Question Of The Day. Saturday 21st of March

[Norachan]

Hello. It's a gorgeous spring day here. I've turned the heat off and opened all the windows to let some fresh air in. The breeze is stirring up dust bunnies that must have been hibernating all winter and is chasing them throughout the house.



Do you spring clean? What needs to be done around your place this spring?

I have a lot of cleaning that needs doing indoors. It's finally warm enough for all the plants to go back outside, so I'll have to wipe down the big windowsills where they were, then rearrange everything so it doesn't look too bare.

I also have change the bedding over from winter to spring futons and blankets, wash and pack away all the winter stuff, vacuum, mop, dust, clean all the light fittings and tackle the Hell Mouth cupboard under the stairs.

Outside there is even more to do. We have to have a few trees taken down this year. Two are dead, one is almost dead and another tree is bound to get damaged when the tree guys take down the two dead ones, so that will have to go as well. Before they do that I have to move all the outdoor cat condos to the other end of the enclosure, put up a temporary fence and take down part of the old enclosure fence so it doesn't get smashed when the trees come down.

There's also a lot of painting, fence repairs and (my favourite bit) planting spring flowers to be done.

I'm exhausted just thinking about it!



What do you need to do for spring?

 

[Jemima Lucca]

Like you said “it’s exhausting just thinking about all I need to do”! There’s huge amounts of dusting from upholstery, to ceiling fans, to washing curtains, to kitchen cabinets. Then there’s windows to clean, deck needs sweeping, and I’m trying desperately to set up my “office” (just where I type emails, pay bills, file important papers etc). Then there’s outside

 

[jcat]

"Spring cleaning" has evolved into "early summer cleaning". Everything gets coated with pollen around here, so it makes more sense to concentrate on vacuuming in spring and leave the scrubbing till the worst is over.

There's a lot to do in the yard/garden, but many things have to wait so as not to disturb the wildlife too much.

It's still too early in the year to think about putting away winter clothing and bedding and getting out the summer stuff. May usually brings extended periods of warmer weather.

 

[Mia6]

Spring cleaning will be done in May as we still get frosts till the end. windows,etc.
Outside branches need to be picked up, etc.

 

[maggiedemi]

It's hard to do spring cleaning with my mom's hoarding. She won't let us move her clutter. She won't let me use the washing machine and she doesn't believe that blankets need to be washed for years.

I tried to explain to her that with cats in the house, I want to wash the bedding at least every month or two. But she just yells at me, so I have to sneak and use the machine when she's gone. I hope the cats and I can move soon and get our own washing machine.

 

[Jem]

I started on some indoor spring cleaning being that I'm home for a while. And let me tell you it's going to be a big job....I started yesterday in fact, with the first room being our bedroom. De-cluttered, organized the closet, swept/vacuumed floors and dusted the walls, trim and furniture (including pulling all the furniture away from walls and getting behind them. All that's left to do is give a good wipe down to the walls and wash the floors and window. I'll finish today and start in the next room. When the upstairs is done (3 bed and 1 bath) I'll move to the middle floor (kitchen and living), then to the....dun, dun, dun....BASEMENT!....AHHHH!, (laundry/bath, rec room) which also includes the crawl space/storage room, that looks like it was hit by a tornado.

As for outdoor stuff...too much to do....but we still have way too much snow to even think about that yet. But I have a fence that needs repaired, flowerbeds needing to be completely dug up and re-planted or removed (I just have too many to care for), I have 3 trees that the squirrels planted in random areas in my flowerbeds that need to be dug up. Unfortunately I let them go way too long and it will be a big job to get those out. I need to move my small storage shed to properly prep the ground under it. We were under a time crunch when we got it so we just plopped it down, I have some painting to do on the house, a deck to build, the big shed needs to be cleaned out and organized, we have some random junk piles that need to be collected and brought to the dump, I need to re-paint some patio furniture with rust paint, and try to see if I can fix my Adirondack chairs, they are pretty wobbly and need reinforcement. And of course the usual, rake the needles from the pine tress, sweep the driveway, and just "clean up" around the yard. I know there are a few other things but I can't remember them right now.
I'm tired just thinking about it!

 

[EmersonandEvie]

The biggest thing we have done so far is to change the direction the fans blow and we sent all lightbulb covers (? unsure of the real word, the covers on the vanities and fans, etc.) through the dishwasher. They were embarrassingly dusty and now we have about 50% more light coming off of our appliances

We've had to mow the grass twice. I need to put the hummingbird feeder back out. I trimmed out holly bushes so they have some sort of shape now.

One of the three perks about living in the armpit of GA is that we don't need winter clothes, so we have nothing to sort through and put away in that department...year round jeans and t-shirts here with the occasional need for a thicker coat for January.

We've pressure washed the back side and patio of our house, which had gotten embarrassing. We started on the front but there is a ways to go there.

It's hard to do spring cleaning with my mom's hoarding. She won't let us move her clutter. She won't let me use the washing machine and she doesn't believe that blankets need to be washed for years.

I tried to explain to her that with cats in the house, I want to wash the bedding at least every month or two. But she just yells at me, so I have to sneak and use the machine when she's gone. I hope the cats and I can move soon and get our own washing machine.

Yikes.....I understand. That's how my in-laws are/were. When my FIL passed away, MIL gave B a blanket of his that is 95% hair from one of their cats....

The cats are also the reason we had to give up comforters. Ours sleep every night on the bed with us and we were ruining comforters by having to wash them every few weeks. We have a quilt now that has held up quite well to all the washing that goes on around here.

