The point of this series is to help you (and myself!) get to be the most organized we can be. Why? So that the routine things of your day are second nature which then allows you to spend more time, and brain power, on other more important things. If you can routinize most of your day then you won't feel quite so exhausted by the end of it...unless of course you fill up all your new-found free time with other exhausting activities!
So today let's talk about your kitchen. I don't know about you, but I spend a lot of my day in the kitchen. Three meals plus snacks to prep and clean up equals a lot of time.
When I moved into my first home as a married woman and had a kitchen that was all my own, my mom came over and gave me the heads up on how to arrange things. At that point, I honestly don't know if I would have thought of some of the things she told me, but now whenever I set up a kitchen, I use those original ideas as my guide.
Every kitchen is unique, but basically I look to do the following:
1. Place the plates, cups, mugs and eating utensils as close to where the table is as possible, but not too far away from the dishwasher/sink. Sometimes our kitchens have been so small that this wasn't a problem, but other times we've had larger kitchens so this took some thought.
2. Place the pots and pans as near to the oven/stove as possible - usually not too hard to do.
3. I like when I can have a spice cabinet near the stove. Right now the two cabinets that flank my stove hold spices in one and teas in the other.
4. My hubby (and all but one of us, really) like coffee, so we try to have a coffee center set up. In one small cabinet I house all of the coffee beans as well as a sugar bowl and the coffee mugs we like to use. On the counter below this cabinet is the coffee grinder and coffee maker.
5. My favorite section of the kitchen is the baking center. I have a drawer with all of the measuring spoons and cups, a cabinet with all the flours and sugars, another cabinet with baking spices and extracts and such, and the mixer and baking utensils on the counter by these cabinets. This alone makes baking things so much faster and more fun!
6. We happen to have two separate pantries in this house, so canned goods are all in one and boxed goods and miscellaneous items are in the other.
Really thinking about the layout of your kitchen can save you so much time and extra work. The idea is to get in and get your work done in there as easily and quickly as you can; or at least that's my idea! Even if you like to spend time in the kitchen, having an organized one makes the time spent there all the more pleasant.
The question for today, then, is: Are you happy with the organization of your kitchen? If not, go find one area and try to fix it. Work on small sections when you have time and pretty soon it will be the way you want it to be.
God Bless!
