Spring Cleaning and Greening: Part I

Part One of a Week-long Series......

I’ve done it! I am officially in my, very beautiful, new downtown clinic: The Live Well Center on Bagot Street!

It was a busy, moving weekend and, as things normally go when we start something in this house, we went a bit overboard….

The flurry of packing, cleaning and organizing my office inspired us to do a bit of spring cleaning in the rest of the house……..we ripped apart every cupboard, closet, nook and cranny; de-cluttering and scrubbing everything within an inch of its life. Saturday afternoon it looked like an a-bomb had exploded in our living room and as I waded to the phone, waist deep in winter coats and boots, I thought to myself “what the (insert swear word) are we doing??”

Several hours later, we managed to put the house back together and sitting here now, I have to admit…..it feels pretty darn good. A weight has been, quite literally, lifted. The weight of excess stuff, of mess, of not knowing what’s going to hit you on the head when you open a cupboard door…….Sigh.

Though my youngest sister vehemently insists that closets and cupboards are designed to hide our deepest, darkest, most disgraceful messes, I really don’t think that there is anything that can compare to knowing my mother herself could show up and she wouldn’t have to lift a finger! So here are some (ack!) before and after shots of my closets….

The Kitchen:

Before

After

Before

After

The Linen Closet

Before
After

The Craft Cupboard

Before

After

Here are some of my favorite “green” cleaners at the moment:

Aubrey’s Earth Aware: An all-purpose, all-natural, do everything, type of cleaner. The best of the best. It’s completely natural and biodegradable, contains no phosphates, no ammonia, and no bleach, and can be used all over your house, on all surfaces, even for laundry. Strong commitment to fair trade .
5/5 from the greater green.

EcoSense by Maleluca: These work amazingly well. They are not “all natural” and the membership to buy them costs a small fortune but they are definitely better for your home and the environment than regular cleaners. Not rated on The Greater Green because the don't disclose ingredients.

Mrs. Meyers: While this is also not a completely natural cleaning product (most aren't!), it is more natural and safe than many products out there. It does still contain some synthetics. They do list ALL of their ingredients and these products have the most beautiful fresh smells….I am in love with the lavender. 3.5/5 from The Greater Green.

Recipe for Amazing All-Purpose Cleaner (From Green Clean: Eco-Friendly Cleaning for the Home)
3 Tbsp Vinegar
½ tsp baking soda
½ tsp vegetable oil based liquid soap (castille soap: Dr. Bronners is AWESOME!)
450 ml hot water
Mix ingredients in a spray bottle or bucket. Apply and wipe clean.

Best Floor Cleaner: The Shark (similar to the H2O mop, I believe). Cleans our hardwood and tile with the almighty power of WATER!

**We also took the opportunity to do away with ALL the plastic in our kitchen. We were still storing some of our bulk foods in plastic containers…now they are GONE!!!! All replaced with beautiful glass storage jars. We also gave away our electric kettle which was…plastic! For 8 years now I’ve been conscious of our plastic use and yet, it hadn’t even occurred to me that we were boiling water in plastic daily. Ugh. So it’s gone. Done.

Tomorrow: We attack the great outdoors!