Organize Your Closet for Spring

Spring brings more than April Showers. It is time to get organized for a new season.

I like to start in my closet. If you are anything like me, you don't have endless closet space. I only have enough room in my closet to display clothes for one season at a time.

I have tried a variety of storage options over the years; I have tried storing in suitcases, boxes and a variety of plastic storage bins. Incredibly, my favorite storage medium is a plastic garbage bag. A plastic garbage bag is pliable and can fit in a wide array of spaces. If you are careful and don't tear it, it keeps the clothes as fresh as the day you put them in the bag, and if you use white bags, you can see through the plastic well enough to tell what you have stored in any given bag.

To get started organizing your closet for spring, you want to start by pulling all the clothes you know you will not wear between now and warm weather. I usually opt to keep a couple of cool weather choices in my closet. Here in the mid-west we can have a chilly day any month of the year.

Now that you have your clothing items pulled from your closet, go through them. Examine each article of clothing. Is it starting to wear? Is the style dated? Are you tired of it even though it is still in good repair? Is it your favorite winter sweater? Begin to sort the clothes into piles. You will want at least three piles.

1. Keep/store
2. Give to a charity
3. Throw away

You may want another pile if you have someone in mind that likes to have your hand-me-downs.

I would like to add a side note here. If you have a tendency to keep clothes that you do not wear, just because you love them, I have a rule that may help you with this. If I really love a certain item, but somehow the season got away from me and I didn't wear it, I allow myself to keep it for one more season. If a second season goes by and I still did not wear it, I will ask my daughter if she would like to have it. If she doesn't want it, no matter how much I tell myself I love it, it goes into the charity bin.

Now that you have your piles, fold each piece and put them into the appropriate medium, trash, storage and a bag or box for moving to your favorite charitable organization. Move them completely out of the room.

I also have many shoes. I keep my shoes in shoeboxes. If you have seasonal shoes, (snow boots, etc) move those out of the closet and out of the room and put them with their corresponding medium.

Continue taking things out, until you have completely emptied your closet. Clean your closet. Vacuum the carpet, seek out any cobwebs hiding in the shadows and wipe down the shelves.

It is time to break out your warm weather clothing!

Go through your warm weather clothing the same way you just went through your winter clothes. If you have stored them after properly going through them, as described above, your work will almost be done. However, when you put those clothes in storage you may have felt differently about them than you do now. As you go through them, ask yourself if each item is something you will certainly wear. If you cannot answer this with a resounding yes, add it to the charity bin. If you have stored them in airtight plastic, you can place them directly into your closet.

I like to organize my closet further, first by style, then by color. For the best organization in my closet, I keep all of my dresses together, all my blouses together and so on. I then hang like colors together. That way if I want a pink blouse, I can easily find all my choices in one location. It makes getting ready for work or a night on the town much more simple.

Once you have placed everything back into your clean, organized closet and stored away last winters clothing, simply close the door. You are ready for spring!