Spring Cleaning Tips for Seniors

Spring cleaning can be overwhelming for anyone. For seniors, it can honestly be intimidating. However, this important job can be tackled with a little planning to help get your home free of unnecessary clutter.  

Montgomery Place offers the following tips for safe and effective spring cleaning. 

The Importance of Spring Cleaning for Seniors

A clean and orderly space to live makes a big difference in the quality of life. A good spring cleaning is the key to feeling rejuvenated inside and out in a senior's home. This also has a lot to do with safety and well-being.

Clearing out clutter helps prevent falls and other accidents, as an organized home is safer and easier to navigate. Spring cleaning simplifies daily living and promotes mobility.  

Efficient Senior Cleaning Strategies

Even an older adult with limited mobility can spruce up their living space. Larger tasks may involve getting some help.

Organize Medicine Cabinets 

A medicine cabinet houses everything needed to keep healthy. Things do expire, however, and then they become dangerous clutter. You run the risk of mixing up what is too old to be effective with what is needed for health. 

Outdated prescriptions expired over-the-counter drugs, and old first aid materials should be removed from the medicine cabinet. Update emergency documents and make sure your first aid kit is complete. Toss out old bandages and empty containers, and contact your city's waste service to learn how best to dispose of medications that are past the expiration date. 

Check Smoke and Carbon Monoxide Detectors

For smoke and carbon monoxide detectors to be effective, they must be in working order. Put fresh batteries in all your detectors, safely dispose of the old batteries, and make sure your devices are functioning properly. This job may require climbing on a ladder or chair to reach the detector, so ask someone to help you with this.

If you have a fire extinguisher, also check its expiration date. This may be the time to replace it or get one if you don't have one.

Refresh the Kitchen

Old food and utensils you no longer use can make a kitchen depressing. Remove expired food and condiments from the refrigerator, freezer, and cabinets. Wipe down the shelves, or have someone do it for you, before organizing what you want to keep by category. 

Putting all cold produce in the refrigerator's produce bin, condiments in the door, and canned goods together in the pantry helps to simplify meal prep. A container of baking soda placed in the refrigerator aids in keeping it smelling fresh. 

Minimize Clutter

This is the time to downsize in terms of accumulated stuff. Decide what things you need and which items are taking up real estate. Donate, sell, or give things away that you no longer have any real need for but others might cherish. Consider handing over family heirlooms to those who have an interest in keeping memories alive for future generations. 

Cleaning Safety

It's important to remember to keep safe when tackling a job like spring cleaning. Independent seniors may push themselves too far, with serious unintended consequences.

Don't risk injury with tasks that are too complicated. Leave the heavy lifting to someone else and ask for help with those jobs that may be too much to handle by yourself. Having a friend or family member over to tackle spring cleaning can turn a daunting task into a fun visit. It will go by a lot quicker, too.

Find Low-Maintenance Apartment Floor Plans at Montgomery Place

Montgomery Place Retirement Community in Chicago, Illinois, offers low-maintenance apartment floor plans that can help make spring-cleaning a lot easier. Contact us today for a tour.

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