Monday 9 December 2013

Nearly There!

I did the second to last room in the big deluttering challenge last weekend, the kitchen. This is how it looked before.
This room wasn't really too cluttered but since we moved in we've not really been using some of the space in the best way. For example the space on top of the microwave had become a bit of a mess as it was often where we just put larger food items due to not having enough cupboard space.
So I cleared it off, threw away the crisps and crackers as they were out of date, and put my porridge oats up there in their place. This jar stays down from the cabinet top as I use it every day (the others have flour etc in which I don't use daily) and I don't want to have to climb the cabinets every morning to make breakfast! I got a box out for stuff to go to the charity/car boot pile but actually everything ended up in the bin liner for the tip, so Minty claimed the box as her fort for the day.
It was already looking better, but still there was too much out on the counters in here for my liking meaning cooking can get a bit frustrating due to lack of counter space. This is our largest cupboard, and it is just full of random stuff.
 The pots and pans were all in this smaller cupboard next to the oven
So I dragged it all out and swapped them around. Now the 'random kitchen stuff' cupboard is the smaller one, and the cookware, tupperware and tea towels are in the larger one. Much more sensible. The carrier bags are all in the hallway now, as I figure if they are near the front door they are more likely to get reused than if they're hidden under the sink.


The next to do was food, we had a bigger kitchen in our last house but now only have one cupboard for food so we need to get better at buying less and only what we will eat straight away. I got all the food out of here and sorted through it.

After getting rid of all the out of date things and reorganising the cupboard I was able to get more things into the food cupboard, like oils and spices, so there is less on the counter and I could move the toaster round and also fit a chopping board in front of it.

 This is the out of date stuff. We have out of date tinned goods, how embarrassing!
We have gained a usable counter space!
It's amazing what a couple of hours and a bin liner can free up, we now have more cupboard space and another work surface. 
I will get a few more small jars when I'm next at The Range as I want to move some more of the dried stuff like couscous up to the top of the cabinet out of the cupboard, and there is room for another row of smaller jars behind the big ones. Other than that now it's nice and clear I'd like to replace some stuff in there like the bread bin and canisters, and bring in some more colour and interest as it looks pretty boring.


Also observant people might notice that the view out of the window looks different, the garden is being redone so the landlords part of it now looks like this.
I will ask if I can take some snaps when it's done but it is certainly more open and they now have a nice spiral staircase in up to their back door instead of the old wooden stairs they had before. We are hoping this will mean more sun into our little part of the garden in the summer and it certainly feels a lot more spacious out there. Our part looks like a dump though as we had to move all our pots into the centre to let them do the work so I need to spend a few hours out there! Another thing for the to do list...

2 comments:

  1. good rearranging, I think there must be a vertical organizing thing for pot lids and frying pans (instead of stacking, big undertaking, well done,
    I cleaned on top of my dusty cabinets and washed my Viking glass collection, gave away 4 big bags of canned goods (in date), thinking how to reduce collection of storage containers in cabinets to make room for stuff that now lives on the counters

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks, I think there is and I might get one if I see one as it would be much easier than stacking!

      Delete