Crafty Spring Cleaning

by Nancy Flynn

Even if it is still cold outside where you live, the days are getting noticeably longer and spring is on the way. In the interest of full disclosure, spring cleaning chez Nancy happened by force—the moving truck was coming, and I didn’t have enough boxes for all the stuff. But certainly casting off the old, polishing off the dusty, and getting things in order is a great way to start off the warmer months coming our way (or the cooler fall months for those of you in the Southern Hemisphere!).

For a crafty person, obviously spring cleaning is going to be a bit different—instead of having two piles—donate and toss, you might have four—donate, sell, good for crafting, and toss. What to hold on to, what to let go of, and what to do with the stuff you keep can be hard to navigate, so this column will explore crafty options for spring cleaning.

Let it go:
The rules of thumb for letting go of various sorts of “stuff” are widely known. But I need to be reminded of them every time I take on a spring clean, or a move. It is necessary to be both brutal and ruthless. Said brutality and ruthlessness are all in the service of doing good—making donations to charities that either sell your stuff to help people in need, or pass along your stuff directly. So, a little room-by-room recap on the rules for letting go:

Your Closet:
•If something in your closet hasn’t had a showing in a full cycle of the seasons (i.e. one year), let it go.
•If you’ve worn it and it caused you pain or discomfort—too tight, too short etc—let it go. Get rid of your skinny clothes, or your fat clothes, because honestly when you lose or gain that weight again, I guarantee you styles will be different. And it doesn’t matter if those shoes were a great deal, if they pinch your little toe every time you wear them, let them go.
•If you just don’t like it, let it go. Do not make yourself do penance for bad purchases—if you accidentally bought ugly boots because they were on sale, or didn’t check the rear view on a pair of pants before buying, or otherwise just don’t like something, even if it is perfectly good, or even almost new, let it go.

Your Kitchen:
•If it is expired, throw it out—check all of your cans, boxes and bags, and everything in your freezer. Open all of your spices and sniff them to make sure they’re still nice and spicy. Some say they should be tossed after 6 months, some say 4, but the sniff test is good enough for me.
•If you have more of them than you need, let them go—in my house, this is mugs. Glasses break, so I keep all of those because they winnow themselves out. I have way too many mugs, and only one I really like drinking out of that I’ll wash rather than using another one. Keep enough of any serving item that isn’t part of a set only for the number of guests you realistically may have for dinner/drinks/tea, and let go of the stragglers.
•If you don’t use it, let it go. I have a madeleine pan. There is a Proustian fantasy that made me buy said pan, but I have made them twice in three years. There are other cookies I like better that don’t require a unique pan that takes up space.

Your Bathroom:
•Expiration: Toss any prescriptions, painkillers and even sunscreen that have expired
•Purge your cosmetics and bath stuff: If it is caked, badly broken, or smells funny, toss it out. If you discovered that blue eye shadow really wasn’t you, let it go, if it comes back into fashion it probably still won’t be you. Don’t save bath stuff or moisturizer or perfume for special occasions—it can go bad. Either put it somewhere that you’ll see it and use it (you deserve it), or get rid of it.
•Give your towels a good look—if they are badly discolored, ripped, or no longer absorbent, they may belong in the rag bag--you deserve some new ones! It is possible to get inexpensive towels in a rainbow of colors at any number of discount stores, and it can really spruce up your shower.

Your Bedroom:
•Check out your bedside table- put away or give away books you’ve read that you don’t need right at hand, and make sure any hand lotion or lip balm you keep there is as fresh as you’d like
•Under the bed is a wonderful storage space—make sure you remember what is down there and that you still need it.

Your Home Office/Bookshelves:
•There are all sorts of rules about when you can shred papers related to tax-time. The general rule of thumb is about 3 years, but if you feel better keeping everything, that is one area where throwing away precipitately can lead to active regret in the case of an audit! Click here for a good idea of what to keep and how long to keep it.
•Books are hard for me to let go of, but they take up a lot of space. Get rid of the ones you know will always be available at the library (i.e. classics), get rid of any you definitely won’t read again, and get rid of any that you bought/acquired but have sat on your shelf for more than six months without being read or referred to once.
•Get rid of stuff that doesn’t work-- headphones that are scratchy, the stapler that always jams, your old laptop with the broken screen and the dead hard drive (get any data you need recovered if possible). You will not use it again, and if you have a Mr. or Ms Fix-it in your life (or that person is you) and the item hasn’t been seen to yet, it probably never will be.
•Magazines: If you have stacks of favorites and lots of time, get yourself some 3-ring binders and plastic sheet protectors and get ripping. Pull out any article or recipe you think necessary, pop it in a page protector and snap it in a binder. Keep your binders organized however makes sense to you—I have a main-course recipe binder, a dessert binder, and a craft ideas binder.

Your Craft Space:
This is a tough one, as every crafter is different, so I’ll just offer up one piece of advice:
*It is good to let go of crafts you took up enthusiastically but found were not really your style. For me, that would include tatting and tiny-piece quilting. I do not keep tiny pieces of scrap fabric anymore, and I’m giving away my tatting needles. Be honest with yourself about how you want to spend your crafting time—if you know you will probably never prefer crocheting to embroidery, that is ok, and maybe you want to make space for more thread and less yarn.

