Homemade Jewelry Cleaner

Another Do-It-Yourself-themed post.  I hope these aren’t getting old yet.  I have a simple one today, though, and it doesn’t involve tacos or quinoa.  In fact, it doesn’t mention food at all.  I found a “recipe” for a homemade jewelry cleaner on Pinterest a few weeks ago and finally tried it.  The best part about it (for me) was that all the ingredients were things that I already had at home.

Ingredients:

• 1 tablespoon salt
• 1 tablespoon baking soda
• 1 tablespoon dish detergent
• 1 cup water
• 1 piece aluminum foil
• A small bowl (like a cereal bowl)

I actually used less than a tablespoon of salt and dish detergent, though I wasn’t measuring it exactly.  When reading the comments on the original article, a few mentioned that they didn’t understand why you needed the salt since baking soda already contains it.  I thought I’d play it safe and only used probably a little more than half a tablespoon of salt.

Directions:

1. Cut a piece of aluminum foil that roughly covers the bottom of the bowl.
2. Heat the water up in the microwave for 1-2 minutes.
3. Pour the hot water into the bowl and add in the salt, baking soda, and dish detergent.
4. Place the jewelry on top of the foil and let it sit for 5-10 minutes.
5. When you remove the jewelry, rinse it in cool water and dry it with a soft cloth.

They say to discard the solution after each piece of jewelry has been cleaned, but I didn’t do that.  I think it depends on how dirty your jewelry is because if it was very dirty, you’ll see the dirt in the solution and want to change it.  I saved my dirtiest piece for last.  According to the site where  I got this recipe from, this solution “works well for gold-filled, brass, german (nickel) silver, and sterling silver. I have even cleaned jewelry with freshwater pearls, shell cameos and mother of pearl with no problem.”

I only kept my jewelry in for about 5-7 minutes, because I started reading the reviews off of the site I was using and while 90% of them were positive, there were still a handful of people who complained about it turning their jewelry black or yellow or making the texture sticky.  I was really paranoid and didn’t want to leave it in for too long, as I read responses to those reviews and each person who responded said that if they were having problems, it was because they left it in the solution for too long.  For me, it worked like a charm.  I was SO pleasantly surprised at how great the results were, particularly with my old heart necklace from my grandma.  I recommend it, as long as you be sure to keep an eye on the jewelry and not keep it in there for longer than the recommended 10 minutes.  Good luck!

The solution:

My ring before:  It didn’t have much luster.

My ring after:  It’s much shinier and the diamonds sparkle a lot more.

Soaking my necklace:

The grand finale:  Looking how freaking shiny my necklace got!  And this was only after just 5 minutes.  If I left it in another maybe 2 minutes, I think it would’ve been even cleaner.  I am pretty sure this necklace hasn’t been cleaned EVER before.