Kitchen De-Clutter...

My mother recently took over ownership of an established downtown Antique store...again. I'm very excited for her! She's a wonderful business woman and a great shop owner, the buzz is that the antique people (not just called that because of they're age...) are all quite excited about it.

I went in this Sunday to help out any way I could...we had a busy day. I know she has all sorts of creative tasks for me to help her with, and I am energized and excited to dive right in. But before all that, Rozz and I walked around the shop to check out the goodies.

I found a white kitchen cabinet...with black Bakelite knobs (no less) It is tall and thin, and was a great deal. It has three doors, hiding 6 shelves...and I thought it would fit perfectly into my somewhat thin long rectangular kitchen (honestly, I've said it before and I'll say it again...the rooms in my house are somewhat long in the wrong way...if they were more square, I'd be in better shape...as it is, I am having to be quite creative) and help me get some of the clutter up and off the floor and off the chairs and table and anywhere else I managed to stuff it.

I have a small cabinet that holds my toaster (which I hardly use because of the wheat/gluten allergy thing) and my coffee maker (which I use daily...gotta have my decaf you know) It also holds my rice cooker and my heart shaped Le Cruset casserole. This was the exact spot I wanted to put the new cupboard...so things needed to be rearranged (as you can see by that picture up there...it was a big mess in the kitchen)

I opted to put the coffee maker on the tiny hoosier (which houses my pots and pans, teas, coffee grinder and other cute decorative things) because I rigged up a power strip when I moved the hoosier in years ago, and I need electricity for the coffee maker...I also need to clean up the top of the fridge...

First things first...Does anyone else have appliances that they need, but not all the time? Things you use every once in a while, so it's worth having them, but then they need to find a place to live? Yeah...I reorganized a cabnet and found a lot more space than I thought I had...and was able to put some other things away! I also got rid of some things that I don't need. I will be passing those on to the right places this week.

I originally thought that my little white cabinet, but with some quick thinking, I was able to find a better place to use it. Right next to the back hallway...and it will hold a few more things. Also on the door in this hallway is a set of hanging shelves...this is my only pantry option...which is a little nutty. Seeing as my house was built in 1925, there's a huge possibility that the original owners had a lot of free standing storage options, so I'm just slowly replacing them, right?

I moved everything around, cleaned everything off and even found myself crawling around on my hands and knees scrubbing the floors where everything had been sitting (and yes, that includes all the walls as well.) Rich helped me go get the new cabinet and moved it into my house for me (thank you so much Rich!!)

I love the new cupboard (even though either my wall seems to be off or the cupboard does...as it appears to be leaning...it's very sturdy though, don't you worry) I filled it up with all the food goodies that have been strewn all over the kitchen, and made a ton of room on those hanging shelves in the back there, and was even able to keep the LeCruset heart in the forefront of my decorating...

Now...I just need to continue organizing cupboards, drawers, and my bowl collection...

...And change that Halloween tablecloth to a Thanksgiving one...I mean, with all the organizing, I may be able to actually sit at the table one day and have a meal...

How novel.