Clearly this doesn’t cover every room, or every category of stuff that could be culled. There are those who have garages and attics, which seem to me to be places that require whole other systems of cleaning and organization. Spring cleaning is about making the spaces you live in daily lighter and easier, so give yourself a break about rooms you rarely use, or that are designated for keeping odds and ends.

The Pile System

Ok, you know the rules, so as you go through your rooms and your stuff, it is time to designate piles for the things you are ruthlessly, but altruistically, getting rid of.

Pile 1: Donate
There are so many wonderful charities out there that accept gently used items. Most people have a favorite, but the resources section at the end of this column offers a few to choose from if you need some guidance. Some will come to pick up large or bulky items like furniture, and all you have to do is call. Some tips on what to donate:

•Clothes that you wouldn’t wear for reasons of fit or style, not because they are terribly dirty or in bad shape—random logo t-shirts, acid washed jeans etc.
•Old sheet sets—it is ok if they are faded and worn, just not stained or ripped.
•Books- in my opinion even dog-eared and lightly highlighted or written-in are ok, as long as they are still legible

Pile 2: Sell
A confession- I do not have a sell pile. I know myself well enough to know that I do not have the patience, time or energy to sell my stuff on Ebay, or to have a garage sale. I prefer to use this pile to throw a modified Naked Lady Party and pass along good stuff to my friends. Unless you are an Ebay or garage sale master, you should only sell things for which the sale price will be worth the time and effort you took to put them up for sale, some examples include:
•Nearly new clothes/shoes you’ve barely worn.
•Books in good condition (many used bookstores will give you credit for these so you can come back for more!)
•In-demand vintage items.

Pile 3: Craft it Up!
There are in-between things that may not be new enough to sell, old enough to donate, or flawed enough to throw away, that crafters can give a new life. Imagine that you are thrift shopping in your own house, and finding new uses for worn-out things.

A few ideas to get you started:
•Wool sweaters with edges that haven’t been serged: If you are a knitter or crocheter, you can unravel these sweaters for lovely yarn! Obviously this is a bit harder with super-fine weight yarns, so choose carefully. Some great tutorials on recycling sweaters for the yarn can be found here and here

•Wool things that went in the wash: Yay for felt! I have some wool/cashmere socks my sweetie accidentally put in the wash that are going to become the softest, cutest sock monkey ever. If you have fine weave sweaters that are too holey to donate (a moth got at one of my cashmere sweaters), try machine-felting them and use the resulting soft, thick fabric to make pouches, mittens, hats or anything else you desire

•Linens with holes in them: If your favorite sheet set has holes in it, or your curtains have faded beyond recognition , you can salvage them. Sheets can make great aprons, linings for bags, and skirts. You can also cut squares from unfaded portions to use in a quilt, or cut a floral motif out to use as an appliqué

•Clothes with special meaning: The old standby t-shirt quilt is great here.
If you don’t think you can come up with a use for it, but don’t want to throw it away, think about posting it for other crafters on Freecycle.com , or even craigslist.

Pile 4: Throw away
When I say throw away, I don’t mean just the garbage, I also mean the recycling bin. In my experience, every area has different rules about what can be sent to local recycling centers. Spring cleaning is a good time to brush up on those rules, and make sure that anything that can avoid the landfill does. It is also good to keep a rag bag in your pantry full of cotton from old t-shirts and even underwear , as they make great polishing cloths.

There is only really one hard and fast rule as far as throwing stuff away goes:

*I’m sure you don’t need me to tell you this, but don’t donate anything that is so gross you would never use it. If the charity staff has to put on HazMat gear to deal with it, it should go in the trash. For example, badly stained or threadbare clothes and linens, dangerously chipped classes or mugs, everything expired from your kitchen or bathroom.

When all is said and done, and you’ve brushed the dust from your jeans and cleaned the dirt from under your fingernails, you’ll feel great. There is a feeling of satisfaction in loving everything you have around you—knowing that the clothes in your closet fit and make you feel pretty, that your favorite books are at your fingertips, your linen closet isn’t bursting open, and you have a perfectly edited selection of craft supplies that includes new items you’ve thrifted from your own house. So brew yourself a cup of tea or coffee, relax and enjoy it!

Resources:
By no means exhaustive—please feel free to add your own favorites in the comments!

Charities for Donation:
The Salvation Army
Goodwill
The Red Cross-
Dress for Success—Good condition women’s business clothing-
The Princess Project—for dresses/bridesmaids dresses-

Crafty Organization Inspiration:
How to by Ceebee
Organizational Craftistas-
HGTV’s Take
Craft Blogger Cotton Strudel calls March "The Month of Spring Cleaning" and blogs her progress.

Nancy Flynn is a dilettante crafter in San Francisco who just moved a block from her old apartment. She lives with her fiancé in her new apartment, which is full of boxes of stuff she is sure she loves. She’ll be using Ceebee’s tutorial on organizing a craft space very soon.