If you are starting to see those little green buds on the trees outside your house like I am, if the breezes feel like a refreshing drink of water, if the baby bunnies are nibbling at your garden (shoo bunnies!) then it must be spring. Spring is a wonderful time of renewal. The great outdoors beckons, it’s time to throw open the windows and let in some fresh air. And if the fresh spring breeze stirs up the dust bunnies in the corners (shoo bunnies!), the time may have come for a little spring cleaning as well.
Don’t despair, though, spring cleaning can be fun. Okay, maybe not fun. But … rewarding. Trust me, we’ve got it easy these days. Spring cleaning for our great grandparents probably meant beating the wool rugs, washing the soot-covered walls (coal-fired furnaces), and covering the furniture with slipcovers to protect it from the dirt flying in the open, unscreened windows. So if you are counting your blessings today, you might want to include window screens, central heating, air conditioning, and vacuum cleaners. The truth is, we probably keep our houses cleaner all year long than our great grandparents ever did. (Just kidding Nana.)
What spring cleaning means for most modern Americans is de-cluttering. Tackling all that junk in the garage, finding a new place for the winter coats, sprucing up your outdoor living spaces. (Storage units are a great place to protect your patio furniture from the winter elements, by the way.) If a few baseboards get dusted and the drapes get cleaned in the process, all the better. There are a number of resources on the internet to help you get started, offering both motivation and organizational tips. One site, called springcleaning365.com, encourages you to adopt daily habits that will keep your home clean (or at least presentable) 365 days of the year.
In the next installment, we will talk about cleaning products and tools – what you really need to get the job done. Until then, if you need some place to store those winter coats and all that ski equipment, check out our storage locations: