Organizing the Kitchen Part 1: “We Have 8 Boxes of Brown Sugar?!”

Julie from All Squared Away come over on Saturday and let me tell you… I have never felt so good about the decision we made to hire this company!!

Also, before we go any further, I have to give mad crazy props to my Husband.  He is playing along with this whole project and is such a good sport!

We started out by taking everything out of our Tupperware cabinet.  Now, it had bowls, platters, strainers, baking things and LOADS of Tupperware.  We were able to pare it down to the essentials and extras that we needed.  Taking the rest to be relocated either downstairs or to be sold/donated.

BEFORE Tupperware Cabinet

AFTER Tupperware Cabinet

Then we went through the dreaded “Hodge Podge” cabinet.  This is a catch all for things like Lunch bags, bake ware, flower vases, etc.  We got everything out and found all of my baking essentials and put them in instead.  This way, when I want to have Kate over to help me bake things… we just pull out the basket and start! 

BEFORE Hodge Podge Cabinet

AFTER New Baking Cabinet

This brings me to the first major “Ah-Ha” moment of the experience.  Since our cabinets were so cluttered and scattered, I would never know what ingredients I had.  So, I would go to the grocery store and get say another container of Vanilla, just be sure.  Low and behold, I had multiples upon multiples of MANY baking items!  8 boxes of Brown Sugar!  8!!  What the heck?!

So, we took the extras downstairs to our NEW pantry… photos to come on tomorrow’s blog so stay tuned!… and put the rest with coordinating items underneath.  LOVE IT!

Next up was the spice situation.  Again, we had multiples of MANY things.  I mean, I know that I like the “Smokehouse Maple” spice and Nick likes the “Spicy Montreal” spice… but we had 5 of each!  CRAZY!  So we put the extras downstairs.  Then, we grouped together like spices, so all the salts and peppers are in one tiny basket and rubs and actual seasonings are in another in a different basket.  GENIUS!

BEFORE:

BEFORE Spice Cabinet

AFTER:

AFTER Spice Cabinet

Then… we hit the mother lode of food.  We don’t have to buy dry ingredients for a WHILE!  Evidently we had a stockpile under our noses this whole time!  We found boxes and boxes of brown rice (YUM! OUR FAV!), whole wheat pasta, soups and more!  WHO KNEW?!  So, we grouped together those like items together.  These corner cabinets were seriously PACKED with all kinds of things and there was no order to anything.  So while I would look in the upper cabinet and find no brown rice, there would be 3 boxes buried down below!

BEFORE

BEFORE Lower Food Cabinet

AFTER:

AFTER Lower Food Cabinet

We put the baskets in at an angle as well, so we can easily pull them to the edge or completely out and onto the counter depending on what we need.  This is going to make everything SO much easier!

BEFORE

BEFORE Upper Food Cabinet

AFTER

AFTER Upper Food Cabinet

Then, Nick hit the dishes/bowls cabinet.  We took out the sushi plates and put them in the pie safe and divided it up into bowls and plates.  The little shelves are great for those mini plates and allow us to not have to pick up everything in order to get to what’s underneath!

BEFORE

BEFORE Dishes and Bowls Cabinet (had all those sushi plates and everything op top of eachother!)

AFTER

AFTER Dishes and Bowls Cabinet

The pots and pans are still a work in progress.  We need to find something better for the lids, but for now .this is better than what we had!  Although we’re still using the pot protectors, we also are using a pot rack in the back.  This doubled up on the space we could use down there.

BEFORE

BEFORE Pots & Pans

AFTER

AFTER Pots & Pans

The Pie Safe was kind of a catch all as well.  And to be honest, this before photo is really a post we got stuff out of there but before Julie came before photo LOL.  We took a lot of the appliances downstairs to store.  I don’t mind walking downstairs to get the ice cream maker or the slow cooker if it means I can actually get to things!  HOORAY!  Plus, now we have a specific place for our sushi plates!

BEFORE Pie Safe

AFTER:

AFTER Pie Safe

The biggest thing I can take away from the adventure on Saturday is to continue to clean as you go and put like things together!  This way you always know what you have.  (Like 8 boxes of brown sugar!)

We didn’t get to the glasses cabinet, fridge, countertops or any of the drawers really, but those will be coming over the next few days as I go through them now that I have a game plan and area to actually store things!

BEYOND EXCITED, PEOPLE!  I’m headed to Wal-Mart after work today to get more of those little baskets.  If you want to try this at your home: they are Mainstays Baskets and come in all different sizes.  They are relatively inexpensive and work WONDERS!  I’m sure after a while I’ll want to change them out to something more “homey” or “decorative” or whatever, but for now… they are AWESOME… and don’t even have super awesome labels on them yet!

Side Note: We are finding A LOT of things that we no longer want/need as we go through this process.  I will be creating either a page on this blog or a group on Facebook so I can post photos or make lists of items and you can call dibs on what you want!  Furniture for the bedroom comes on Thursday, so this week there will be many posts as we get things set up!  My goal is to have the Kitchen and Bedroom completely done by Saturday! WHOO HOO!