Day 10: Front Entry and Hallway

I made it to the last day of the Spring Cleaning Party! Today's focus was the front entry and hallway. We do not have an area to classify as a "front entry" so I revisited Day 2 - The Living Area.



The front door of our home leads right into our living room area. Beside the front door is two bookshelves, the smaller of which is for the little girls.

We hung two hooks above this shelf to place our keys. It has been an immense time saver!

Also, I recently purchased a storage box by Orla Kiely from Target.
We use this box for any library items that we borrow.

With 3 girls and myself making weekly trips to the library, I need to stay on top of where everything is and when it is due! The girls know that when they are done with a particular borrowed book or game, they must immediately put it back into the box. So far it has been working splendidly!

To make sure our library items get back on time, I have installed Google Calendar on my iGoogle homepage. It has been a life saver!

The calendar is a daily reminder for all our to-do's, school activities, and saved dates! Using Google calendar has eliminated paper clutter as well! All the paperwork I would collect as reminders for school events, lunch menus, library receipts or upcoming birthdays are recycled and keeps the desk area free of clutter! Perfect!

My final comments on the Spring Cleaning Party are that I have noticed a difference in my daily cleaning and am glad to have rid my home of unwanted, unused items! As of today, I have made $80 from old games and books that I listed on Half.com! There is also 3 huge bags ready for The Purple Heart and 2 boxes of items ready for a yard sale!

So, how do you feel about this 10-day Spring Cleaning Party? Has it been worth the effort in your own home?

A big thanks to Tsh at SimpleMom and Mandi at Organizing Your Way for hosting this event and giving us great daily tips to keep motivated and create an clean, organized home!

Also thanks to all the readers and comments made throughout the Spring Cleaning series! Your comments gave me the motivation to continue day after day! I hope that my tips and before/after pics sparked a bit of motivation behind your own Spring Cleaning!

Please visit SimpleMom and visit the other participants listed in the comment section or if you have Spring Cleaning before and after pictures, join SimpleMom's Flickr group to post some of your own!

Day 9 - The Master Bedroom

I'll be honest. Today wasn't what I anticipated. The master bedroom in our house is a catchall for anything and everything. Throughout this Spring Cleaning Party, our bedroom has become the storage room for all the seasonal clothes boxes, all the items collected to Sell/Give, a steadily growing pile of laundry and lots and lots of clutter.

I would have loved a clean, peaceful sanctuary at the end of the day! However, I had to settle for a fraction of that. Everything I did accomplish was a step towards my goal.

When I continue with the master bedroom, I will be much further ahead than I was before today's clean-up!

I must be reminded of an Old Chinese Proverb that says,

“It is better to take many small steps in the right direction than to make a great leap forward only to stumble backward.”

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AFTER:



7 boxes of Winter clothing, boots and accessories plus a hamper of baby things are waiting in the hallway for my husband to put them in the attic storage! Whew!



Here are my sick, cranky babies towards the end of my bedroom cleaning. They had just about enough when I snapped this shot.



Time to nestle down under those fresh, clean sheets and dry those baby tears. See you tomorrow for my last day of Spring Cleaning!

For some great tips on decluttering and organizing your Master Bedroom:

• Zen Habits: 15 Great Decluttering Tips

• Organizing Your Way: Making Your Bedroom A Haven

• Organizing-Life: Feng Shui Tips for the Master Bedroom

• Organized Home: Strategies to Cut Clutter
  

Day 8 - The Kids' Rooms cont...

I had much to do with the girls' bedroom closet. I had been throwing Winter clothes out of their dressers and into the closet to make room for Spring/Summer clothes. Now, it was time to straighten this mess out!

What I did:

• Sorted the clothes by size and put into boxes to be stored.
  

• All the winter boots and accessories were also put into a box for next year.

• Unused items (A Boppy, a newborn hamper and receiving blankets) were also put away...wishful thinking, perhaps. I unfortunately suffer from a bad case of Someday Syndrome.

