Green Spring Cleaning Tips
After you have sorted through all of the items in your closets, basement, attic, garage and any other place that you normally store things that you are not using, decide what to do with things. If your neighbor or a friend at work could use that old pair of pruning shears that you replaced a few years ago and you just don’t want to throw out the old ones that work perfectly well, give them away. Not only are you saving space in the landfills, but you are helping to save the person who recieves those items some money in the process. If you have some old clothing that has holes or stains on them and they are not acceptable enough to donate to a local charity, cut them up and use them as rags for tasks around the house such as spills or especially dirty jobs. This will save some paper towels and you can get some extra use out of these old items.
In the kitchen, it is a good idea to start with taking everything out of your cabinets and wiping out all of the shelves with warm water and some baking soda. This will get the dust and crumbs out and anything else that may be in there and it will deodorize the inside of the cabinets. After you have wiped down the shelves, start sorting through all of things that were in the cabinets and getting rid of things that are expired or that you do not use. Check expiration dates and if it is past the date, throw it away. After that, put what is left back in the cabinets neatly and see how much more room you have in them! The outside of the cabinets can be cleaned with a mixture of one quart of warm water and one teaspoon of lemon juice of vinegar. You can use an old article of clothing that you found when you were decluttering as a rag to wipe things down. To wipe down the counters, you can use a mixture of warm water, dish soap and baking soda. The dish soap will act as an antibacterial agent and the baking soda will act as a mild abrasive to remove tough stains. To clean inside the refrigerator, take everything out and throw away what is not safe to eat anymore and use a mixture of four cups of water and three tablespoons of baking soda to wipe out the inside it. Once you are done, put everything back that you are keeping in an organized way. You should find a lot of extra room in there too! To clean the inside of the oven, wipe it down with a mixture of water and baking soda and let it sit for a few minutes to soak. You can sprape off stuck on and baked on food particles with an old credit card to even an ice scraper. After you have gotten all of the stuck on food loosened, wipe it down again with your water and baking soda mixture and then wipe clean with another old article of clothing.
In the bathroom, old newpapers work well to clean any glass or mirrors. For the sink and outside of the toilet and any other surfaces in the bathroom, you can use a mixture of one quart of warm water and one teaspoon of lemon juice or vinegar. For the inside of the tiolet, make a paste with water and baking soda and let it sit for two hours. After that, use a tiolet brush to remove any stains. You can also use the baking soda paste to clean mildew in the shower or bathtub. You can make a disinfectant using two cups of water and one cup of grapefruit seed extract, clove, lavender, or tea tree oil. Put this mixture in a spray bottle to make it easier to use.
In the closets, empty everything out of them and remove any dust and dirt using an old rag or a broom for really dusty closets. You can wipe down any shelves with the disinfectant in the spray bottle explained to use in the bathroom. When you are done, put everything away and as you are putting things away get rid of anything you have not worn or used in at least eighteen months. Within that amount of time, there has been oppurtunities to use everyhting inthere, regardless of the season it is for. You should have plenty of room in all your closets after you have done this.
Once you have given away everything that you think others could use, and you have made rags out of old clothing, decide what you could sell at a yard sale and take a weekend to sit outside and sell some of your unwanted things. You will not only be keeping from the landfills, but you will be selling it to someone who will be able to use it. Also, you will be making some extra money from things that have been sitting around and taking up space in your home. After the weekend is over, donate anything that wasn’t sold to a local charity. This will help out those that are less fortunate than you and you will be recycling some old and unwanted goods.
There are a lot of things that can be recycled at your local recycling center such as plastic, aluminum, newspaper, and many other things. Take any items that you can to the recycling center to have them recycled. Once you are done with that, there should be a substantially less amount of things that will actually need to be thrown away. Any personal documents that you no longer need can be shredded up and taken to a paper recycling center and the shedding is a great project to get the kids involved in. Make sure you explain to them the dangers of a paper shredder so that they do not cut themselves.
When you have finished with all the rooms in your house, you will be ready to work on the floors. To remove carpet stains, you can use a mixture of vinegar and soapy water and gently rub them out. Use a wet rag with the same mixture to wipe down all baseboards throughoout the house to remove dirt and any other stains that may be on them. On hard surface floors, use a toothbrush and the same mixture as before to clean the corners and hard to reach parts of the floor. Once this is done you are able to give your floors a good cleaning with a mop or by hand. A mixture of vinegar and water works well on most types of hard surface floors. For the carpet, move as much furniture as possible to clean under it and thoroughly vacumm each room. Use the hose on the vacuum to reach corners and hard to reach spots.
When you get the inside of your house completely clean, not only will the air you breathe be cleaner but you will feel a genuine sense of accomplishment for getting it all done. Now you can put it out of your mind and check it off of your to do list and move onto other things. Tackling all of this cleaning may even get you motivated to get the outside of your house cleaned up and to plant beautiful flowers in your flowerbeds.
