Cleaning, organizing, and de-cluttering your dining room is simple and very worthwhile. Here are some helpful tips to get you started.
Do you have a dining room that could be used to host fabulous dinner parties or cozy family meals, but you don't use it very often because it has become an extended closet? Is the table covered with school books, newspapers, mail, coats, and even some dishes that you didn't have room for in the china cabinet? Is your china cabinet and buffet a cluttered mess? Is that chandelier you proudly bought at the flea market when you were first married covered with dust and cobwebs? Perhaps just looking at the mess overwhelms and depresses you. Don't despair. There is hope. A few simple cleaning and organizing tips will help you reclaim your dining room for its original purpose - to celebrate friendships and family while sharing a meal.
Organization of any sort takes a little mental preparation. You need to deal with your procrastination and hoarding in order for any organization and cleaning tips to be effective. A few of the main issues to consider before attempting to reclaim your dining room are these: You need to tell yourself that you will be consistent in your cleaning and take care of what needs to be done immediately; and you need to step away from your emotions and insecurities and take a good, hard look at why you keep the things you do.
When your mind is ready to make the commitment of redeeming your dining room, use these tips to help you in the reclamation process. First clean off all surfaces of the dining room that have items on them that aren't supposed to be there. Hang up any coats and put away any items on the table that have other existing storage places. Get baskets to separate mail. Have a basket for bills, have a basket for magazines and newspapers, and have a basket for items that you want to consider at a later time. Anything else goes into the garbage immediately. There should never be a time when mail leaves your hands without going into one of these three baskets or the garbage. Make decisions immediately. Remember, you do have a basket designated for things to think about, so you don't have to panic over making the wrong decision about an item. You will learn to become more and more secure about making these decisions with a little practice. Place these baskets in a convenient place where you enter your house, so that the decisions are quick and convenient and then remember to routinely empty the baskets every two weeks.
Next get five plastic storage containers with lids and two large corrugated boxes and go to work on the other areas of the dining room. Label four of the plastic storage tubs with these labels: summer dining; fall dining; winter dining; and spring dining. You will use these containers to clean out seasonal and holiday items from your dining room that are used only once a year. For example, you will wrap the turkey decorated platter in tissue paper and place it in the storage container labeled "fall dining". You will add to this container those cute little cornucopia napkin rings and the Thanksgiving tablecloth and napkins too. When fall comes you can take the "fall dining" storage container out and use its contents, but in the meantime they won't be getting dirty nor will they be in your way. As you go through cleaning out the storage areas of your dining room, you will evaluate each item according to the time of year it is used and put it in the appropriate tub. As you work your way through any storage space in the dining room, you should leave in place only those items that you could use every day or those which are family keepsakes that you wish to keep on display or don't want to risk in the jostle of storage. After going through all items, place your season-specific dining boxes in the basement or in the attic or storage closet and bring them out when the pertinent season is upon you.
That leaves you with one more plastic storage box and two corrugated boxes. Put the fifth plastic storage box near the most-used entry to the house. In it place the items that you need to take with you when you go somewhere such as dry cleaning, books to return to the library, the sweater you are giving to your sister, etc. Use one of the corrugated boxes for donating to good will. In it put the dining room items you never use and don't plan to use. Use the other corrugated box to put items to throw. There should be nothing left in your dining room that you won't use for dining on a regular basis or is not an heirloom.
Another organizing trick for the dining room that is very useful is to place a bedroom dresser in your dining room to store napkins, tablecloths, placemats and other items which need flat space storage. The dresser makes a unique addition to a dining room and each drawer can be designated for a particular type of linen. The top of the dresser also makes a nice sized surface for displaying grandma's silver service or a particular serving piece.
Speaking of displaying objects in your dining room, keep in mind as you organize and make your dining room more user-friendly, that you should minimize the items displayed on walls or on surfaces. The purpose of this is two fold: If you have too many items on display at one time, they lose their effectiveness as visually satisfying additions; also, anything that is not in a drawer or behind glass is a cleaning problem. Your goal should be to have a dining room that is inviting and easy to clean, but not cluttered.
Now that your dining room is organized, it is time to clean. Make cleaning your dining room a regular activity. In its organized state, cleaning it will be a breeze and mostly consist of dusting the room and polishing the silver. If you keep the silver in tarnish-preventing bags, the cleaning time will be cut down even further. For cleaning purposes, buy a duster that has an extendable stick so that you can carefully remove dust from light fixtures and ceilings. Once a week use a dust cloth to run over the surfaces of your dining room (don't forget the seats and legs of chairs). Sprits a little glass cleaner on the windows of the china cabinet and any windows facing the out of doors. Run a dust mop over the floor once a week for hard surface floors, or vacuum once a week if carpeted (more frequently if the dining room is located in a high traffic area).
After organizing and cleaning your dining room, step into the center of it and vow that you are never going to let it get into a chaotic state again. When you sit down to dinner with family and friends with a minimum of preparation, you will be glad that you did.