• Yes, that is a dresser in the closet! I put all the twins' clothing in this dresser. The dresser was purged of Winter clothing and outgrown items and replaced with their new Spring/Summer clothing of the appropriate size. Much neater and organized now!

• Now that there was room on the top shelf of the closet, I moved some of the games from the playroom that were not suitable for the little ones and put it away from their tiny grasp.

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Here are the pictures of the refreshed game cabinet. After freeing up two shelves of games to the girls' bedroom closet, the remaining shelves are now home to:

• age-appropriate games for the little ones

• two boxes of blocks that had originally sat on the playroom floor

• all the puzzles from the bookshelves downstairs as well as the shelves in the playroom!

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I am certainly not done with my Spring Cleaning in the Kids rooms but I must save the rest for another day! My babies have had enough time without Mommy's attention and there is a big pile of laundry with my name plastered all over it!

Although I did not complete these rooms, I am not discouraged. I made a lot of progress! Tomorrow starts Day 9 of the Spring Cleaning Party hosted by SimpleMom! We take on the Master bedroom (yikes!).

Day 7- Kids Room Cleanup!

Day 7 and counting! I had every intention to march into the girls' rooms this morning and take charge of the clutter but my baby Gracie had other plans. She is running a fever and wanted me to be near her.

My accomplishments today consisted of a bit of light cleaning and a much needed fish tank scrubbing. Oh, and I also made a sick little girl a little bit happier.

I would have to check that as being at the top of my list of accomplishments for the day.



Here is what is on the agenda for tomorrow:

The Game Closet -



The Girls' Bedroom Closet -



The Playroom -



Since I don't have any tips to share today, here are just a few links to others joining in SimpleMom's Spring Cleaning Party:

• Abbie @ Organizing-Life
  

• Buffie @ Pillaging with Buffie

• Katie @ Three Blondes and a Redhead

• Sweet and Simple Mama

• Rana @ Free to learn and lovin it
  

Day 6- Spring Cleaning the Bathrooms!

Monday already? We declared soap scum be gone today and continued our Spring Cleaning Party, hosted by SimpleMom, in the bathrooms!

I have one and a half baths. The half bathroom was a cinch and just needed a general cleaning with some extra time spent cleaning the door and woodwork. Not much to declutter. The full bath was next!

First, I removed the shower curtain and liner, the bath mat and any used towels/washcloths and threw them into the washing machine to be cleaned. By the end of the cleaning session, they will be clean and ready to freshen up the sparkly bathroom.

Next, I moved everything from the tub and linen closet to the top of the sink cabinet in order to start with a clean slate. The tub was scrubbed and the shower head, curtain rod and faucet were cleaned and left shiny and disinfected with a touch of rubbing alcohol!

I am always taking a shower with some sort of bath toy under foot! Not only is it dangerous but when the toys sit in the water instead of being dried off they tend to get mildewed.

I recently saw this Ladybug Bath Toy Scoop from Boon Inc. and decided that it will be mine as soon as I have some time to make a Target run. Hopefully, it will solve my bath toy dilemma.



Here is a tip for eliminating soapy, soggy washcloths from your life. I bought each of the older girls their own mesh bath sponge. They each get a different color and we attached them to the back of the shower wall using tiny suction cups. When the girls are done washing, they rinse them out and hang them back up to dry. Perfect!



For the toilets, I used a homemade cleanser that SimpleMom mentions in her e-book, Spring Cleaning for Normal People. It worked well!

Another simple method to clean the toilet is to drop a couple of antacid tablets in the toilet, let them fizz while cleaning other areas of the bathroom, then scrub and flush!

I also cleaned the cabinets above the toilet. I purged outdated and unused items. Then, I took bulky items in boxes, like the cotton swabs, and placed them in little jars to make more space.

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Moving on the the linen closet! The container of bath toys were cleaned out and paired down. The baskets were home to fresh hand towels and washcloths; all the fitted sheets were refolded and grouped together with their corresponding flat sheets.

I enlisted the help of this video on folding fitted sheets. It helped... but it would have helped even more if that guy had just visited my house for the day and did my sheets for me.

