Spring is all about starting anew – the grass grows, the flowers bloom, the birds fly back, and the warm weather rolls in. Watching nature start fresh makes me want to do the same… with my home! When this sunny season comes around, I always roll up my sleeves and get ready for spring cleaning.
This year, my mission is de-cluttering! Parting with things I’ve kept for a while can be a challenge, but I can already feel that my home will look much better once I tidy up and re-organize.
One Step at a Time
My main piece of advice is this: don’t tackle everything at once! Taking on an entire apartment or house can definitely be overwhelming. I would suggest going room by room or floor by floor (at most). You can even go closet by closet, if it makes it easier! The goal is to make it all manageable.
To help me along the way, I also plan on creating a calendar and scheduling my tasks to make sure I stay on track (…distractions are easy to come by when it’s so beautiful outside!).
My wish is to sort it all – clothes, shoes, electronics, school supplies, dishes, magazines, and much more! My plan is to declutter every room and here is what I’ll be doing in each one:
Kitchen
- Throwing out foods that are past their expiry date
- Tossing foods that have been in the freezer for a lil’ too long
- Getting rid of chipped dishes
- Giving away old appliances
- Sorting through tea mugs (14 might be a bit much… or not?)
Living Room
- Donating books that I will likely not read again
- Sorting through old and ripped magazines
- Throwing out damaged vinyl records
- Creating storage for extra throw blankets and pillows
- Minimizing table decorations
Bedroom
- Sorting through my clothes and shoes (this will be tough!)
- Getting a jewelry tree (to avoid hours and hours of detangling)
- Sorting through old school supplies
- Tossing old or ripped bedding
- Creating storage space under the bed
Bathroom
- Sorting through the bathroom cabinet
- Throwing out old creams
- Getting a shower caddy
- Tossing nearly-finished bath products
- Sorting through towels
I’ll be going into each room with 2 boxes: 1 for donations and 1 for garbage (whatever I decide to keep will simply stay in the room). The easiest is the garbage box – if anything is broken beyond repair, then out it goes. But before taking out the trash, I’ll make sure to place what I can in the recycling bin and take old electronics to a recycling center!
The tougher part is deciding what to keep and what to give away. The way I see it, if I used something only 5 times in the past year and it mostly sits somewhere in the house unseen, collecting dust, then it’s time to say bye-bye and pass it on to someone who might need it more. The #1 rule to follow here is: once it goes in the donation box, it has to stay there… no matter how tempting it might be to take it out!
If these are objects that have no sentimental value, chances are I’ll forget about them soon after the spring cleaning is complete.
Once I sort everything into “KEEP,” “GIVE” or “TOSS” categories, it’s time to organize what’s left! To keep things simple in terms of the everyday, I will make the objects I use most often as accessible as possible. I’m also thinking of sorting things by season and size. For example, I’ll keep my cozy sweaters neatly tucked away during the summer months, and place big puzzle boxes at the back of a shelf while keeping the smaller card games at the front.
No matter how you decide to declutter and re-organize, my last recommendation is to do it with someone (if you can). Not only can it speed up the process, but it also makes it fun! I will definitely put on some energizing tunes and dance my way through all of the spring cleaning with my family.
