When I purchased by home several months ago, the most difficult part for me was not having to figure out where to put the furniture or how to arrange the dining room. Those were things that I knew I could always change around and that other people would help me with if I went astray. The most difficult part of the whole moving in process for me was actually deciding what went where in the kitchen.
Growing up in my mother’s house, everything had a place and it always seemed to make perfect sense how things were arranged. I always knew where the plates were and where I could find spices. For over twenty years, I had grown accustomed to my mother’s system.
When it was time for me to leave the nest, it was harder than I would like to admit to figure out my own system. So after I went to the store and purchased all of the necessary accessories, like a blender, cutlery, plates, an assortment of spices, necessary food items (like rice and pasta) and the like, I poured it all out on the kitchen counter and started to put things close to the same arrangement as they had been in my mother’s home.
Then, after about a week, I realized that it was very difficult to continue to place things in a certain order and I wasn’t entirely sure that my system was working. I had put olive oil too far from the stove and I could never seem to reach the spices the moment I need them, like I always could in my mother’s home. Thus, I decided to start again.
Before taking everything out and putting it back in the cupboards, I dedicated a few solid days to researching what other people did. I asked my friends for advice and I looked online for other ideas. I even spent several hours looking around at the home improvement and kitchen renovation store to come up with the system that would be a perfect fit. My mom did, after all, say that I should live with my new kitchen for awhile before actually doing anything drastic.
The first change I made was to invest in a rack system. I realized that the only thing I had to hang my towels and oven gloves on was either the fridge handle (and they got stuck when I closed the door) or the oven handle, which was convenient, but often too far away from the sink. Thus, I purchased a few good hooks that went on the wall.
Next, I invested in a stacking system for the spices in my cupboard so that I could see them all. In addition to the stacking system, I purchased a turning and stackable unit that would allow me to access the spices that were even in the back. I also purchased a spice rack that I could screw into the door. With the spice rack in the door, I was able to put the most frequently used spices so that I could access them quickly and easily. It enabled really good organization.