50 Weeks to Organized: Week 6

Ever since I knew I would be doing this challenge, I have been looking forward to being able to finally organize our pantry and food storage.

Like, I’ve been literally counting down the weeks until we’d be able to afford the massive shelf it would take.

(For the to-do list for organizing the pantry, go ahead and click here.)

In trying to decide how best to approach last week’s challenge, I knew immediately that we would need to buy a shelving unit of some kind since our food storage alone was taking over almost half of the floor space in our spare bedroom (and it was kind of becoming a liability, seeing as we were almost breaking our ankles every time we tried to find something in there). So last Saturday, we skipped off to Lowe’s (well, I skipped–I had to bribe Matt with the thought of buying a movie at Walmart to get him to come) to buy ourselves the biggest shelf that could possibly fit into the limited space we have.

And we found one–a black resin 5-shelver that can hold 175 pounds on each shelf (no joke–Matt could stand on each, no problem).

Once we got the shelf assembled, it was pretty much a matter of just assigning everything to a shelf: staples such as flour and sugar on the bottom, cereal and chips on the top, fruit cans on the second shelf, etc. I also cleared out a bunch of stuff from the existing shelf we were using as a pantry over to the new one, so we would be able to more easily see everything that we had.

I seriously cannot tell you how GREAT it feels to have everything I need to cook a meal right in the kitchen, instead of having to run upstairs to the spare bedroom every two seconds to grab another can.

Check it out:

I know the pantry shelf above might not look a ton different at first glance, but check out the spices at the bottom left corner and notice how you can now actually SEE everything.

 

Not bad, eh? I know I say this almost every week, but now that I’m living in an increasingly clutter-free home, I just FEEL so much different when I walk through the door.

I mean, I’m far from where I want to be, but I’m light years ahead of how I was even just a couple years ago.

Quick Stats for the Week:
Number of Items Tossed/Donated: 8
Number of Items Left to Toss/Donate Before Dec. 31: 391
Amount of Money Spent This Week on Organization: $50

I’m getting so close to being completely done with the kitchen! I decided to add on one more week (to separate the drawers and the cupboards into two different challenges), so it means that it shouuld be completely organized by the end of this month.

For my upcoming challenge, I’ll be focusing on:

The Kitchen Cupboards

Now, if you check out the picture below, my cupboards aren’t nearly as bad as they could be. (It reallly helps that we live in an apartment that actually has a LOT of cupboard space!) But I know that I could have a more efficient design scheme for everything than I currently do, so I’m excited to get this week’s to-do list underway.

Kitchen Cupboard To-Do List:
*Empty everything out of your cupboards. Separate out all the items that you do not use. In a different pile, separate out everything that you use very rarely (such as seasonal items).
*Toss or donate the following:
-chipped or broken dishes
-mismatched dishes
-Appliances you have not used in the past year
-Any jars or containers you do not use or will not put to use this week
-Extra mugs/cups — only keep your favorites
-Plastic tupperware that is mismatched or missing its counterpart
*Find a set place for everything else (put items that are used seasonally with the other decorations/items from that season).
*Let everyone else in the house know the new design scheme so they can follow it next time they do the dishes 🙂

Maintenance:
Once a Month