Six Fall Cleaning Tips to Prepare for the Holidays

As crazy as it may sound the holidays are quickly approaching. Eek! I know, I haven’t even thought about my Christmas shopping. Regardless, the holidays will come whether we are ready or not. For my family the holidays mean lots of gatherings, baking, and general craziness. It also means having many people over to my house. Thus lots of frantic cleaning, organizing and wishing my house looked more like a Pottery Barn catalog. But there are a few fall cleaning tips we all can do now to help get your kitchen in tip top shape get ready for holiday guests.

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Six Fall Cleaning Tips to Prep Your Kitchen for the Holidays

Toss the Clutter from your pantry

The fall and winter baking season means grocery stores run some of their best deals on dry goods and baking supplies. So it’s the perfect time to stock up!  Prepare for the influx of extra goods by making space in the pantry. Toss the clumped up brown sugar or half used ingredients. In my house I always seem to have partially used up bags of pecans (fun fact: I’m allergic to walnuts) that need to be chucked.

Besides making space, another great reason to de clutter your pantry is to avoid unwanted guests. As the weather cools pest start to try and find a place to winter in your home. Make the place less appealing by getting rid of crumbs and placing opened supplies in sealable containers like these ones.

Clean under and around appliances

Honestly there is never a convenient time of year to do this, but this one doesn’t take long but you will be shocked at the amount of dust (picture dog fur and cobweb tumble weeds) that accumulate in these areas.

I don’t move my large appliances out of the completely for this task, but instead move the stove and fridge forward several inches, sweep behind and around, and then scoot the appliances back. I highly doubt your holiday guests will look beneath your appliances (rude). But this way when someone inevitably drops something on your floor you don’t have to cringe about the dust bunnies that may be eye level while they’re down there.

Clean your Cupboard Doors

Cupboard doors, especially those above the stovetop or by the sink can tend to build up a layer of grime (grease, fingerprints, food debris and dust). To make your doors look like new mix up a solution of 1 teaspoon dish soap, in a small bowl of warm water. Wet a dish cloth with this solution and wipe down cupboard doors.  If your cupboards have a gloss to them you may want to dry them with a dry dish towel to avoid streak marks.

Wash your China and Serving Dishes

Now maybe your house keeping skills blow mine out of the water…but I never wash my china. Mainly because I never use my china. (Don’t tell my husband since I absolutely NEEDED the pretty dishes when we got married). Anyway, my china is stacked sweetly in my buffet, and rarely used, collecting an impressive layer of dust.

Spare yourself the last minute rush of cleaning your “fancy” dishes, serving ware, or whatever you decide to pull out when company arrives. Clean them now! That way if you do end up hosting christmas dinner at the last minute, or just want a pretty serving tray for the cookies your friends brought over, you will be all set! My china is a very old vintage set, so I hand-wash them to be safe. Look up the manufacture’s directions for your china before putting them in the dishwasher.

Clean Out The Freezer

Make space for leftovers from all your large holiday gatherings by cleaning out your freezer. The weeks leading up to Thanksgiving and Christmas are a great time to plan meals that use up ingredients you’ve frozen for future use. This not only saves space, but also money. And chances are you have a few unidentifiable freezer burned items that need to be tossed.

Recharge Your Dish Towels

Dish towels are the heavy weights in my kitchen. I typically have at least 3 in use at a time. One for drying my hands, another to wipe up spills, and sometimes even one to grab something hot off the stove. Over time the towels can become a tad scratchy and less absorbent. Another repercussion of their kitchen use is that they can smell.

The good news is that this is easily remedied. Throw your towels in the washer on the hot setting with a cup of white vinegar. Then repeat with 1/2 a cup of baking soda. Dry as your normally would and your towels will be good as new!

So are you ready for the holiday rush? I plan to put these 6 fall cleaning tips to use this weekend to get ahead. Do you have any holiday prep tips of your own? I’d love to hear them!