-Purpose Stain & Odor Remover Wipes eliminate tough stains and odors at home and on-the-go by simply wiping it away.

Not a butt-wipe, not a bleach wipe! Our biodegradable, multipurpose formula can be used on any water safe surface to clean up messes fast while tackling smelly surface stains safely and effectively – neutralizing and eliminating the odor instead of masking it with a different scent like many other solutions on the shelf.

Car seat cover full of food smudges? Wipe it away! Show up at work with fingerprints or make-up on your blouse? Wipe it away! Muddy paw prints on your pants or carpet? Wipe it away! Mysterious stain on your sofa? Wipe it away!

Created by a parent and pet owner – for parents and pet owners, KIDS ‘N’ PETS is proud to be a winner of the Women’s Choice Award and Parent Tested, Parent Approved Seal of Approval, an honor given to products that meet PTPA’s high quality and safety standards.


Purchase KIDS ‘N’ PETS Instant All-Purpose Stain & Odor Remover Wipes on Amazon, and visit their social media:
www.kidsnpetsbrand.com
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Our Thoughts
Kids 'N' Pets products are a staple in our household with a child and dog.  Although, it's mostly stains from the dogs over the years rather than the  one child.  Mostly. :) I do have one cream-colored upholstered chair I am rather fond of that has gotten fairly dirty over the years and I was contemplating the best way to go about cleaning it, especially the place where he-who-shall-not-be-named spilled his cappuccino on it.  Most of it was mopped up, but the hidden part was not. Seems there was plenty of dog hair and a piece of a chip down there too!



The wipes are meant to be pulled thru the small opening in the lid for maximum evaporation protection, but honestly I found it easier to just remove the lid entirely and take the wipes out from there.  There is no excess liquid in the container and due to that natural phenomenon called gravity, the wipes are much more saturated down at the bottom than they are at the top.  I found that to clean this old, dried cappuccino stain, I needed to use the saturated part first and scrub pretty hard.  It took 3 wipes for this area to come clean.  And I realized while scrubbing the best part about these wipes: they don't shred!


If you look closely at the top right of this photo you'll see a stain line I still need to clean up.  It's hard to judge when the fabric is wet with cleaner whether or not you've gotten it all.  It's easy enough to simply let it dry and tackle it again another day if you need to.

Since we somehow didn't happen to have any accidental spills in the duration of this review, I tackled some other older stains I'd been neglecting. The top front half as well as the vertical front part of the chair's cushion was dingy from years of use; I did find it harder to saturate, then scrub using just the wipes, so I grabbed my trusty spray container of Kids 'N' Pets (which I purchased at Walmart), sprayed the area, let it sit a few minutes, and used the thankfully non-shredding Kids 'N' Pets Wipes to clean it.  Again, it's a little hard to see if you got the area clean when the fabric is wet, so be sure to inspect it after it dries and see if you need to re-apply and clean some more.  The below photo is after the first round of cleaning.  I think I got it about 80% clean, but even still it's a huge improvement over looking at a plainly dingy chair!


Another item I attempted to clean was our couch.  With his sensory needs, our son always has his hands in his mouth and subsequently gets drool in the same 3 places on the couch thanks to his saturated hands.   Like the chair above, I sprayed the area first, let it sit, and then scrubbed with the wipes and was even more thankful for their non-shreddi-ness (is that even a word??). I went thru a pile of the wipes cleaning the couch.  That's a cleaning project I'll be repeating over the years until he can fulfill his sensory needs in a less-wet manner.

I also used the KIDS ‘N’ PETS Instant All-Purpose Stain & Odor Remover Wipes on our big front window - I figured the "cleaned" window would have smears, and it did, but that wasn't my concern.  Our son's wet hands are frequently in contact with the window which leads to a buildup of drool.  Glass cleaner can remove it, but it takes some scrubbing.  The wipes cut right thru the dried drool easy as pie and then I just finished up the window with a 50/50 vinegar/water solution to clear the smears.

The adorable, now house-trained puppy in the above photo is responsible for two small stains on the 8 year old carpet that I have as yet to be able to fully remove using Kids 'N' Pets nor any other carpet cleaner (actually there's 4 carpet stains, 2 of which were from a dog that spent a week here). Next time I attempt it, I'm going to take their suggestion from their "Spill It" Q&A on their Facebook page, where they recommend using a half or even a FULL bottle on one stain and letting it air dry.  I hadn't tried using near that much, so next time we're going on vacation, I'll dump a whole lot on the stains and they can air dry while we're gone.

Again, Kids 'N' Pets products are used often in this house - highly recommend!