4 summer cleaning tips from social media's Brunch with Babs
Insta-Gram Barbara Costello helps your home shine
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Reviewed / Rikki Snyder
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Barbara Costello may be the internet’s favorite grandmother right now. She is best known by her social media handle @brunchwithbabs, and she has 2.9 million Instagram and 3.8 million TikTok followers who watch her easy and reliable home and kitchen tips.
Over 1.7 million viewers have watched her soften butter quickly, and we recently used her summer grilling hacks to get our favorite grill ready for the season.
Although Babs leads a busy life managing her social media success while being a mom to four and grandmother to eight, this internet sensation put aside some time to chat with Reviewed about all things cleaning and hosting. As the end of summer approaches, she shares four affordable solutions to keep your home clean in the summer.
1. Focus on cleaning your kitchen and bathroom
Since summer is for fun and outdoors, you’ll be tracking lots of dirt and sand inside your home, says Babs. “The rooms I concentrate on [cleaning] are the kitchen and bathrooms. When we come home after spending the day outdoors, you want to eat and you want to shower. This is where we spend most of our time.”
Luckily, you don’t have to spend all day cleaning these areas. Having a good mop like the Swiffer WetJet on-hand helps you easily clean up any mud or dirt that gets tracked in.
Babs gives us a bonus tip: Rather than buying expensive refills, she wraps a paper towel around the mop head to clean her floors. “I use the Viva Multi-surface towels to save money on mop head replacements,” Babs says.
With a dual wet-dry combination mop, you can tackle even the toughest of stains on a variety of surfaces around your home.
These durable multi-surface paper towels from Viva are Babs-approved for creating squeaky clean floors.
2. Make your own all-purpose cleaner—It's an easy DIY
Making your own homemade cleaning solution doesn’t have to be complicated.
Babs shares that most of her cleaning tips have come from her own grandmother and mother. It's from them that she learned that the most reliable cleaning products are the most affordable ones you can make yourself.
Two products she always has on-hand are her homemade window and all-purpose cleaners. The natural, all-purpose cleaner is great at refreshing your space as the seasons change, and it doubles as an ant repellent.
To make the all-purpose cleaner, you need a mason jar, citrus peels, and white vinegar.
Babs says to save all your citrus peels whether they be tangerines, clementines, or oranges. Stuff them into a mason jar and when it’s filled with peels, fill it to the top with white vinegar. Cap the mixture and let it sit for two weeks before straining it out and adding it to a spray bottle.
Mason jars aren’t just useful when it comes to preservatives—you can also use them to store your homemade cleaning solutions.
Lucy’s white vinegar is great for cooking and cleaning, which is ideal when you're trying to cut costs (or just get a bang for your buck!)
3. Explore multiple use cases for paper towels
In her Brunch with Babs videos, she is always innovating new ways to use everyday cleaning products, like paper towels. In addition to using paper towels as mop head refills, she says they’re key in cleaning up dog hair.
After all of those summer road trips with the whole family piled in the car, your four-legged family members have left behind a trail of fur. Before vacuuming up the hair, rub a paper towel over the surface to trap it. This way it won’t clog up your vacuum.
A paper towel bonus tip: They help with dinner prep, too. Babs says, “I like to buy my corn from local farms, and it's always a pain to get the silk off the corn. Try a paper towel to attract it,” and it won't be all over your hands and kitchen counters.
4. Use an all-natural remedy to keep your backyard clean of bugs and pests
To prep for your next picnic, Babs recommends an unexpected tool: shower caps.
Nice summer weather heralds in the season for outdoor entertaining. It also brings lots of mosquitoes and insects, but Babs has some tricks to keep your backyard bug-free.
Before guests arrive, Babs recommends treating the area with bug repellent. On her TikTok, Babs shares her natural bug repellent solution that includes sprinkling Irish Spring soap shavings around your backyard because mosquitos can’t stand the smell. (You can use a cheese grater to create the shavings.)
For an extra layer of protection against bugs, Babs says to utilize an unexpected tool: Shower caps!
Grab a pack from the drugstore and place them over your spread of barbecue dishes. Babs says, “You can even refrigerate them with the shower caps on so that you grab [the dishes] and put them right on the table. When people are lined up and ready to eat, you remove them and they’re fresh and bug-free.”
Plus, shower caps are reusable. Just wash them after use, and they’re ready for your next picnic.
Keep pesky insects away from the perimeter of your outdoor space with the help of the long-lasting scent of an Irish Spring soap bar.
You can use these disposable caps as a barrier against bugs while outdoors, wear them as booties while painting, or on your hair during haircare—the options are endless.
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