Book Review – Simply Wonderwoman – Joanna Gosling

Now I promised you that I would share a little book review so some of the nice books I got for Christmas/birthday. Ok, first a small confession. I have a lot of books on household tips/how to clean your house better/the ancient art of housekeeping. So many that when we needed to do some historical research on this subject at my work, we used my book collection. Visitors to our home would not call it minimal. I am not particularly good at the ol’ housekeeping thing, but oh, do I like to read a book on ‘tips and tricks’? If you don’t and in fact such publications drive you mad – don’t read on.

I read about this book in a magazine and really felt Joanna Gosling sounded like a great woman – a pragmatic busy woman – a woman who just liked sharing all the really helpful things she had learned about running her household. Father Christmas was listening to my silent gift list and I cannot be more grateful. I have literally read this hard backed book from cover to cover.

Some of the tips and hints in the household section I already knew, but reading them again spurred me on in ‘New Year’ zeal to get a couple of nagging jobs done in the house. Sadly on New Years day I knelt in the doorway a cleaned our letter box with her brass cleaning formula. It is lucky I have a very patient family…

The book is divided into two sections, The Basics which include; getting organised, keeping house and DIY  and The Nice Stuff, which has tips on making things and homemade presents. If it is any indication I have already put into action about 6 of her hints and tips, mostly in the getting organised section and keeping house. The whole vibe is not preachy, it is not ‘aren’t I clever’ but it is – ‘I can’t believe this works, and it changed my life and made it less stressful, so in the spirit of generosity, I’m going to share it with you’.

Of particular note was her recipe for stain removal, which uses things in your baking cupboard (obviously for copyright reasons I can’t tell you what it is). I wasn’t totally convinced but in a rather desperate attempt to clean up very persistent marks on our carpets, one from a un-set jelly spilling incident (ooooh messy) and another from a 3am Calpol mercy dash. These are marks which you are unaware are there, lurking waiting to gather more sticky dirt until they become more of a feature than a household stain. Well I gave the carpets the Simply Wonderwoman stain removal treatment and quite shockingly it worked! ‘Hurrah’ for you Joanna Gosling – You seem like a jolly nice lady and you are right, it’s good to share. I love this book!