You’re familiar with Spring cleaning, right? Where you open your windows for the first time and realize how dusty everything got while you were hibernating in the winter?
I think it’s time to start a fall cleaning schedule. One in which you prepare your home for the coming winter.
Here are the things I’m doing to prepare myself for the cold weather (organized by room):
- Bedroom: Go through linens, discard any sheet sets that are threadbare. Refold everything. Put blankets in a more accessible place. Dust surfaces. Go through closet, and put summer clothes that didn’t get worn this summer in the giveaway pile. Understand that since you didn’t wear them this summer, you are not likely to wear them next summer. Don’t be sad. Know that you can get new summer clothes at Goodwill next year. Vacuum floor. Dust walls. Declutter. Make space for winter. Dust heater vent. Dust pictures on walls. Evaluate whether I need more things on the walls. Put flannel sheets on the bed.
- Living Room: Dust walls. Vacuum couch. Rearrange pictures on walls. Vacuum rugs, dust corners of the room. Clean windowsills and windows.
- Dining Room: Clean tablecloth. Make sure there’s only dining stuff on the dining room table (harder than it should be!), and clean thoroughly under the table.
- Bathroom: Go through vitamins and medicine, check for expiration dates. Throw out anything old. Reorganize hand towels and washcloths, sterilize shelves, get a new toothbrush. Clean out the bathroom normally as well.
- Kitchen: Go through cupboards, get rid of any pots, pans, or containers for leftovers that you haven’t used since the Spring. Take everything out of the pantry, deep clean the pantry. Only put back the things you think you will eat before they expire. Donate the rest. Tis the season! Go through plates, cups, etc. Make space.
- Finances: Make sure I’m on track to max out my IRA for 2012. Decide how many months in 2013 I’ll need (and how much money each month) to contribute in order to hit the max. Aim for February.
- Goals: Look at my goals, and see if they still make sense. Realize that I can be flexible.
- Taxes: Re-evaluate and estimate self-employment tax, and save money toward those. Don’t wait until Spring cleaning for that.
Going through a cleaning of my home helps me reset and prepare for the next season. This is particularly helpful in the fall, because I believe humans are all a little like squirrels, and we want to settle into our nests (filled with acorns) for the cold. For me, this means projects. I want to make soup, I want to make roasts, I want to make my house smell and feel warm and inviting. Fall cleaning is also somewhat of a spiritual letting go of Summer. Now that the house is ready for the cold, I don’t have to be sad that hot dog days are limited, or that watermelon eating has given way to figs and pears. It’s easier to embrace the cold when your house is clean and you’ve eliminated the dust and clutter of Summer.
How do you transition into a new season? Are you ready for cold-weather projects?
About Kathleen
We follow a lot of these same steps. I also make sure I turn on the furnace before we actually need to use it just to make sure everything is working properly. I don’t want to have it get super cold and then find out we don’t have heat.
This is just the type of thing I’m planning to do this month. Basically, set aside time to get things cleaned and straightened out. I think it’s important to do this several times a year, as it helps ground me and get me on track. This can involve cleaning the home, organizing, as well as tying up loose ends with financial things as well. Organization and direction are good things!
I’m ready for the cooler weather. It looks like you have a really nice schedule set up for yourself. I already organized documents for tax season.
Good list, although I hate doing all the cleaning steps it is a good time of year.
Usually I create a similar list and geek out on the finance side of it (max out retirement savings, do 1 of my 2 semi-annual index port re-balancing,, etc) Thankfully my wife takes care of the other items on the list!
Great list! At home, we also started our fall cleaning and cleaned all the rooms in our house. A few days ago, I just finished cleaning our heater vents and made sure that our heater was properly working. My wife went through our pantry to make sure that there are no expired food, those that are close to expiring, we either donated to charity or cooked right away. As with our financial goals, we sit down twice a year to make sure that all our goals are on track.