At Costco right now they have these big 25 lb bags of flour from Lehi Roller Mills for something like $6 bucks. That's a pretty great deal on good flour. So I bought some all purpose and bread flour. I had purchased a bag once before and just kept it in this leftover tub sitting on my counter. It worked, but it took up so much counter space that I wanted to get my baking cabinet better organized so I could have my counter back. The next step was selling Marty on the value of getting some specifically sized food storage containers to allow me to optimize my cabinet space. I think I really just sold him on "happy wife, happy life".
Long story short, I spent much more money on containers than I saved buying the cheap flour in a big bag. How's that for logical? I'd like to think that I would have organized my cabinet anyway and maybe after 100's of bags of flour I'll break even.
So that's what started the organizing kick. I only planned on doing the baking cabinet, but it was SO invigorating. I was so jazzed about it that I did another cabinet, and then (dun-dun-dunnnn) the hall closet. Don't be too impressed by all of this organizing, each area took me a full day to get done between babies.
I had been waiting for a couple of my containers to arrive before I could fully finish the baking cabinet, so I finally finished it today. Here are some of the before and after pictures of my handiwork:
Baking Cabinet Before:
After:
It's soo beautiful! Everything is much more accessible and I can actually see what I have in there. I found sprinkles from years ago that I didn't even know I still had. True frugality requires organization. (Truly Frugal Shelly is still a work in progress)
Baking Counter Before:
After:
Bonus points for creating so much space that I was able to move things over from a different heavily-burdened counter space.
Kitchen Cabinet Before:
I kid you not, I was only using about 30% of the items in this cabinet on a regular basis. Prime cabinet space wasted!
After:
If you look really close you'll see a rack on the bottom shelf. I got that lovely husband of mine to whip up a new spice shelf for me. *swoon
Hall Closet Before:
(don't judge me!)
This was the "throw it somewhere and deal with it later" closet. I was dealing with it later... much, much later.
After:
Be still my soul.
Lastly, this one wasn't horrendous but today I tidied up the closet in Peter's room.
Before:
Mostly this is a mess from things stuffed in that area on the left, and from piles of outgrown clothes on the shelves to the right.
Ah, that's better.
And... the behind the scenes shot of the pile of things I boxed up to take down to storage in the basement:
Yay for diaper boxes being such a great size. Also, we go through a lot of diapers 'round these parts.
I've been wanting to organize the closet in Carolyn's room because it was our guest bedroom closet and is overflowing with bedding and pillows and such, resulting in no room for actual baby items. The trouble is that I get most of this done during her nap times and it's a little hard to rummage around in her closet while she's napping. Ah well, maybe I'll wait till she's two for that one.
Labels: Family, Personal Growth
