Spring cleaning tips

No matter how many times I write about how to de-clutter the home, I am always asked the same questions: Where do you start? Should you hire a professional? Where do you take the things you want to throw or give away?

So instead of answering readers’ questions this week, I’m giving tips on spring cleaning.

Turning your house upside down and dusting off every corner and cornice is not easy. What’s even harder is conquering the clutter in your home, deciding what to toss out and what to do with the castoffs, and what stays.

Once a year, you do need to do spring or general cleaning. This means removing things you have no use for and allowing your closets to breathe. Weeks before the target date, pick out the furniture you want to have professionally cleaned. Beds, sofas and carpets can’t be thoroughly cleaned even if you vacuum them or air them out. Book the cleaners at a date around your cleaning marathon. Many of these companies are contracted by hotels, so it takes time to get a schedule. Professional cleaners are listed in the yellow pages under "Cleaning Services," and they recommend that you have your beds and sofas dry-shampooed twice a year to get rid of dust mites and other germs. How much do they charge? When we had one bed, six upholstered dining chairs and a three-piece sofa cleaned by Handy Crew, it came up to around P2,300. They clean on site and it takes around an hour and a half.

Another thing to consider is fumigation. Do it a few days before your spring cleaning so you can clean up chemicals from the floors or walls especially if they spray the entire house.

Enlist the help of the entire household, including all the househelp, drivers, and members of the family. Get all the cleaning supplies ready – glass cleaner, furniture polish, rags, garbage bags, silver polish, liquid disinfectant, dishwashing soap, vinegar, detergent, oven cleaner, old boxes to hold things you will throw out or give away, floor polish and polisher, vacuum cleaner, garden hose, and that ever valuable cleaner Goo Gone (available at True Value).

Unlike weekend cleaning, spring cleaning puts you in the right frame of mind, which means that you’re under obligation to clean everything – including trash bins – and to wash all your slipcovers, draperies, blinds, and linen. Take down everything from the closets, shelves and cupboards and de-clutter.

Experts recommend that you start with a corner room in a one-story house and work inwards, or at the top corner of your house if it’s multi-level and work downwards.

Coming Out Of The Closet

If there’s a part of the house that’s the hardest to clean and keep neat, it’s the bedroom. This is the place where you hold most of your treasures stuffed in closets that leave no space for you to hide when there’s burglar in the house.

How do you organize a closet? The most logical way is to group your clothes by kind and color to make it easier to choose what to wear. Sleeveless tops belong together, skirts belong together, and so on. It’s the same thing with handbags and purses – the evening bags go together, work bags in one space, etc.

If you share a closet with your husband, the unwritten rule is that he gets only a third of it. After all, how many white shirts does he really need? You, on the other hand, need all your 20 black dresses.

As with the rest of the house, organization starts with an efficient design. If you have the budget to remodel your closet, make sure the rack and shelving systems waste no space. The American Institute of Architects has standard measurements for closet space to keep in mind when remodeling. Since Americans are taller than Filipinos, just subtract a few inches or better yet, measure your longest dress and take it from there.

• Long dress: 69 inches

• Regular dress: 45 inches

• Skirt: 35 inches

• Pants (hung by the waist): 44 inches

• Pants (double hung): 30 inches

• Blouse/shirt: 28 to 38 inches

• Men’s suit: 38 inches

• Women’s suit: 29 inches

• Coat: 50 to 52 inches

• Tie: 27 inches if hung over a hanger

• Dress storage bag: 48 inches

• Hanging shoe bag: 38 to 72 inches

Seasonal clothes, such as thick jackets, should be kept in stackable, hard-plastic clothing cases (available at Handyman) and don’t forget to stick an inventory on the outside before putting them at the top of the closet. These are also available in large sizes, ideal for toys.

When weeding your clothes and accessories, be merciless. Provide three boxes for things to give to charities, to friends and colleagues, and to decide on later. Obviously, five-inch-heeled Manolo Blahniks are useless to street children. Cocktail dresses and accessories should be either sold or given away to people who will actually use them. Don’t be embarrassed about selling your stuff to friends. If people now drive six hours to Baguio just to buy ukay-ukay, it’s so much more acceptable to buy from somebody they know.