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Now the sink, mirrors and under the sink cabinets! I have many containers that I bought from Ikea and with my handy label maker created neat storage for items. Much neater now!



One last trick worth mentioning is to keep a timer in the bathroom! Growing up in a large family, if we decided to daydream while taking a shower, the last few people would only get cold water. Set the timer for an appropriate time, I allow the girls ten minutes, and when that timer goes off it is time to get out!



Day 7 & 8 will be spent in the Kids Rooms! I am cringing already.

Day 5- TGIF! Kitchen Part 2

The first week of our S.C.P. has come to a close! I feel lighter and happier that my rooms have been rid of their unwanted, unused items. It has made the daily cleaning much easier! Plus at the end of the night, the downstairs looks calm and ready for the following day!

Today, I cleaned and straightened up both food cabinets in the kitchen. I have a tall pantry closet and the dreaded "junk" drawer that may be put off until tomorrow.

BEFORE: It is quite a scary cabinet. When I am searching for spices, something will inevitably fall into my dough or batter. It drives me crazy.



EVERYTHING OUT: Wow! There was that much stuff in that little old cabinet?



AFTER: Aaah! I feel I can breathe again!



INVENTORY OF SPICES: I used the inventory sheets from SimpleMom's e-book, Spring Cleaning for Normal People! I cut them down to eliminate the columns I did not need and in the quantity column put a star next to the items that I was getting low on (since I only had one of each spice).



I surprisingly had MANY outdated spices. Who knew? It seems like I just went through the spices and extracts to check for expiration dates! Embarrassing as it is, my oldest spice was from 2001. Yes. It's true.

Check the dates on your spices and extracts! You may be surprised! Many will have the date printed on the bottom but if there is a code, check the Best By dates at McCormick or Spice Islands.

Enjoy the Mother's Day weekend! I hope to be spending a good part of it relaxing in a bubble bath. ;)

Day 4- The Kitchen, Part 1

Day 4 of our Spring Cleaning Party already?! I tackled the kitchen today and it took longer than I had originally expected! Since my kitchen is small, I was quite smug with the idea that I would be finished in one day and would be able to take a day off. Not the case.

SimpleMom allows 2 days for the kitchen and I am certainly going to need it! Today I focused on a major surface cleaning and purging the cabinets that are home to the dishes. It was a productive day...but then I had to make dinner. Bummer.

Tips for kitchen clean-up:

• The dishwasher cleans your dishes but you must clean the dishwasher! Check around the inside seal on the edge of your dishwasher. It collects food from all those dirty dishes! Remove the silverware racks and clean them out. Also, clean around the drain for any debris that may have gotten stuck.
  

• Don't forget to clean the underside of your kitchen wall cabinets and the baseboards along the floor. These spots are hidden and easily forgotten during a routine cleaning.
  

• If there are any items in your kitchen that are broken, chipped, heavily worn or expired, throw them away! This will be the easiest part of your clean up! Be ruthless! Inanimate objects do not have feelings.

• If you don't use them, lose them. I noticed that I had a 9" stainless steel pan, extra pot lids, a casserole dish, a set of spring-form pans that never quite worked correctly, and some miscellaneous bowls and coffee mugs that I didn't use and quite frankly didn't even like. They went into the SELL/GIVE box that is steadily growing.
  

BEFORE:



AFTER:



Here are the cabinets that house the dishes. Everything was removed; the shelves were cleaned and the shelf liner was washed. I won't bore you with the before pictures but they were quite cluttered with unused, unwanted items.





Tomorrow, I have a date with the spice cabinet. I will be taking an inventory of the spices, extracts, and sugars using SimpleMom's Pantry Inventory Sheet from her e-book, Spring Cleaning for Normal People.

Until then, get some rest! We still have 6 more days to party!

Day 3- Media cabinets!

We are at Day 3 of SimpleMom's Spring Cleaning Party! Today was not as productive as I hoped but I must remember my own tip to not get discouraged! I had two cranky babies, an unfortunate bathroom accident via Sophia in my bed this morning, lots of laundry to wash and sort, vegetable seedlings begging for bigger pots, and my everyday tidying up. Sigh.

