Picture a blurry-eyed Hilary, fresh from ripping the band-aid off and leaving the life she knew in California. I think I cried for a good hour on that car trip, but then it was time to wipe my eyes off and look forward.
And boy oh BOY did I have a lot to look forward to! We were leaving a 1100 square foot house, for a 2300 square foot house. And honestly, it scared me a bit.
I had left a super-tiny galley kitchen and was heading to a home twice the size, with a kitchen three times larger. I knew I wanted to start out on the right foot in this new home. I furiously googled “how to organize your kitchen” with very little luck.
I did find a few gems, and I have started to make my own list as we’ve been here. Anything I wish I had done differently (or things I later thought were super smart) I’m excited to share them with you! Having an organized kitchen makes meal prep about 10 thousand times easier! 🙂
BTW, looking for organization gems all over the house? — I love this course.
Know where your keys are, be ready for guests at a moment’s notice and no spending hours looking for your missing stuff. You can even get 10% off with code PC10.
You don’t have to be moving fresh into a new kitchen to make these adjustments (they’re just easier and very smart to do). You can re-organize your kitchen at any point, or even just make small adjustments to make life easier
Don’t miss my other posts about organizing around the house:
- Organizing your bedroom
- Organizing the bathroom
- Storage & Organizing
- Helping kids learn to organize
- How to organize awkward corner cabinets
Organize Your Kitchen
Define The Territories
Now, this didn’t matter as much when we had such a tiny kitchen in California. There wasn’t much territory to split up, but now that I have a larger kitchen with a circular flow around an island I needed to sort of split the kitchen into specific areas. I knew I needed a baking area (as I make bread & cookies a lot), an oven use area, and a dishes area.
Step 1: Create a Baking Area
This is where you put your baking goods (obviously). I have a whole cupboard with flour, sugar, etc. Plus, all my baking powder, oil, chocolate chips are also around there. The majority of baking can happen in just that corner. Things that are great to keep in this area:
- Staples
- Your Mixer (both stand &/or hand) — I now have a Bosch Universal Mixer.
- Measuring Cups/spoons — I love these and these.
Of course, things you don’t reach for often will be in another spot. This area should be available for the things accessed most frequently.
These are my favorite containers to keep staples in smaller areas (because you can buy them nice & tall — which helps with vertical organization).
Step 2: Create a Dishes Area
One thing that has saved me a world of hurt is putting the dishes cabinet close to the dishwasher. It is SO much easier to load. Also, I think I would have used one of the larger cabinets for this, which would have been a BIG mistake. I felt like the tiny cabinet that we had wouldn’t hold them all, but with some creative plate racks, it has totally worked! Also, the silverware is just behind it. This was super smart of me! #momwin
Creative use of dish space is a TOTAL MUST. Check out my before & After….
A few things that helped me to use a small cabinet for our main dishes:
- Plate racks — make it SO much easier than stacking on top of each other
- Corelle dishes are so thin (also helps in the dishwasher)
- Paring down our vast mug collection (my husband was a teacher and he always got tons of mugs) — learn more about decluttering in this awesome course.
Step 3: Organize Your Cooking Area
This is an area for larger dishes that you use in the oven, and then platters to put things fresh out of the oven on. All of our Pyrex bakeware is in there. The cake pans and cookie sheets are below the oven (just because it’s a great place to store them).
I also keep all of the spices around there as well. Most spices are things I throw in while I am either mixing something to go into the oven (which I don’t usually use my mixer for) or while I am cooking on the stovetop — so it made the most sense to put the spices close to the oven.
I have a little container (like this one) that keeps all my often-used spatulas and whisks close at hand, then the rest of those items are in a drawer just to the side of the stove. I think it’s super handy to have that as I cook.
I also have the most INSANE cupboard to the right of my stove. That’s right in a corner and SO deep. I have a video about how I organized it in this course because you might have an insane cupboard too. Either way — this was imperative.
A little organization in the kitchen goes a long way (and makes it way easier to keep a clean kitchen!). It will save you steps when you’re cooking dinner as well as brainpower when things are just within arm’s reach.
I love that I really thought out my kitchen in a methodical way before we moved in. It’s not too late for you to change yours either.
After that, I came up with just 5 words that can change your organizing system. They’ll come straight to your inbox, and you’ll start to see your storage options in ways that will make it easier to manage!
Interested in creative ways to organize your home in a way that will help you manage your life? The principles in this course REALLY work! Check out the testimonials on that page, people love it!
If you liked this post, I also have a home cleaning checklist — join my thousands of followers who have figured out a cleaning schedule works for them. — and be sure to check out all of my other household tips below that.
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[…] The Kitchen: It’s the heart of the home — having things at hand makes a HUGE difference at dinner time! […]