Baking soda outdoors

Baking soda is versatile and rough enough to be effective for outdoor uses as well. Don’t think that just because baking soda is gentle that it won’t be strong enough for the big, bad outdoors.

Here are some really useful and helpful uses for baking soda outside of the house.

Car Seat Freshener

Just like with before, it is fully possible to use baking soda to completely de-odorize your car. All you need to do is sprinkle baking soda onto the seats and floor of your car generously.

Leave it overnight, then vacuum up the excess baking soda the next day. Your car will be fresh as the day you bought it, minus the leather smell.

This works great to absorb and clean up any oil or grease spills inside the car as well.

Car Air Freshener

Most air fresheners that hang in our cars smell incredibly artificial. They don’t even eliminate any odors that are in the car, and just mask them with a strong pine scent.

Instead of hanging a little green tree from your rearview window, try pouring some baking soda out into a deep cup, and leaving that in your drink holder. This will de-odorize your car, and should be good for about a month before changing it. You can even tape a piece of paper over the top of the cup and just poke some holes in it to make sure that the baking powder doesn’t spill.

It’s the car equivalent of what you do with the box of baking soda in your refrigerator.

Spackle Substitute

Spackle is a substance used to fill in holes and small dents in white colored walls. Its purpose is just to make it appear aesthetically as if nothing had happened.

Unfortunately, we don’t always have spackle on hand, even though it might just take a tiny bit to make something look much better.

Just make a thick baking soda paste – much thicker than any you’ve used before from this book, 1 cup of baking soda to ¼ cup of water. Use a broad surface like a flat metal spatula to fill in the holes and the dents, and just let it dry!

If you’re feeling creative and brave, you can mix food coloring into this to attempt to fill in holes and dents in differently colored walls.

Anti-Fungicide for Plants

If you make a ½ cup of baking soda and 1 cup of water solution and spray it over your plants, it will make them more resistant to fungus. This combines the gentle nature of baking soda with its anti-fungal properties.

This has the added benefit of protecting your plants from insects, because as covered before, insects will die when they ingest baking soda.

Improve Potting Soil

Baking soda is naturally neutral and an alkaline. This means that it can lower the acidity level of soil, and this is great for plants because high levels of acid are bad for them.

This means that you can pour a 1 tablespoon baking soda and 8 ounces of water solution directly into the soil of plants to balance the pH level of the soil and it will improve the health of your houseplants. You have to make sure to do this very sparingly though, because soil that is too basic is also not healthy.

You can determine the pH of your soil easily with kits from garden stores.

De-greaser

Baking soda is an excellent de-greaser, as you already know from how baking soda can be useful in the kitchen.

But there is grease outside of the kitchen too. For example, if you have a car or motorcycle. These things leak grease and oil constantly, and sometimes you have to clean it up or prevent a buildup elsewhere.

You can simply make a ½ cup of baking soda and ½ cup of water paste and spread that onto the pile of grease or oil. It will help absorb it some, and make it much easier to grab and clean up from the car or garage floor.

Septic Tank

If you add 1 cup of baking soda to your septic tank a week, it will help maintain a balanced pH level, which helps it flow better and prevents corrosion of the tank and associated pipes.

De-icing Paths

When winter rolls around, often the outdoor paths we use around our homes are slippery and dangerous because of ice.

Baking soda can serve the same purpose as rock salt or kitty litter – it will provide traction over dangerous icy spots and actually melt the ice. Sprinkle it liberally over the icy parts, ideally before you have to use them.

It doesn’t melt ice quite as well as rock salt, but it can work in a pinch to make your days safer.

Conclusion

I hope I’ve shown you many wonderful ways that baking soda can help you run your home cheaply and naturally.

I have no doubt that you will save lots of money on toxic substances like cleaners that you’ll never need again. Humans didn’t need Windex until about 50 years ago – we can function amazingly with natural cures and homemade remedies that involve baking soda.

I hope that you have found some value in this book, and see reason to stash a few boxes of baking soda in your home from now on.

I wish you the best,

Patty