At Home with Bounty

Cleaning is a chore that most people do not enjoy doing. It's hard work to keep a house sparkling clean, and it's even more difficult if you have hard water. Hard water can leave calcium and rust stains on your bathtub. It can be especially tricky to remove calcium deposits from a bathtub if you don't use the right tools. But fear not. Using common household products, it is possible to remove hard water stains.

What You'll Need

• Vinegar
• Hot water
• A scrub brush
• An old toothbrush (optional)
• Baking soda (optional)
• Peroxide (optional)
• Bounty Paper Towels

Instructions:

1. Stop the drain and fill your tub with hot water.
2. While the water is running, add 3 to 4 cups of white vinegar to the running water.
3. Fill the tub with the hot vinegar-water until the stains are covered.
4. Let the hot vinegar-water sit in the tub for four hours or more. In my experience, letting the hot vinegar-water sit overnight works great.
5. Drain the water from the tub, and scrub any remaining stains with a scrub brush or old toothbrush.
6. If the stain does not easily scrub away, you can make a paste of baking soda and vinegar to apply to tougher stains. Let it sit for an hour or so then scrub again. This mixture will fizz as it is mixed, but it is non-toxic.
7. If the stain is too tough for the baking soda mixture, adding peroxide to the vinegar/baking soda paste and reapplying removes excessively difficult stains with ease.
8. Once the stain is gone, rinse the bathtub with plenty of fresh water then dry with Bounty paper towels.
9. After the stain is gone, preventative weekly cleaning with a good all-purpose natural cleaner, or vinegar and water will help keep the stains to a minimum, making it easier to remove calcium deposits from a bathtub in the future.