New Age Dream Chick

With spring around the corner, most people start thinking about spring cleaning. If you’re typically pretty busy and don’t always have time to put the work you want into each room, you might find things to be overwhelming. I am compiling a list here that will show how often various items are recommended to be washed. Here is a break down to help you get organized room by room so you can work on getting a deeper clean to your home this spring.

Living Room

The living room may be the most active room in most peoples’ homes. Most people spend the majority of their time in the living room so it’s the room that tends to get the dirtiest. You will want to remember to start from the top of the room and head down to the floor. Here is a list to go through for when you start with your living room:

1. Look at your light fixtures. Rooms gather dust. It doesn’t matter where the item is located, you will have dust build up.
2. When you dust, make sure you dust from the ceiling to the floor. Dust falls as you swipe, so you will undo your work if you dust from the floor up.
3. Get the corners of the ceiling, walls and floor/baseboards
4. Vacuum and shampoo the sofa and other upholstered furniture. You will want to make sure you
5. Clean up all toys and put them in the kids’ bedrooms.
6. Shake out the area rugs.
7. Clean and wipe down all tables.
8. Clear out books you don’t read, games that are broken or you have outgrown.

Kitchen

The kitchen is the most important room to keep clean. You fix food and handle raw foods as well as cooked. Any countertop that handles raw food needs to be sanitized

1. Clean the food out of the fridge, check to see if anything is expired and arrange the fridge where you can easily access everything.
2. Wipe down all the shelves and drawers.
3. Clean the surface and top of the fridge and use a polisher to add the extra shine.
4. Arrange all the cans in your pantry and pull the earliest expiration dates to the front.
5. Wipe down all shelves, pull everything out and wipe off the shelves. Bleach the inside of the fridge.
6. Weed out all expired foods.

Bathroom

The bathroom can easily get to be the dirtiest room. It’s the room everyone goes to shower off, brush teeth and use the bathroom. With all those things going on- toothpaste potentially being sprayed thanks to your teeth or particles of poop, drops of pee being sprayed by the toilet- you want to make sure it’s sanitized on a very regular basis.

1. The tub should be washed out between uses anyway but make sure to bleach out the tub and scrub the grout.
2. Scrub the floors, baseboards and bottom of the wall.
3. When was the last time you really scrubbed the base of the toilet?
4. Drop a toilet bowl cleaner inside the toilet and scrub the inside.
5. Clean the shower head and faucets.
6. Don’t forget the mirrors.
7. Sometimes toothpaste will get sprayed while you’re brushing your teeth. Make sure to get all of that cleaned off the wall (especially if you have kids).
8. If you can’t remember the last time the tooth brushes were changed, it’s time to replace them and clean the holder.
9. It’s also the right time to replace any hand soap or bar soap that may be sitting out.
10. Move everything off the sink and wash the countertop.

Bedroom

The bedroom is one of the lease used, but most important rooms in the house. Your bedroom is meant to be your sanctuary. It’s the room you go to retreat and recharge, so it needs to be as simple and tailored to you as you can get it.

1. Dust ceiling fans
2. dust anything else higher up on the walls (shelves, dressers, etc)
3. Dust off or wipe down all mirrors, vanity tops and TVs
4. polish all wood
5. Clean under every piece of furniture and the beds.
6. Go through your closet to straighten things up and store things in three spots- where they need to be stored, to donate/sell or trash.
7. Go through all your clothes after going through your closet to clear out clothes you won’t be wearing.
8. If you’re cleaning the kids’ rooms, pick up all toys and have them choose the ones they like vs they want to give to other kids or sell for money.

Stairs and Entry Way

There typically aren’t too many things you need to do with entry hall ways, halls and stair cases.

1. Run a dust mop along any hard wood/laminate or hard flooring or vacuum carpets
2. Sit down and really scrub the sides, edges and walls at and below the stairs.
3. Shake out any rugs.
4. Clean out shoes and the shoe racks
5. Clean the front door or the screen door.

All Over

1. Curtains are supposed to be washed every 6-12 months, unless you have more of an issue with allergies and the dust bothers you. Use Spring cleaning as your time to take all curtains down to wash them. While they’re being washed, dust all the blinds and wash the windows- both on the inside and outside.
2. If anything has been splashed on the walls and was ignored, clean the walls.
3. Furniture gathers dust like nothing else and very few people tend to really clean the tops and surfaces the ways they should.
4. Sweep, mop and polish all hardwood or harder floors.
5. Vacuum and shampoo/steam clean all carpets, upholstered furniture.