Anything you haven’t worn in over a year should be out of the closet. Likewise with old cosmetics. Also to be gotten out of the way are things we bought or were given to us that we now wouldn’t touch with a 10-foot pole. It’s a phenomenon how unopened shopping bags just keep piling up at the back of the closet and how our relatives have the tackiest ideas for gifts. These things should be given away when the right occasion comes – just remember who gave them to you.

One of the hardest things to let go for parents is the clothes their kids wore when they were babies. Indeed, how could you bear to throw out the tiny booties your teenager wore when he was but a day old? The solution is to keep a piece of each type of clothing or toy: A pair of shoes, T-shirt, rattle, stuffed toy, a piece from the mobile over his crib. Keep them in a box, alongside with your wedding dress.

Keepsakes like these come in handy when your life becomes empty and bitter in old age.

When your kids protest about giving away their toys, put your foot down and teach them about giving to less fortunate children, but allow them to keep their security blanket, whether it’s a now-hairless Barbie doll or a favorite pillow. The trick to separating kids from their toys without their blaming you is to have the toys professionally cleaned. Explain to them that you want to make their toys last longer, but make sure you take the kids with you to the dry cleaners so they will think you’re sincere even though you’re really not.

To make bedrooms, closets and drawers smelling great, spray perfume or room scent on cotton balls and tuck them inside your closet or pillows. Great, unisex scents (I doubt if the husband wants rose water scent in his boxers) are peppermint and eucalyptus (two very good oils are by L’Occitane and Cereo, the latter costing a third of the former).

Walls, Floors & Minor Troubleshooting

Do your cleaning room by room, starting with the ceilings. Cobwebs are really not an indication of how long you haven’t cleaned because spiders can create webs overnight – but they’re the first order of the day. Then on to the walls, which should be cleaned with a dry rag (a damp one will just spread the dirt), and then onto the floors, which should be thoroughly scrubbed to get rid of stuck dirt before you start polishing. Remember, work in one direction and avoid crisscrossing the room to save time and effort.

Here are solutions to common household problems:

• For wooden furniture with shallow scratches, use a little shoe polish with matching color to mask scratches. Spray paints in different colors are also available in hardware stores.

• For burns on wooden furniture, furniture designer Claude Tayag once recommended to me to sand the affected area and then refinish the entire piece.

• To make faucets and showerheads sparkle again, use the shiny side of aluminum foil and rub it onto the faucet (you will have to use a lot of foil).

• For spaces that are hard to reach with a rag, use a paintbrush.

• Books should be cleaned with a paintbrush or a bristled tool to remove the dust that gathers on top; a rag will just push the dust into the pages.

• To remove that fried-fish smell from your microwave, put lemon wedges in a bowl and microwave on high for a minute or longer if necessary.

• To prevent dust from swirling back on the floors, moisten your dustpan to make dust stick.

• To clean stainless steel sinks, sprinkle baking soda on a sponge and wipe the sink with it. Buff with a dry rag or paper towel after. To remove rust from the sink, rub lighter fluid on it.

• There are many products to clean ovens and I’ve gone through most of them without much results when it comes to grime and grease. The only thing that worked for me is Goo Gone, which can remove practically any kind of dirt, tar, adhesive and so much more. Soak it in Goo Gone the night before.

• Cleansers for the bathroom should also be sprayed on surfaces the night before you start your spring cleaning, and repeat spraying before cleaning.

• Clean the inside of the refrigerator (including the freezer) with a solution of three tablespoons of baking soda and warm water.

• To remove gum from shoes or clothes, put the item in the freezer overnight or press ice on it, then scrape off the gum with a dull knife.

• To remove rings from your bathtub, wash it with vinegar or water softener solution mixed with water.

• For ceramic counters with greenish marks, use a rag moistened with vinegar and then dip it in table salt, then rub the area briskly and rinse well.

• Shower doors should be washed with distilled white vinegar to remove soap scum. To prevent scum from returning quickly, wipe the door with lemon or baby oil.

• Take off all items on tables, cupboards and kitchen counters before you start scrubbing or polishing, and clean them well before returning them.

• Clean mirrors, light and chrome fixtures with glass cleaner.

• And, as the piece de resistance, to keep hard-water or mineral deposits (that white, chalky stain) from developing in your water closet, drop a denture tablet every six weeks.

