I love my cute, unique, 1940’s home. It has interesting doorways, built ins, beautiful hardwoods, and a lot of charm. It’s the perfect first time home for Nick and me, but despite everything I love about it, it does have it’s downsides.
As soon as we moved into our house we outgrew the kitchen. We both enjoy cooking, and as a result of our hobby and recent wedding, we had acquired a great deal of kitchenware. Our cabinets immediately filled up, and items began spilling over into garage storage.
Kitchen storage and organization has been a battle since day one, and I recently decided it was time to reorganize our impractical spice cabinet, and try rearranging things. First we tried moving our mugs to our spice rack and our spices from the narrow cabinet next to the oven to the more spacious top shelf of our glasses cabinet. This arrangement lasted a week before I decided it wasn’t going to work.
After a lot of brainstorming I decided I should make my own spice rack, or spice shelf, for easy access to my spices, and as an unconventional way to decorate. A stainless steel shelf was already installed in the kitchen when we moved in, and my goal was to find a match to the shelf, lower the original one by a few inches, and add a new one above it. Based on a hunch I checked Ikea to see if the original shelf was from there, and I was lucky enough to find it, three years after the original shelf was purchased. As soon as I returned home from Ikea the spices were cleared out of the cabinet and I got to work.
I consolidated the spices into small jars, only $3.99 for a set of four from Ikea. In addition, I found small oil containers, which I decided to use to store olive oil, red wine vinegar, balsamic vinegar, and apple cider vinegar. These containers were an added bonus, and convenience while I cook.
Unfortunately the oil containers didn’t have a stopper, so I fashioned my own out of wine corks. The end result of rearranging my spices on display on my brand new shelf, and our wine glasses and medicine stored on the top shelf of the glasses cabinet, which allowed more space in one of our lower cabinets.
I am very pleased with our new arrangement, and I think it makes the space with the shelves look more complete. Our cooking lives are easier, and I have a new addition to our kitchen to admire. This project only took one day and a few tools to complete. It was worth every penny and minute I spent on it!
If you are struggling with the organization in your kitchen or any room in your house, try to think outside of the box. Not everything has to be hidden in a closet or cabinet, think of ways to display items on shelves to allow space elsewhere. I love the decorative quality of my multicolor spices.
I hope you enjoyed my spice rack organization suggestions! Please help me spread the word about my blog by liking, e-mailing, sharing, subscribing, and of course, commenting! I would love to hear about your kitchen organization nightmares and solutions. Thanks for stopping by!
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