Do you have a set time to work on decluttering your daily life? Thursdays are the day we focus on awareness of one area of our life we can declutter. This week you’re invited to think about how you utilize and use your kitchen.
Do you have things in your kitchen you never use?
Do your counters and cabinets stay clear after picking up?
Are you keeping things in your kitchen because “they are ‘good’ or “expensive” or someone gave them to you?” Boy I have to watch my internal talk for keeping clutter due to guilt or shame.
Our kitchen is really limited in storage and space. We have just four upper cabinets and the two lower ones are narrow. After moving from 3 seasonal homes when work forced us to keep more than one household to one location we have entirely too much equipment, basics in pans and tools we never use.
I love a clean table and table scapes are my favorite. Setting a pretty table simply adds to our family time.
Unfortunately, lately the kitchen has had more stacked dishes than peaceful presence. What happens when too much is not fitting easily in the dishwasher or in storage in the kitchen when its not in use? It gets piled on the counter and we just.keep.leaving.it.out.and choosing another one that is clean….ugh!
This was the scene I walked into the other day.. Because there were multiple pans out, instead of cleaning as we went, each cook just grabbed the next one. Then the issue of course is the sink is filled, the dishwasher is filled and no one has a space to wash the extra by hand. So much easier if we simply have less to dirty and rinse and put away as we go.
We cook in our home, we love to bake and create together, all of us. When we moved in, I believe there was a time all counters were clear! I’m determined to see that again in this lifetime! Staying safe at home in the Covid 19 season certainly brought to light just how much our organizational systems in the kitchen aren’t working.
So today I’m taking the dive in to put all the pans on the table, baking pans, soup pans, and choose a base set that will fit and live in our limited space.
Doubles will be put in a box for donation, and if after 2 weeks we’ve not needed them again, out they go from the garage.
A shelf has been built in the laundry room to store large items we know we’ll use regularly, but not need in the kitchen daily (like the big soup pan) or crock pot.
Today’s focus is simply the pans and baking items…Overwhelm happens for me if more mess than I’m willing to clean up gets pulled out, so I’ll keep it simple.
What might make your kitchen cleaning easier to navigate?
Fewer pans? Releasing pans that no longer are the ones you use? Finding a specific place for your baking pans? Aligning the cake pans you actually use? Releasing specialty pans that were fun once but no longer part of your used tool set?
How can you give yourself the gift of ease today on this “Take It Out Thursday” Challenge? What extras did you find lurking in your cabinets taking up room that could store what you DO use?