Where To Take Your Castoffs

Your house smells of pine and your silverware is polished to mirror perfection. But now you’re left with piles of old books, clothes and houseware items that you want to give away. If your old clothes are dirty and so dusty that they will give the recipients asthma, have them laundered first at home or at your neighborhood laundromat (it costs less than breaking your back).

Be considerate when giving – you don’t want to insult the recipients no matter how needy they are, so don’t even think of giving them your old santacruzan gown and tiara. It’s up to you to do your donating with grace.

Here’s where to take them:

Operation Damayan: Several times a year, the Philippine STAR’s Damayan goes on missions to distribute basic goods to the most depressed areas and those that need aid. It accepts donations of clothing, books, houseware items, and money which goes a long way to rebuilding lost livelihood or starting a new one. In past missions, it distributed water pumps and boats to communities devastated by typhoons. Located at 13th st. corner Rail Rd. Port Area, Manila. Call Millet Dioso at 527-2901 to 15.

SM Foundation: In January and February, SM holds its annual "Share Your Extras" project and accepts donations of clothing and houseware items. In May, it accepts books in time for the start of the school year in June. In November, it accepts toys for distribution during the Christmas season to orphanages and street children. Call 831-1000 local 1495.

Sagip Kapamilya: Run by ABS-CBN Foundation, it accepts clothing and other help in cash or kind for the ravaged areas of Quezon. Located at 60 Scout Gandia St., QC. Call 411-0846.

Caritas Manila: It accepts clothing and other donations all year round, and conducts rummage sales of items that may not suit recipients, with proceeds going to its charitable programs. Located at 2002 Jesus St., Pandacan, Manila. Call Sheila Conti or Gina Santos at 564-1831, 563-8380.

Laura Vicuña Foundation, Inc.: Donations accepted all year round and are distributed to beneficiaries of its centers and programs: Street children drop-in centers in Sta. Mesa and Tondo, Laura Vicuña Center (temporary shelter for sexually abused girls), Community Resource Development and Training Center in Negros Occidental, street outreach; or shared with other like-minded agencies. Located at 3500 V. Mapa Extension, Sta. Mesa, Manila. Call 714-7793, fax 714-7428.

VIDES Philippines Volunteers Foundation, Inc.: The group conducts a weekly street outreach program for street and urban poor children in Pasay City. It holds annual mission camps for 2,000 children of sugarcane workers families in Negros Occidental. For the mission camps held in August, ideal time for receiving donations is June and July. Same address and telephone numbers as Laura Vicuna Foundation.

Public libraries: Public libraries and public schools accept book donations. Old Harlequin and Mills and Boone novels whose covers hark back to the time when Fabio was "in" are probably not suitable for Balara Elementary School. Out, too, are world and current events booklets from the 1980s – school kids are confused enough these days, let’s not mislead them into thinking that there is still a USSR and that half of Europe is under communist rule. It’s hard to let go of books, I know, especially travel books that you swiped from some hotel room abroad. When donating books, think of the child that will read them, and you’ll find yourself giving up significant ones. I can’t think of better books to give to a child than those by Nick Joaquin or Ernest Hemingway, which suit any age and economic background. Travel books with pictures would be welcome, too, because they touch on the history and culture of a country to help widen a child’s knowledge and tickle his imagination.

Eloy’s, UK stores in your neighborhood, and in Bangkal, Makati: If you want to make a little money out of your castoffs – and we really mean little – take them to these places. In the late 1980s, I dragged a friend to Eloy’s and was shocked by two things: How cheap the clothing was priced (no more than P3 per shirt, I think) and that they still used an abacus – the first and only time I’d seen one being used. Stop by the neighborhood ukay-ukay and ask if they buy second-hand clothing, including your old, hideous bridesmaid’s gowns.

* * * Home 911 Has A New Text Number!

Home 911 answers questions about the home – cleaning problems, DIY projects, decorating ideas, home store resources, and things you’ve always wanted to know about but never had the friends to ask. Home 911 runs twice a month and will ask the experts on your behalf. For questions and suggestions, e-mail philstar_home911@yahoo.com or text 0915-4002565. Questions sent through the old number will still be answered. All questions will be answered through this column – Tanya is too lazy and too chatty to text her answers.