Makes 4 sachets
Most of the dirt that gets into our homes hitchhikes on our shoes. Remove them at the door, and you might spend less time cleaning. But taking footwear off at our house exposes another problem: stinky sneakers.
To solve it, I’ve made sachets filled with absorbent clay cat litter scented with an assortment of essential oils. I place a sachet in each sneaker and leave it there overnight. Below is the formula that my boys like; I prefer more lavender myself. You may reuse the sachets for as long as the scent lasts.
• 2 teaspoons essential oil of sandalwood
• 1 teaspoon essential oil of tea tree
• 1/2 teaspoon each essential oils of lemon and grapefruit
• 1/4 teaspoon each essential oils of spruce and lavender
• 4 cups natural clay cat litter
• 4 clean socks
• 4 rubber bands
1. Stir the oils into the cat litter in a glass jar, cover, and let the mixture age for a week.
2. Fill the socks with the sachet blend and close them with the rubber bands.
3. Put them in your stinky shoes to help mask the scent.
Louise Gruenberg gardens as much as possible and cleans house as little as possible in her Oak Park, Illinois, home. She also writes and teaches about herbs. Due to popular demand for reprints of this article, it has been reprinted from our February/March 1997 issue with the author’s permission.
Click here for the main article, "Spring Cleaning Tips and Tricks."