31 {More} Days of Pinterest: Day 5 Cleaning a Microwave the Easy Way

It may seem like I'm pulling lots of projects off my "Clean ALL the Things!" Pinterest board, but these are things that I've wanted to try for some time. We have cats who like to "help" with projects, so I don't like using harsh chemicals when I don't have to, and the greener cleaners are always worth a shot.

This past weekend I tried more, with varying results.

The first one I did on Friday night was to attempt to clean the microwave using the hot water/vinegar trick.

And oh my goodness, it sure needed it.

I seriously cringed when I saw those...

ANYWAY.

The original pin came from the blog Crafty Little Gnome, and when I read their instructions, I thought, "I can do that. Easy."

I'd like to go on record as saying that if my life had a soundtrack playing so that I could hear it, this would've been the moment where the music got ominous in that, "THIS IS NOT GOING TO GO WELL" kind of way.

First, I assembled my supplies.

See what I mean? TWO THINGS. How could this go wrong?

So, I put the bowl of hot water and a glug of vinegar in the microwave:

I set the timer for 5 minutes:

And then I walked away.

When the timer went off, I came back.

It was time to wipe all the crud off. Yep.

Problem was, the crud didn't get the memo that it was supposed to be easy to wipe away. I put the bowl back in and set it for another 5 minutes:

This time didn't work much better, even with a plastic scrubby thing. I added some Barkeeper's Friend to the scrubber and went to it.

After a few eternities minutes, it was better:

I worked on it for awhile, and called it good.

I'm pretty sure this wasn't as magic as I'd hoped it would be for a combination of reasons. It's an OLD microwave, and it'd been awhile since it'd really been cleaned. Maybe if the crud hadn't been fossilized things would have worked better. I know it's not going to go like this for everyone, and I do believe in the power of steam cleaning. In this case, I'd have needed a steam ENGINE worth of steam, but hey.

Eh, win some, lose some, call a draw on the rest.

To see my other 31 {More}Days of Pinterest projects, click on the image below, and it will take you to my original post.