Clean Slate

Start every part of your spring clean process with a clean slate. When you are cleaning and organizing your closets, take everything out of them so they are completely empty. In the kitchen, empty your cupboards and wash them. Do the same thing in the bedroom with drawers and under the bed. A clean slate helps you to really get down to the nitty gritty to get it clean. It also helps you with the next organizational idea.

Visualize

Once you have emptied the area you are spring cleaning, visualize how you want it to function. If you had a good flow of function before, then feel free to keep using the same flow. You know you had a good flow when everything was clean and organized before you pulled it out. If things were a mess or disorganized, it's time for you to make some changes. For example, in your closets, ask yourself if more shelving would help you, or a particular type of shelving, like a shoe rack. If you need help with storage and organization ideas, run a search on the internet for the item you want to get organized. For example, you could type into a search engine, "shoe organization tools" and get a whole list of ideas for products to organize your shoes with and ideas on how to organize them that will keep them orderly for the rest of the year. You can also look around your house and see if organizational solutions you are using somewhere else would work better in the area you are currently working in. The key is to visualize how you want the space to function then get the storage and organizational tools to do it. Do this for every space you want reorganized and get your storage solutions working for you so you can keep your spring cleaned look all year long.

Donate and Throw Away

The next step in the process is go through the items you took out of the area you are spring cleaning and figure out what is being kept, donated, and thrown away. For example, when going through the food you pulled out of your pantry and cupboards, throw away anything expired, donate canned and bottled goods to a food bank if they haven't expired but you know you won't use them, and keep what's left over. This is also the time to go through and figure out what you use the most and make it the most accessible. For example, when going through the drawers in your room, figure out which clothes you are donating, which are too old or worn out to donate and throw them away, and which you are keeping. Then, of the things you are keeping, decide which you use the most and put them in your top drawer, the things you use a lot, but not as often in your next drawer, and so on. When going through your clothes, it is also the time to pack away the winter and break out the warmer season wardrobe. Go through the clothes you are storing and donate anything you didn't wear this season. It is just taking up space you could be using for something else, so it's time to get organized and get rid of it.