Saturday, May 21, 2011

Kitchen Organization

Just in case you've been wondering about the progress of my kitchen organization, which I began during the cooking-making process, I took a few photos today.

I am currently waiting the arrival of 5 pairs of 11"-18" tension curtain rods that I am going to use to organize my baking pan cupboard.  I got the idea from a Martha Stewart or BHG web page - can't remember which.  Maybe BHG got the idea from Martha Stewart.  Anyway, I am eager to get the curtain rods because my pans are all over the place right now!  I'll post more photos when the rods arrive!

In the meantime, I thought I'd document the organization process.  Here is the cupboard above my oven...


 All my roasting pans and large, rectangular baking pans are stacked within each other.  The cooling racks keep getting tangled... some stacked, some on edge that fall onto the stacked ones.  I found some really cool baguette baking pans at some thrift shops.  Eager to make some bread in them one of these days.

When my rods arrive, I'll insert them into the cupboard so that my pans can all stand on edge.  Hoping all will fit into one cupboard!

Right now my muffin pans and related types of baking pans (including a way cool doughnut baker that I found at a thrift shop, but haven't found a good recipe for using it yet) are all in the pantry.


Really, the pantry is just a huge appliance garage.  I used to have my cookbooks on this shelf, but moved them out when I found a bookshelf at a thrift shop.  It was senior day, so I got an additional 25% off on the purchase; but, found out when I got home that the shelves weren't deep enough to even hold most of my cookbooks, or high enough between the shelves, either.  Right now the shelf is temporary storage for things that need to find a final "home".

I am still trying to find a good way to store all my cake and cookie decorating stuff.  The Lowe's project booklet arrived in the mail today.  It has a cool little cart - which Phil could build someday (ha!) - that I thought might be a good idea for all that stuff.  If I put all of it onto a cart, I could just roll the whole thing out of The Tornado Shelter into the kitchen when I work on cakes and cookies.  If I can't get Phil to build one, maybe I can find something useful at a thrift shop.

Anyway, I moved that little brown shelf into The Tornado Shelter - which is actually the midget closet under the stairwell.  This is where Marge and I, and the two cats and our 3-legged beagle all had to cram into when we had the tornado come through here a few years ago.  If I put all my cake/cookie decorating stuff on a cart in here, I could easily roll it out if we have to get into the shelter again.  BTW, the dimensions of this little "room" are about 4' W x 8' L x 4' H, so it's pretty tight in there with two people and three animals - without the shelves and such!  But there is a light and electricity.  We just need a good weather radio because, during the tornado, we couldn't hear the radio in the kitchen over the sound of the hail and wind!


Anyway, maybe you can see the dark brown shelf in the back on the left side - next to the shredded lampshade that was on a huge lamp in the living room.  (Keep watching my blog for how I plan to salvage the lampshade...one of these days.)  I moved my cookie mold collection to the floor in The Tornado Shelter because I needed the space in The Cove, but I'm not sure that is their final resting place.  Maybe I can move them to narrower baskets and put them on the brown shelf?  We'll see!

Everything else on the shelves that Phil installed toward the front, in the blue dollar store baskets - believe this or not - is MOSTLY paper napkins, paper plates, plastic or paper coffee cups, and plastic utensils.... many of which were left over from Marge's 90th birthday party from 3 years ago.  Something tells me we haven't been having enough parties!

Phil's birthday is coming up, though.  I wonder if I have enough time to plan a party large enough to use up some of these party supplies...

c@

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