Major cleaning shouldn’t be a once a year event taking place in the spring. After a summer spent bringing the outdoors in, and before you close yourself in with your dirt for the winter, a good cleaning is in order.

• If you have outdoor furniture, clean it and store it.
• If necessary, switch out screens for storm windows.
• Get winter coats and other heavy clothes out of storage. If you have kids, make sure the coats and boots still fit.
• Before you store your summer clothes, make sure they fit and are clean and in good repair. Why spend time finding space for something that you can no longer use?
• Clean vents and have your furnace serviced if needed.
• Flip and/or rotate your mattresses. Consider switching to winter weight bed coverings.
• Clean windows and launder or dry clean curtains as necessary.
• Clean carpets and rugs.
• Do a general uncluttering. Get rid of things that are broken or rarely used.
• Do through medicine cabinets and discard old cosmetics. Do NOT flush expired medications. Most police stations will happily discard them for you.

Basically, it's time to do all those annoying cleaning chores you like to put off. Fall cleaning sets the stage for your holiday decorating and entertaining.