7 Places You’re Forgetting to Declutter While Spring Cleaning

Inside: Are you forgetting to declutter these spaces during your spring cleaning? Eliminating unwanted items from these spaces will help you to have a cleaner home!

A guest post by Rose Morrison

Spring has finally arrived, which means better weather is just around the corner. It also means we have to clean up the clutter we’ve been ignoring all winter.

Most of us take care of the high-traffic areas, such as the bedrooms, living room, and bathrooms, but we often skip over other areas without realizing it. 

Here are seven places you may be forgetting to declutter while spring cleaning. Getting rid of unwanted items in these areas will make them easier to clean and help freshen up your home even more this season!

7 Places You’re Forgetting to Declutter While Spring Cleaning

It’s common to overlook various areas when cleaning your home. Likewise, certain spaces tend to be forgotten when decluttering your home while spring cleaning.

Decluttering and spring cleaning are two distinctly different processes, but they work well together. Taking the time to declutter and clear out unneeded items in a space makes it much easier to dust and clean.

If these areas have been getting overlooked in your home, set aside some time to declutter them and then continue with the rest of your spring cleaning process.

1. Attic

The attic is a cluttered room for many households. It often contains old furniture, decorations from past holidays, and other sentimental goods.

We might prefer to keep these items out of sight and mind, but they still gather dust when we’re not looking. Use spring cleaning as an opportunity to clear out your attic and get rid of accumulated dust.

Dust isn’t the only thing you need to worry about. Mold could set in since everything is sitting in one place and there is little air circulation. Pests also might make a home in a quiet area with many entrances and exits.

Stay mindful of these problems as you inspect the room. Check your insulation to ensure there are no weak spots for cold air and moisture to sneak through.

Wipe away the top layer of dust and then move the furniture and other items so you can vacuum the floor. Do one last sweep before reorganizing and sorting out what you don’t need. These measures will make the cleaning process much easier next year.

2. Pantry

The pantry gets more traffic than the attic, but we still leave some items behind without realizing it. We also take for granted that pantries hold much of our food and need to be extra sanitary.

Take everything off the shelves, sort through the items, and discard anything that has expired. You should also start a donation pile for foods you don’t like.

These efforts will consolidate your food collection and make reorganizing the pantry easier.

Wash the bare shelves with warm, soapy water. Apply baking soda and a warm paper towel to any sticky spots and let sit for a few minutes. Dry with a clean dish towel after washing and line them with contact paper if you wish.

You might find it helpful to separate foods into categories with large plastic bins when organizing. These containers will keep similar foods together and prevent the pantry from becoming too cluttered. 

3. Garage

The garage isn’t necessarily a room we forget to clean but a room we avoid. Like the attic, it often contains a lot of miscellaneous goods that don’t get much use or attention.

Plus, the few things in the garage that we do use often get scattered around and lost. That’s one more reason to add this forgotten area to your declutter list while spring cleaning.

The rearranging process is similar to the attic. Clear as much clutter out of the garage as you can and dust and vacuum the area.

Separate any items you don’t need into three sections: trash, donations, and yard sale. Watch out for mold and pests as you rearrange. Mice, in particular, seek garages during the winter because they can get inside easily and hide for a long time without being noticed.

Garage floors require a special cleaning solution that removes oil, paint, and rust. Make sure you get the right product to tackle those issues. You should aim to have as much open space as possible when you’re finished.

Maximize floor space by taking advantage of unique storage tools like hooks, shelves, and racks that move everything to the walls and ceiling. They will keep your garage much more organized throughout the year.

4. Cupboards, Cabinets, and Drawers

Sometimes out of sight becomes out of mind when it comes to enclosed spaces. Cupboards can gather quite a mess.

They pick up anything and everything, including crumbs, dirt, hair, and other unidentifiable substances. This debris can create a layer of grime that becomes more difficult to remove the longer we ignore it. 

Start by removing everything from the inside. A blank slate is essential for you to get a complete cleaning. Get rid of anything you don’t need or use. Then, vacuum the inside.

Apply baking soda and a wet, warm paper towel to old spills and sticky spots for a few minutes. If that doesn’t work, scrub them with the rough side of a damp sponge.

Wash the inside and outside with a light, soapy dishcloth and dry with another. Take advantage of this opportunity to reorganize the contents more practically as you put them back in the cabinets.

5. Refrigerator

We like to think we keep our refrigerators sanitary, but an occasional wipe with disinfectant cloths won’t cut it. You should give your fridge a thorough cleaning at least once a year (if not more, depending on how dirty it gets) to protect the food inside.

You can take the quicker route and try steam cleaning or you can follow these steps for a DIY cleaning:

• Remove all the contents. As you take items out, throw away any food that is expired, spoiled, or you know won’t get eaten.
• Vacuum the inside for crumbs. 
• Take out the drawers and wash them with dish soap and hot water. 
• Wash the fridge’s interior with the same materials.
• Pay special attention to the hard-to-reach corners where mold likes to grow.
• Wipe down any glass with a cleaner.
• Dry everything thoroughly with a clean dishcloth.

Make sure the fridge is as dry as when you started. You don’t want to leave moisture and condensation behind, or else it could lead to a humid atmosphere that causes mold to grow and food to spoil. A cold, dry space is the optimal environment for refrigerated goods.

6. Play Room

Homes with children usually have designated playrooms to confine kids’ messes into one space. It’s an effective strategy, but it can also lead parents to forget the mess exists.

Plus, kids tend to get new toys every year and add to the clutter as time goes on. Give their playroom a clean slate and unearth some forgotten toys by decluttering the space with them.

Take your kid(s) into the playroom and sort through the toys. Separate the toys into a keeper pile and a donation pile based on their suggestions. Toss any toys that are broken beyond repair. With the clutter out of the way, you can start cleaning.

Check the furniture, walls, and carpets for stains and scrub them out with a multi-surface stain removal solution. Vacuum the floor and pay special attention to underneath the furniture. Dust the TV and curtains (if applicable) and disinfect all surfaces.

7. Home Office

Home offices get more use now than ever with a greater number of people working from home. As many white-collar workers know, desks can get unorganized and unclean in just one day.

Heaps of paperwork and drawers full of office supplies are the obvious indicators, but dust also seems to gravitate towards office surfaces.

Start by clearing off the desk and decluttering the items in the drawers. Reorganize your files and throw away or donate anything you don’t need.

You also want to keep your supply inventory under control. For example, you don’t need a pack of 24 pens and multiple boxes of staples. Store only the necessary amount to get you through the foreseeable future.

Dust and disinfect all surfaces, then vacuum the floor. If your office space has a rug or carpet, you might want to consider switching to hard-surface flooring. Carpeting gathers a lot of dust and allergens, harming the room’s air quality and limiting productivity.

You should swap out fluorescent lights for LED lights as well. LED lights conserve energy and are much easier on the eyes.

What additional areas have you been forgetting to declutter while spring cleaning? Share it in the comments section.

We like to imagine that we cover every area during spring cleaning, but some places get left behind. Whether we honestly forget these areas or have chosen to ignore them until now doesn’t matter.

If you opt to make these seven areas a priority, you’ll get your home even cleaner this spring!