Albeit those obstacles, I did manage to purge my DVD/GAME cabinet and eliminate some clutter. Every VHS I had was put into the SELL/GIVE box and old games that were not being used I put on Half.com.

Half.com is a site where you can list books and textbooks, music, movies games and even game systems to sell! Within hours of listing a few of our old games, one sold for $14.99! How nice!

Here are my before and after pictures for today! Next we'll be starting on the kitchen and dining room area! Let's hope my girls are on the same linear path as I am tomorrow.

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Day 2- Living Room Clean-up!

Day 2 arrived for the Spring Cleaning party! If you haven’t already joined, roll up your sleeves and jump in at any time over at SimpleMom! Leave a comment with your own tips for decluttering, cleaning and organizing the home.

Today’s focus was the Living Room, family room, den, or any other area you spend most of your time in. This area will take about two days. I spent today cleaning, dusting, wiping the blinds, putting away things that did not belong and steam cleaning all of my area rugs.

Tomorrow will be spent behind the scenes in the cabinets, drawers and closets where dust bunnies and clutter like to hide. I will be decluttering the bookshelves and arranging our DVD/Game cabinets. I hope to continue to fill my Sell/Give box with things that are not of use to us anymore.

Here are some tips on what I learned today!

Enlist the troops! Sophia helped with all the dusting today! Armed with a rag, I would spritz surfaces and she would travel behind me cleaning. By finding age related tasks for the children willing to help, it makes the clean-up go much faster!

Don’t get discouraged! I have 5 children. Some days the mess is endless. As soon as one room is clean, another room has been destroyed. This will happen no matter what. Do not give up even if you think your cleaning is pointless! By taking the time to minimize some of the “stuff” in your home and to do a deep cleaning, it will only make the following days easier to control.

Here are my before and after pics for today!

The first set is of my bookcase. The twins love to read. I have the pleasure of cleaning up the “before” picture often since I can not quite get two one-year olds to put the books back on the shelf correctly...yet. I took some extra time to sort the books and make them look a bit neater.

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If you haven’t already, check out the tips and comments at SimpleMom to see how other homes are enjoying their Spring Cleaning Party!

Day 1: Declutter your Home

Today began Day 1 of the big Spring Cleaning Party hosted at SimpleMom!

Everyday (cross your fingers) I will be highlighting the activities for the day, posting a before and after picture of one of the areas I cleaned, and leaving some tips and tricks to help with your own spring cleaning!

The one goal for today was to perform a "clean sweep" throughout the entire home!

Basically, I went through each room of the house and did a routine cleaning. Picking up clothes for the laundry, clearing off surfaces, throwing away trash, putting lost items back in their homes, and straightening up. This will be a good foundation to grow upon in the following days!

Gather your tools! I grabbed a trash bag, a box (to sell or give away), and a big paper grocery bag for paper recyclables. I also made sure the paper shredder was ready so that junk mail or any other personal paperwork that needed to be recycled could be shredded easily.

Dress for success! When I am in for a Cleaning Party such as this one, I make sure to put on comfortable clothes and sneakers. As long as your main focus will be inside, wearing shoes puts one in a state of mind that there is a work to be done! It's some simple motivation knowing there will be no putting your feet up on the sofa to relax!

3 simple ways to make your home appear cleaner!

• Always make your bed in the morning! An unkempt bed makes the rest of your bedroom look untidy even when it may not be.

• Keep your sink free of dishes and clean! By eliminating this sore spot, it brightens the kitchen!

• VACUUM! If I can only accomplish one thing for the day, I always go for the vacuum. By having a clean floor and rugs, your rooms will definitely appear neater.

My "clean sweep" yielded a full bag of paper recyclables (school paperwork, junk mail shredded and some old magazines), 1 bag of trash and half a box of things to either sell/give. I am sure the sell/give box will grow over the course of my spring cleaning!

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For more tips or to join in the Spring Cleaning Party, visit SimpleMom!