Clutter Free: Kitchen Cabinets

Do you ever have those moments where you just can't take anymore? You know something has to be done. Right. That. Minute. That's how I felt this weekend and it was due to my train wreck kitchen cabinets. Somehow over the 20 months of living in our home they became a complete mess. Actually, to be honest, ever since day one they have been a mess. I've made it work. Moved things around. Moved things around again. And again. Until I gave up - until this weekend!

My biggest problem? I have to much storage. I know what you're thinking, you can NEVER have to much storage!! Coming from apartment living where we usually only had three to four kitchen cabinets, my current kitchen is a huge change. In total, I have 12 upper cabinets, 11 lower cabinets (including the island) and 8 drawers (including the island). And I'm constantly trying to figure out the best place to put all of my kitchen items like dishes, coffee cups, vases, pots & pans, etc.

I have a long wish list of items I want in my kitchen, mostly accessories as I have all of the main appliances and tools I need. But, one of the most important items on my wish list: DISHES! Somehow, in the almost 7 years that the hubs and I have been married we have lost/broken more than half of our dishes. I blame this on the 7 moves :). We went from a set that served 8 to 5 plates in total (and that's only after you combine dinner and dessert plates!). Add on the fact that neither one of us liked our dishes anymore, we were ready for a change. Our goal: find classic white dishes that we will never outgrow. The budget: find a serving of 8 under $100 (including plates, bowls, coffee mugs).



While walking around Walmart I decided to check out there options 100% thinking I wouldn't find what I wanted. Low and behold I found the perfect set of classic white dishes for us. Price tag for a service of four was only $25 - SCORE! So, I threw slowly positioned two boxes in my cart and headed straight to the check out. When the cashier rang them up they were on clearance for $15 - DOUBLE SCORE! So, I ran back and picked up another serving of 4. For $48.00 I left with a service for 12, which is awesome since Brian has a HUGE family and we host a lot of gatherings.

As soon as I got home I couldn't wait one more minute. I had to wash all the dishes and clean/organize our cabinets. I only tackled a few cabinets this weekend, but I am thrilled with the results and I can't wait to show you! Now onto the good stuff:

This cabinet held our mismatch set of glasses and our sad amount of dishes. Yes, that is only three bowls.

I took out all of the green dishes and replaced them with my new lovely white dishes. The second to the bottom shelf holds one matching set of coke glasses (which will be replaced when we find glasses we like) and beer glasses we bought when we first got married.  I moved our wine glasses to the top shelf and Brian's grandmother's tea pot next to them.

Here is our coffee/tea station - but you wouldn't know that by looking at it. Complete mess. Our top cabinets are really long, which you can't really tell; however, I also stored all of my vases in this cabinet for easy access.

I took our all the mismatch coffee mugs, they made me cringe. Except I have one I bought while we visited Hershey Park and Brian was given a Semper Fi mug a few years back that had to stay. The bottom shelf holds all of our coffe mugs. The second shelf stores all of our to-go cups, coffee filters and tea bags in a container I already had on hand. The top sheld holds all of my vases.

I couldn't stop there, so I moved on to my baking/spice cabinet. It was semi organized. But still made me cringe.

The bottom shelf still has my spices and colanders. The second shelf has my supply of powder sugar, brown sugar, regular sugar and flour. The top shelf has all of my baking decorations and misc items.

The clear containers I already had on hand and I made labels by using a scrapbook punch and cardstock I also already had. Free labels! I love using the clear containers because I can see how much I have left.

I used extra cardboard from the new dishes to make a tiered spice system. I don't expect it to hold up forever, but until I decide how to store my spices it will work. It was free so I can't complain.

This baking box holds all of my coco powder, baking powder, baking soda, cupcake liners, etc. It's an old shoe box I covered in scrapbook paper and added a cut out label. Again free!

And I still had enough energy to do one more. This cabinet was so full of my tupperware containers that they jumped out at you when you opened the doors. This had to be changed ASAP as the Mr. was getting tired of picking them up off the floor.

I moved stuff around, downsized our tupperware stockpile and organized to make this cabinet more functional.

And this was the result - an island full of Goodwill goodies. They were donated later that same day so I couldn't talk myself into keeping anything. All of that from only 7 cabinets - I still have many to go. All of the organizing was done for free with stuff I already had on hand - can't beat that!

With my cabinets being so organized now it makes it so much easier to cook dinner, bake and pack lunches. I can't wait to tackle the other cabinets!

Do you rearrange your kitchen cabinets often or do you have them perfectly organized to fit your needs? Have you purchased any new kitchen gadgets, accessories, dishes? I would love to hear all about it!