Create a Spring Cleaning and Decluttering Strategy

Next week is Clutter Awareness Week and National Clean Out Your Closet Week.

It’s a great kickoff for Organized Priorities Operation Spring Cleaning and Decluttering. If you are one of those people who do Spring Cleaning every year then maybe you already have a plan on how you tackle it. If this is all new to you, then creating a strategy is a great place to start. Here are a few tips to get you started.

What Do You Want to Accomplish?

Having an end goal is always a great place to start. Do you want to do a full deep cleaning of your whole house? Or do you want to just clean all the things that usually get skipped during your regular cleaning routine? Maybe you just want to focus on cleaning out clutter in closets and cabinets. Once you know what you want to accomplish you can move to the next step.

How Much Time Do You Want to Spend?

Whether you want to spend an hour a day, or five hours on the weekend, deciding how much time you want to spend will go a long way to helping you to fit your plan into your regular priorities. It will also help you to figure out if your time commitment and what you want to accomplish will work together. For example, if you want to Spring Clean your entire house but only have 15 minutes a day, then you may be spring cleaning all the way to fall. That’s ok…but is that going to work for you? If not, adjust accordingly.

Who Will Help?

Are you going to make this a family project? Or, are you going to go solo? Do you want to hire a professional to help? There is no right or wrong answer here, but the answer will help you to put together a great plan. Once you decide who will help, you also need to decide what they will be responsible for. This will help you delegate later.

Write It Down

Now that you know the what, how and who you are ready to put pen to paper. I always recommend making lists. I love lists! Grab some paper, or use a journal or planner. On the top of the page write down a room or area in your home. After you pick the room, visualize what you want to do in that room. Here’s an example of a decluttering and cleaning plan for one of your rooms:

Master Bedroom (full clean and declutter)

√ Declutter Closet

• Clean the closet light fixtures, switch plates and moulding
• Vacuum and dust surfaces
• Declutter dresser drawers and empty them one at a time (don’t forget the nightstands!)
• Vacuum or wipe our drawers, change liners if necessary
• Refold and put items back

√ Declutter and dust tops of dressers

• Clean under bed and dressers (move them if necessary/possible)
• Clean light fixtures, switch plates and moulding
• Wash all bed linens and curtains, remake bed when finished
• Vacuum and clean floors

√ Step back, look at your progress, and pat yourself on the back

After you have made your list for the first room, move on to the next room. Again, adjust for your strategy. If you are only going to declutter than just make a list of the places you want to declutter.

Have a Clean-up Plan

If you are going to be decluttering, then you need a Clean-up Plan for what you are going to do with the items you are decluttering. If you are thinking of a garage sale, then have a place to store items until you are ready to garage sale prep.

When a garage sale is not your jam, decide where you would like to donate. For those of you that are going to be doing a full house declutter it may take an extended amount of time. If this is the case then you will want to plan to do periodic donation drop offs rather than wait until the end. The biggest challenge some have with decluttering is actually getting the stuff out of the house. Plan how you will act on this from the beginning. Oh, and don’t forget to write down what you donate in case you need it for tax purposes.

Get a Support System

If you need some momentum, or maybe some accountability, head over to our Facebook Group – Organized Priorities Collective.

Organized Priorities Collective is a brand new private group to ask questions, share your progress, and get support for your home organization and decluttering challenges. It is our mission to help provide practical and realistic advice and support to help you get organized, feel less overwhelmed, and save time.Does decluttering and organizing make you feel overwhelmed? That’s where Organized Priorities can come in and help. Head on over to our Services page and click the link to schedule a consultation.