Unexpected life hacks you stumbled across

[Janboree]

I’ve just discovered that my body mist cleans my spectacles brilliantly. As good as my opticians cleaning spray and a lot cheaper. Added bonus it makes my glasses smell nice too and I didn’t like the smell of the glasses spray. I only used it as it was to hand and my other spray had run out.
Have other mumsnetters stumbled across any life hacks unexpectedly?

Exactly. I was just pondering why you'd risk dropping the pan and colander over the sink, or inadvertently pouring boiling water over yourself or your hands.

Just put it in the sink, dude:)

Nivea is pefect for keeping leather bags looking lovely. Just wipe them down with a dab of nivea on a cloth, or cotton wool. Cleans them too. Stops them getting stiff.
No need for anything else.

You can also microwave baked potatoes. Prick them deeply a few times with a sharp fork or you'll end up with exploded potato bits all over your microwave (looking at you, DD2).

You could put potato waffles inside trousers legs and cook them whilst ironing👍

Otherwise, they were a fisher price family. 😁

Yeah that's got "look what I can do!" written all over it. I wonder how many pans of pasta down the plug hole and hand blisters that took!

Keep attractive bottles to use as vinegar bottles with liquor pourers on top like these. Also keep glass jars to keep leftovers etc. in the fridge - they have a small footprint and you can see what's in them.

The risk of scalding must be high for a few bits of pasta going through the colander I wouldn't try it.

This is a very subtle advertising thread. 🤡

And thinking further (as you can tell, I tend to ponder on stuff like this!) it's success depends on having the perfect sized colander for the pan being used, hand injuries and lost pasta aside.

I think we all agree that beardy instagram man is a pillock.

I need to know now if the water was steaming. Or very cold.

To avoid large packets of crisps going stale, eat the whole packet in one sitting.*

I find this also works on chocolate and ice cream (not that they go stale of course)

Whatta da hell are you talkin' about? You take-a la pasta to la sauce, just a touch off a dente, then it absorbs la sauce.

No drainin' anywhere. You losin' the golden water there. Ladle of golden water. Emulsifies sauce.

My Cousin Tony wants words with you. We can have a sit down. Very polite.

My brothers friend taught me this… roll up carrier bags to make the storage of them much neater.

Take make up off with Vaseline or olive oil.

If you have run out of sticky tape use your kids stickers 🤣

Cut the tubes open of anything , from foundation to toothpaste.. to scoop out remnants and make it last longer

Use baking soda and a few drops of washing up liquid to clean clothes if washing powder is in short supply

Use white wine vinegar for cleaning

After reading the initial tip about using the mist to clean glasses, I quickly decided to warn others about using cleaners on glasses that aren’t designed for lenses, and to tell of my very expensive mistake with doing exactly as you describe in your post 😳.

After reading various comments on Mumsnet about the best way to clean lenses on glasses, the Fairy Liquid option came out tops every time, so I decided to try it. BIG MISTAKE!

I loved how clean it instantly made my lenses, but I didn’t love how it has started to strip my coating off of my lenses 😬. Doh! I didn’t think that one through properly before doing it 🤦🏼‍♀️.

The coating will, I presume, continue to come away from the lenses, and interfere with my line of vision. £400+ to replace them.

So, a word of warning: please don’t be a numpty like me and ruin your glasses 👓 😞!

You just need to use a bottle opener - usually on the end of a can opener. Two seconds to pop the seal and then easy open. Lift the edge of the lid like you do opening a bottle, hear the pop and good to open normally

My weird tips : If you are parent of a child with long hair, any time you see a stray bobble around the house pop it around your wrist. Has saved me cursing for a bobble of a morning before now.

Put a couple of wet wipes in your pocket every so often and let them go dry , if you forget to take baby wipes out with you just wet the wipes in your pocket to wipe kids faces … if this does not apply you have a hanky anyway 🤣

Don’t laugh , it’s useful! 🤣

This also works beautifully on stickers on packaging or gifts with prices on

We keep a loaf of bread in the freezer like most people, but we also keep all our bread in the fridge, it keeps easily for 2 weeks without going mouldy as we were buying it every week but not anymore, it doesn't go hard either. 🥰

I watched a video of someone baking crumble the other day. Instead of spending ages rubbing in the butter to make the crumble, they just quickly stirred melted butter into their ready measured flour and sugar! It made a nice knobbly looking crumble.
This is a totally amazing revelation to me that I’m excited to try.

I use the back of a metal spoon to rub butter in to flour. You use finger tips as they're cool and don't melt the butter. Metal spoon is similar, particularly in ametal or glass bowl.

If you get a water mark on a polished table, you can remove it with a hair dryer. It takes some time and you need to keep moving the heat around, but it does work.

If you need to apply some moisturiser to your back and there's no one around to help, use a fish slice or a wooden spoon.

If you're feeling tired and can't motivate yourself to do some housework, try the Advert Olympics. Watch a programme on a commercial channel, then get up and dash about during the commercial breaks. It can be quite effective, and doing something is better than doing nothing.

With high energy prices, I take a padded pot holder and cut a slot in it to fit snugly over the knob on a pan lid. It keeps the heat in the pan and saves electricity. Also, switch the hob off before the end of the cooking time to use the residual heat.

If you batch cook and freeze, take a meal you want to use out of the freezer 24 hours in advance and defrost it in the fridge. It will keep the fridge cool and save on energy costs.

just a warm wet flannel on their tummy does the trick with both of mine

Yes!
Bloody hack 🙄
It's a tip 😁

@mathanxiety if I’m understanding right I do this all the time with a sieve or colander as I don’t like the idea of the pasta touching the sink. I didn’t realise there was another way to do it

Can you explain how the pasta would touch the sink if you poured it into an upright colander?