Keep Your Home Smelling Fresh Naturally With Two Ingredients From Your Kitchen

When you walk into your home, the last thing you want is to be hit by unpleasant odors. It happens, though — especially if you forget to take out the trash, or your pet has an accident while you're gone. Although you might not be able to avoid having these "whoopsies" from time to time, you can do something about tackling those smells, and it doesn't require lighting candles. All you need are two basic kitchen items to help keep your home smelling fresh and clean. Simply grab an orange and salt, and in minutes, you can have an all-natural air freshener.

Many people reach for store-bought fragrances when their home turns stinky. Even though they're a quick fix that have been around for decades, air fresheners are oftentimes filled with volatile organic compounds (VOCs), meaning that's what you're spraying into the air. Not everyone is bothered by this fact. But if you're looking for a smell-fighting solution that's inexpensive, free of VOCs, and adorable, too, look no further than this clever deodorizing hack. Oranges have a natural, yummy scent that pairs perfectly with salt. Since salt has the ability to absorb moisture and smells, it's an excellent teammate for a fragrant orange peel, which can also deodorize. Create several of these DIY air fresheners to keep in different rooms of your home for maximum impact.

Start by grabbing an orange and a container of sea salt. Slice the orange in half, then scoop out all of the flesh until you are left with just the rind. Next, fill the rind with sea salt — it's now ready to be placed in rooms that tend to have funky smells, like the kitchen. If you want to give it an extra boost, before adding the sea salt to the rind, mix it with drops of essential oil or flowers and herbs. These fresheners look cute, smell wonderful, and can neutralize bad odors for up to a week. What's great is that, since they only takes minutes to make, replacing them often isn't much of a chore at all.

There are many inventive orange peel hacks for a fresher-smelling kitchen, and citrus in general can be used for all kinds of cleaning jobs, too. If you're a bigger fan of another fruit's citrus scent, you can swap out the orange rind in this DIY air freshener hack. Create a mini version out of a lime to enjoy the vacation-like fragrance. You can even add a few drops of lemon essential oil for a little twist. Or, make a bigger version out of a grapefruit, placing tiny flowers on top of the salt for an added decoration. They look amazing on a counter or tabletop — just make sure to replace them after a week or so to keep things fresh.