 

[posiepurrs]

I need to go through and clean all the woodwork as well as clean carpets (one of my least favorite things to do). I did quite a bit of heavy cleaning in the winter, but it all needs refreshing. Since the virus is going around I have been paying more attention to the housework so hopefully the spring cleaning won't take to long. Outside I have a MAJOR project waiting for me. I am removing 20+ year old shrubs so I can get rid of the invasive Oriental bittersweet vine. Removal of the shrubs is the only way I can access the vines to dig them out. Unfortunately, I can't afford to have it done so I am doing it myself - with pruners, saw and shovel. Will probably take several seasons to do since there are about 15-20 of them. The one thing I am looking forward to is planting the vegetable garden and all the flowers I have started from seed.

 

[muffy]

I just hired a cleaning lady and she came over last Saturday to do a very thorough cleaning of my dust filled house. Now I won't be ashamed to invite people to my house. Even all my food from hoarding has been put away or thrown out. She will only be coming twice a month. That's all I can afford for now.

 

[susanm9006]

After a long winter, I love when I am open the windows, let the fresh air in and that usually means cleaning the window frame of their accumulated winter dust and then doing the same to the screens. I will vacuum, wash curtains, wipe blinds and clean windows at the same time. The rest is just normal period cleaning.

Now, outside is another story. In the spring there are the remainder of last falls leaves to pick up and collecting the tons of branches and sticks that have dropped throughout the winter. As the snow has melted I have already been out a couple times starting that . Another accumulation to be taken care of is removing all of the seed shells from my feeders which requires raking and vacuuming. And once it gets warm enough I will climb into the retaining wall gardens to scrap off the leaf insulation from my perennials as they start coming up and remove the rabbit protection wrappings from the shrubs. Then there is 100 feet of shrubs to be clipped before they leaf out. And it goes on with usually two or three weeks worth of yard work to get ready for summer.

 

[Winchester]

I usually did my spring cleaning when Rick was away on union stuff in the spring and I'd take a week of vacation time. That was my time to rip through the house, wash the windows, wash the walls down in the living room and kitchen, wash the kitchen cabinets, etc. Now that we're retired, I don't know when (or how) I'm going to get it done. It's so much easier to clean when he's not here. I'm not being snotty, it just is.

There's the house to clean: a thorough vacuuming, dusting, washing, etc. Put the screens back in the windows in the living room and kitchen. Drapes to be taken to the cleaners, floors to be Bona'ed. Outside: branches to be picked up (we've had a lot of wind storms and we do go out regularly to pick up branches), spring weeding to be done and the flower beds put into some semblance of order. We'd like to put even a small vegetable garden in and he's been semi-working on a raised bed. The pool will need to be opened and cleaned and the cement deck around the pool will need a good bleach scrubbing. Outside furniture needs power-washed as does the house siding, esp on the northern side, where we don't get much sun at all.

The shed deck needs stained and then landscaping and the path put in.

We got the riding mower and push mowers back from the garage; they needed a good going-over and the riding mower needed brakes. We're good to go there.

You know what I'm really looking for to? Opening the windows!

 

[Jem]

It's so much easier to clean when he's not here. I'm not being snotty, it just is.

TOTALLY understand!!!!! My husband always seems to find THE WORST times to come ask me something, or need to go to the bathroom, or want a glass of water...I'll warn him, "I'm washing the (blank) floors, do you need to (blank) before I start? I'll get a no, but then as soon as I'm done or sometimes not even done yet, floors still wet, he comes around the corner....then I get the...."Are we going to be having dinner soon?" if were getting close to dinner time.

 

[Graceful-Lily]

Not really. I like to be on top of things all the time so I clean throughout the year.

 

[neely]

I'm getting exhausted just reading the list of posts and realizing I forgot about that chore. Probably the first thing that gets done is hardwood floors thoroughly cleaned and a good dusting. Once summer arrives I launder all the winter coats, sweaters, etc. because I like to hang them outdoors to dry. Everything else follows when I have a block of time.

 

[MonaLyssa33]

I just bought my first house, so I've been busy settling in, well I've actually taken the last 2 days to do absolutely nothing, but I will eventually start settling in again soon. There are a lot of things that need to get cleaned or fixed. The previous owners never used the water softener (apparently it was broken), so my dad installed a new one and now I have to deal with all of the calcium deposits. I ordered some CLR but I have to wait for it to arrive from Amazon.
Not only do I have to clean my house, I have to clean my apartment so I can do the move-out inspection. I've been putting that off. I should really go do that today since I left my shampoo and conditioner there by accident and I've been having to use bar soap to wash my hair the last few days.

 

[aliceneko]

We're going to do a big spring clean of the house now we have more time. It needs it!

 

[maeganj]

I also do a spring clean. It's cool out now but all of our windows are open, I love fresh mountain air flowing in the house.

 

[MoochNNoodles]

I have yard work to do outside. Mostly clearing out leaves. Inside I need to clean the windows and in between the window and screens where all the dirt accumulated. I’ve done a few already so I could open those windows.

I also need to sort my kids clothing to see what still fits for this spring and summer. That can wait till May though. They might grow before then on me.

Then there is dusting hard to reach places. And maybe carpet cleaning. DH and I are looking at replacing some flooring this summer.

 

[mani]

I Autumn Clean. It's so humid here in Summer you find mould on the mould. So I have the clove oil out and am going for it (Sthn Hemisphere member for those who don't know )