I really don't like doing dishes but my dishwasher does such a poor job since we have such hard water I have no choice but to wash them by hand most of the time. You know, you can waste alot of money by just washing the dishes....on dish soap, running water, ect. Here are some ways to save money on doing your dishes!
- Scrap the dishes off first. Clean off all food particles so you don't have it in your sink while you are washing and so it doesn't go down your drain. You really don't want food chunks down your drain. They will start to smell and can possibly block off your drain pipes creating a problem in the future that will cost alot to fix. You can avoid that headache and expense by just scraping those dishes clean first.
- Don't leave the water running while you wash. Have a system. Fill up one sink with soapy water and the other sink with clear water. Use the first to wash and the second to rinse and put a towel on the counter for the dishes to dry. Not only does this keep you from running water, with dishes sitting on your counter you will be more likely to get them put away sooner so they don't take up counter space!
- Don't use pure dish soap. Here's what I do, buy one of those foam dish pumps. When the container is empty you can keep refilling it. Just fill the container about 2/3 full of water and fill the rest of the 1/3 of the container with dish soap. You will get about 5 times the use of the soap if you do it this way and you won't notice the difference.
- If you want to be super thrifty you can just wash dishes with a little vinegar and lemon juice.
- If you prefer using the dishwasher, make sure it's completely full before you run it otherwise you are just wasting water. Make sure the dishes are scraped clean before you put them in the dishwasher to avoid clogging the drains. Also, if your dishwasher has a water saver cycle, run on that. It will get your dishes just as clean.
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We have really hard water too and I put vinegar in the rinse aid dispenser in our dishwasher to help with that. It has made a difference but our silverware is still grody. I put a few drops of food coloring in a quart bottle of white vinegar and keep it under my kitchen sink for refilling the dispenser. The coloring makes it easier to tell if it needs refilling.
We tried vinegar too but it didn’t work the best for us. We ended up using Seventh Generation for the rinse.