"Essential" Essential Oils For Around The House

There are a number of essential oils that any home should be happy to have around.  They are perfect for cleaning, for caring for your plants, for keeping bugs at bay, for disinfecting and for creating nice smells.

CLEANING WITH ESSENTIAL OILS

Lavender essential oil is great for cleaning and disinfecting areas such as the toilet bowl and around it.  Lavender comes from the word, laver, in French means to wash so it's no wonder that it is a powerful cleaner and it also smells lovely.  I have a solution of water/lavender/citronella/sweet orange that I spray on my toilet bowls and all around that area regularily to keep the bathroom smelling lovely and also clean

CARING FOR YOUR PLANTS WITH ESSENTIAL OILS

Oils such as Clove, Rosemary, Eucalyptus and Tea Tree all help to repel harmful bugs from your plants.  You can spray on a solution of any of the above 1 - 100 solution, on your plants and keep them looking healthy all year around.  Some of these essentiall oils also serve to attract butterflies  For example sage, rosemary, lavender and orange.  These are more for outside plants.  And to repel insects from your house, I'm sure you've heard of the tried and trusted remedy of geranium essential oil.  In fact, geranium planters on your window sill is supposed to keep the flies out.  I can't vouch for its efficacy though!

ESSENTIAL OILS THAT MAKE YOUR HOUSE SMELL WONDERFUL

I suppose this very much depends on what qualifies as a nice smell in your books.  Uplifting smells around the house would be lemongrass, peppermint, rosemary while more relaxing smells might be lavender, ylang ylang and chamomile.  More earthy ones are cedarwood, vetiver and patchouli.  Take your pick!  If you want all three conditions at the one time mix and match.  There's no right answer.

Essential oils are not so expensive.  It is worth having about 5 in your medicine chest at all times:- tea tree, lavender, eucalyptus, rosemary and ylang ylang.  You can chose to have more than that or a different five.  A few drops is all that is needed at  any one time so that little 5ml bottle can last for a long time.