This post is very firmly categorized as a random thought, but I'm just so impressed with the results that I had to share.

We have a ceramic sink. With ceramic sinks come stains. It's remarkable how quickly our sink collects stains and scuff marks. I've always had stainless steel sinks before this, so—surprise—I didn't know how to get rid of these pesky blemishes. After a weekend of thorough housekeeping, which included catching up on all the dishes, I noticed how dirty our sink looked. (If there are any trolls reading this, take your judgment elsewhere; my theory is that we're too busy doing fun things, so we have no time to pay attention to our disgusting sink. I'm fine with it.)

Stains include coffee, rust spots from an old muffin tin, and blue speckles from when we strained rehydrated black beans.

But it was time. We were home for a whole weekend, so I made a point to scrub this ceramic beotch. I prefer to use homemade remedies or green-cleaning options, so I researched what I could do that didn't involve CLR or Lime-A-Way, which were my old standbys before I realized how corrosive and kinda toxic they are. (Man, the early 2000s were simpler, blissfully ignorant times, huh? Maybe not.) Anyway, I read up on a few different techniques, and the one I liked best was in a post by Beth Dreyer. She suggested drying out the sink as best as you can, then spraying it down with hydrogen peroxide and leaving it overnight. Not only did I forget to dry out the sink at first, but I also didn't have a spare empty spray bottle, so I kind of just dumped some peroxide here and there and moved it around with a paper towel. Very scientific. Then I forgot to tell Jon what I was doing, and he washed his hands in the sink.

Trial number two! I did the same thing, but I noticed that most of the peroxide was just collecting in the drain stopper. I also didn't have the patience to leave it overnight.

Trial number three! I decided to follow the second half of Beth's advice and dump some baking soda in there to scrub around. I used my dish scrubby brush with a little bit of water to create a nice paste. Holy. Crap. This worked so well. If you've never tried using baking soda to clean stuff, start right now. (If you have, sorry I'm late to the party.) The slight abrasiveness of the baking soda helped to get the nastiness out of my lovely white ceramic sink. (And there are a bunch of other reasons why it's such a great household cleaner, as well as numerous other applications you can use it for.) I'm so happy with the sink in its current, shining, beautifully bright state, I'm definitely considering stashing a box of baking soda under the sink just for this.

*Singing The Little Mermaid song from when she gets her voice back that goes "Ahhhh ahhhhhh ahhhh" . . . you know what I mean*

So yeah, I'll be using this trick again. Probably for everything. I've already used baking soda in our laundry, but now I'm convinced it's a cure-all. Supposedly it can leave a film behind, but I'll deal with that when I notice it, heh. Until then, our sink quite possibly looks better than when we moved in. If you clean with baking soda, what have you used it for? Do you have any suggestions for tackling the stubborn scuff marks we have left?