"Pledge" to Condition your Wood Furniture!

Wood Conditioner and Cleaner

¼ cup mineral oil

¼ cup vinegar
1 cup water
18 drops of lemon essential oil for cleaning, germ-fighting prowess, and that lemony scent so many of us attribute to furniture polish!

Using a funnel, add mineral oil, vinegar and warm tap water to a 28 oz (or so) spray bottle.  Add lemon essential oil, cap and shake about.  Thoroughly spray a dish cloth, or old cotton rag with the just shaken mixture.  Use cloth/rag to wipe wood surfaces down in the direction of the wood grain.  Continue until mixture is well absorbed by the wood and wood looks clean and even a tad shinier!  Be sure to shake your spray bottle about before each use, as the ingredients will separate.

Background:

Many years ago, my husband and I helped his brother and soon-to-be wife lug a couch from everyone’s favorite college dorm/first apartment furniture store: The Salvation Army.  While waiting about, an old farm table and four chairs in sad condition caught my eye.  The set looked hand-made and a store clerk confirmed my suspicions- Naturally, I just HAD TO HAVE the set!  I’ll never forget the indulgent look my husband gave me, the quizzical look my soon-to-be sister-in-law gave me, and the “you’re just plain crazy” look my brother-in-law gave me.  It’s true, the table and chairs were in need of major TLC.  But our dining room was an empty room, and I knew we would not be able to afford a dinning room set any time soon.  I also knew that while the color of the wood was totally not my style, the chunky rustic lines of the pieces were!

After a few weeks of much harder than I had anticipated work, I had the set all sanded and re-stained a darker mahogany color.  My first attempt at furniture restoration was complete!  Our dining room set is now one of my favorite pieces in our home.  The wood is a soft pine, and already, thanks to our Labrador Gaucho, in need of re-sanding/re-finishing.  Aside for the few scratch marks here and there, the set looks and works just fine.  I have learned, however, that all wood furniture could use some semi-consistent conditioning to help it last and keep it looking pretty.

If you’ve read any of my other posts, you can easily guess that something as STINKY as “Pledge” is totally out of the question for me.  I had been cleaning the set (and all my wood furniture) with a vinegar and water mix and dusting with a dry “Swifer” wipe, old sock, bit of scrap cloth, etc.

A few (less) years ago, Vidal came across this office furniture that a financial company about to go out of business needed to unload.  Somehow, he and his brother and friends found enough muscles to lug the stuff home and the movers recently had the joy of moving it once more into my husband’s office in the new house.  As part of the unpacking process, Vidal decided his office furniture needed cleaning and polishing- He came home one day with… yep. “Pledge.” 

YUCK!

So between the dinning room, and Vidal’s office cleaning experience, I had enough incentive to find an alternative to “Pledge.”  Happily, it was rather easy to find.

I use mineral oil to condition my bamboo veggie chopping boards in the kitchen, so as I searched for alternatives to “Pledge,” I kept this in mind.  Most online recipes you find call for olive oil and lemon juice- Olive oil is expensive, and fresh lemon juice spoils!  I use olive oil almost exclusively in cooking, so I am well aware of the dent it makes in our grocery budget.  I wasn’t about to add to my household expenses with the use of yet more olive oil.  Also, some of my online research spoke of the olive oil eventually going rancid (probably because of the lemon juice).  I don’t know about you, but if I go through all the trouble of making my own cleaning supplies, I don’t really want to worry about their shelf life!

This recipe is food safe and does not spoil (that I have yet to see).  So far, after a few months of use, I have been happy with the results.  My wood surfaces look so much richer and nicer after application, I’d quite forgotten how pretty wood could be…  I feel content that my mixture is food safe, since so many of my wood surfaces see lots of food thanks to our informal lifestyle and the children.  I also really like that I don’t have to worry about spoilage.  I’d hate to walk into the living room one day and sit down next to a rancid smelling side table!  I do not use the conditioning spray every time I clean or dust, so it is nice not to have to worry that my mixture will spoil in the spray bottle between uses.

Additional Notes:

Everyone’s nose and body tolerance to essential oils is different.  For this recipe, I used my trusty math equation to determine how much essential oil would be needed for effective germ/bacterial cleaning.  If you plan to clean/fight germs with another substance (like my all purpose cleaning spray), feel free to use less or no essential lemon oil!

Can you see how the right side is extra pretty?

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