DIY Air Freshener

So, I don't know about all of you, but I am OBSESSED with making my house smell absolutely yummy! LOL. With a husband, toddler, and two dogs it can be a struggle to keep my home smelling absolutely perfect all the time.  I try to do as many all natural products as I can to help keep my home smelling great. I LOVE my DIY Febreeze to keep my household linens, couches, and pillows smelling awesome, my DIY carpet freshener does an amazing job at keeping my rugs and bedroom carpets smelling great and fresh for when the family is playing on the floor, and of course the essential oils in my all purpose cleaner keeps all of my hard surfaces smelling great too, (don't worry I use the same scented oils for all of the products). BUT, I was having a hard time finding an air freshener that I really liked.  I was using the air-wick air freshener with two compartments with different smells in each which makes it so you can always smell the scent.  This is really important to me since I mainly use these in my kitchen by the trash, in the bathrooms, and of course by the diaper pail (eww).  But, I always hated that they weren't all natural, I didn't like that with all the efforts I've been making to keep my home as free of harsh chemicals as possible, that I was shoving chemicals into the air, just to make it smell good! So, once my air-freshener containers ran out I decided to experiment with ways to make an all natural air freshener that actually worked. I was so excited to get it right on my first try, AND it's SUPER easy!!!!!

Materials:

1) Empty Air-which air freshener

2) Essential oils

3) Water

Instructions:

Okay, so this is so easy you don't even need official steps! First you want to separate the part of the air freshener that actually holds the liquid. All you have to do is pull the glass section (that holds the liquid) apart from the plastic top-this will have the holes where the smell comes out of. Then you want to open the glass container. You may need to put a little muscle into this, but be careful not to break the glass or the lids/sponges that pull the liquid up to the plastic part of the container.  Once the container is open, I washed the sponges as best I could to remove an residual smell from the original oils. I then filled both sides of the glass container about 2/3 of the way full and then added about 40 drops of essential oils into each side. I chose spearmint for one side and lavender for the other. If you are using essential oils that have a weaker smell you can put more oil into the water to make the smell stronger, and visa versa for stronger smelling essential oils.  Once the oils are in put the sponges and caps back onto the top of the glass container and make sure it is secure.  I then shook the glass container gently to help mix the essential oils and water together. The water will be cloudy once shaken and that is fine. Then you just put the glass container back into the plastic top and plug in the air-freshener. See, super easy!!  

I really like this air freshener for a couple reasons:

1) It's all natural (can't beat that).

2) You can manipulate the water/essential oil ratio to get the exact strength you want

3) You can customize the smells for what works for your family, needs, and the smells of the other products you use.

4) The smell you get is very subtle and not too overwhelming, which I find the commercial products can be.

I hope you guys found this helpful! Let me know what other home products you would like to see DIY all natural substitutes for, I love to experiment!!! And if you want more information on essential oils, click here.