Friday November 27th, 2009
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Spring Cleaning Room-by-Room
Posted by Regina Leeds on April 30, 2007 - 10:36am.
THE CLOTHES CLOSET
Can't find anything to wear? Get to the bottom of your clothing crisis by making sure your closet is well put together!
Step One: Be Clothes-Minded!
Look at your closet and quickly remove everything that doesn't belong. That means everything but the clothes! What's in your closet besides clothing? Have the kids toys migrated here? Did you put some free weights here hoping they might trigger a desire to work out? Take a minute to return things to their rightful place in your home.
Step Two: Make Room for Better Living
If you left the plastic bags from the cleaners in your closet, rip those space hogs off and find out if your municipality will accept them with your other curbside recyclables. Why recycle the bags? Residue from cleaning solvents can be carcinogenic. You don't want to be inhaling them the next time you wear that garment. Use canvas bags for suits, dresses, and gowns.
Step Three: Hang it All
If you don't have uniform hangers, add them to your shopping list. The wire hanger is a tool meant to provide inexpensive, short-term transport, but it can't really become a permanent fixture for your closet as it looses shape too easily, leaving marks on your garments. To get rid of the wire hanger problem (as well as the toxic chemical problem!) look into eco-friendly dry cleaners that offer safer treatments and eco-hangers. For hangers that last longer and therefore produce less waste, try wood options.
Step Four: Eliminate What You Don't Wear
Do the easy part first by making rags out of items that are faded, worn, ripped, or torn. That old nightgown will get at least a hundred more uses as a dust cloth. Likewise, denim can be perfect for a good hard scrubbing. Once you've separated out what has been damaged beyond repair, you're ready to let go of things you don't wear. This is very tough for most people, so rather than use arbitrary rules like ‘if you haven't worn it in 6 months or a year, toss it,' I ask my clients to address the emotional attachment that encourages them to hold on to something they haven't worn in a long time. Are you holding on to your favorite maternity dress even though your last child is in college? Why not cut a swatch of fabric and put it in a scrapbook next to a photo of you wearing the dress? Unearth the emotional attachment-that's the key to letting go. Don't know what to do with all the clothes you're getting rid of? Take a look at LIME's Guide to Recycling for some good ideas.
Step Five: Picture Your Shoes Somewhere Else
Get your shoes off the floor! Use a cedar shoe rack and get automatic moth protection or an over the door hanging canvas shoe bag for exercise shoes. To store the rest of your shoes, go ahead and use the boxes your shoes came in, stacking them neatly and taking a photo of the shoe to put outside the box, so you can find them easily.
Step Six: Straighten Your Purses
Do your purses flop all over the shelf like drunken sailors home on leave? The next time you buy clothing or get a present, save the tissue paper and stuff it in your purses! They will retain their shape much longer.
Step Seven: Tame Your Sweaters
Nothing is more demoralizing than a stack of unruly sweaters. Canvas sweater bags let your clothing breathe and look nicer, too. If you have the shelf space, stack your sweaters and use bamboo bookends as shelf dividers. Be sure to hide some cedar chips in between them to keep the moths away.
Step Eight: Find a Home for Small Things
Looking for items to hold your small things? Bamboo baskets are great for keeping track of items in your closet like scarves and gloves.
Step Nine: Pack Non-Wearables
Souvenir clothing (think baseball caps, tees, and dresses that will probably never be worn again) should be packed away. Use space bags to shrink the tees.
Step Ten: Embrace Change
Is spare change all over your closet floor and dresser top? Now is the time to use it to purchase a piggy bank, or even an attractive dish to place the day's leftovers in. Once a month, take it to your local bank and cash it in.
Room-By-Room Guide
Getting Started
The Bathroom
The Kitchen
The Home Office
Topics:
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Currently my closet is pretty clean. I am however, targeting the kitchen. Out of all the divisions in my house, this is the hardest to keep organized and tidy.
But yes, definitely getting a good night's sleep and having plenty snacks available to keep the energy flowing makes a lot of sense, I usually get weary halfway there and well, I usually just leave the job unfinished.
I just hope I can maintain it clean afterwards, I think that cleaning it might possibly be the easy part for the most part, maintenance is what really get's to most of us.
Maintenance is also import for our bodies. It's easy to slack here and there, not exercise for a few days, eat a few too many pieces of chocolate, but there's a price. Just like my closet if I don't keep it neat it ends up a big mess that I have to devote 5 hours to cleaning out on a beautiful spring day. I vow to maintain my body in the healthiest way I can. And I hear that chocolate is good for you!
When I teach my classes, I begin by telling everyone that they are already organized. In fact everyone is.
Not only is everyone organized but they have a system they work religiously.
The sticky part is that some systems promote peace, order and calm while others keep the chaos going.
Maintenance is just a word for 'a good system.' I teach my clients and students to set good habits in motion. What is a good habit? It is any repeatable action that keeps the environment in order. Consciously repeat the action for 21 consecutive days and voila you have a new habit!
Here are my favorites for every day:
Make the bed
Take out the garbage
Wash the dishes
Put the clean dishes away
and
Put your keys in the same place the minute you enter your home.
Because we are in the bathroom every day, it would work to establish the habit that any product that gets taken out for use, gets put away in the designated spot the minute you are done with it.
Another good habit is to wipe the counter off before you leave. You can use a fancy wipe or just keep a sponge on the counter.
I hope this helps. Thank you all for taking the time to post a comment. It means a great deal to me to have some feedback!
Blessings,
Regina...
The Zen Organizer
yes I try to do this twice year -- since this is the memorial 3 day weekend -- i will be processing the spring cleaning for my closet -- moving the winter items toward the back and returning the summer items to the front.
Making your own homemade glass cleaner will not only give you a feeling of accomplishment it will also improve the way glass looks in your home. The first and most important tip needed when making and using homemade glass cleaner is that natural homemade cleaners will smear unless you first remove the chemical residue left behind from previous cleaners.
John
house cleaners Twickenham
Cleaning any part of the home is really a task we all take seriously. So when it comes to home carpet or rug cleaning then something the vacuum cleaner will just do the part of removing dust. For cleaning of the stains you will want to use non-toxic cleaners so that just the stains go not the color.
Kelly
Persian Rug Cleaning