How to Organize Your Kitchen

Today I am sharing tips on how to organize your kitchen. Our kitchen is the most used room in our home and it really needed some help!

I am so excited about this post because as much as I think I don’t like to organize, I actually love it! I always think of two things when I organize … function and style. (But not necessarily in that order.)

I use our kitchen a lot. Over the holidays I cooked a lot of dinners. Of course, I loved every minute of it. The only unfortunate part of all of these family dinners is that my kitchen (and butlers pantry) took a bit of a hit.

I knew my kitchen needed a lot of organization. Because there are some pretty unorganized situations hiding behind those cabinet doors of mine!

How to Organize your Kitchen

There are two things I always think about when I want to organize.

They are function and style.

Evaluating the Functionality in your Kitchen

To start the organization process, I look at the room. I make a note of any areas that are under-used. Areas that aren’t “functioning” as well as they should.

#1 – For example, there is a drawer just underneath my “Bakery” sign. I open about once every three or four weeks. That drawer needs a new purpose.

#2 – Just above that drawer is our “appliance cabinet” with a toaster and Cuisinart that has been overcome with hand sanitizer and masks. Dave can barely even use the toaster anymore.

#3 – I rarely even open the three drawers in the front of our island because they are unorganized. They need cleaning.

#4 – The biggest area in our kitchen that needs help is the part of our kitchen that has never been shown in a photo. Never ever.

In this photo, it’s the wall adjacent to our large farmhouse sink on the left side. It has way too many small appliances, such as a blender, toaster oven, 20-year-old microwave, juicer, and a Sonos speaker. This area drives me crazy and needs a major overhaul. This is the after photo and it looks amazing.

Finding Areas in Need of Styling

Because of my profession, I do have to focus on styling on areas that look camera-ready. So what needs cleaning, replacing or re-styling?

#5 – The two rugs in our kitchen were 20 years old. I probably should have replaced them years ago but I hadn’t been able to find anything I liked, in a similar style, that was affordable.

Also, the area with the gazillion small appliances is also another area that needed styling. I am tired of hiding and editing it out of my photos.

Before I actually start the organizing, I walk the room, in this case, it is the kitchen, with two different colored post-it notes. In this case, I used light pink for function and dark pink for style.

I place a post-it note on any cabinet, drawer, or area that needs help with either the function or style of the area.

I found two more areas.

#6 – The Lazy Susan cabinet is overrun with Tupperware. I ignore that cabinet too because I am convinced my Tupperware multiplies at night while scaring all of the lids away. Does anyone else have that problem?

#7 – We have a drawer that used to hold Tupperware lids (that didn’t disappear at night) that now holds about 15 water containers. Since I refuse to buy the kind of water bottles that have water inside them, we have accumulated way too many bottles. At least half of them need to find a new home.

At this point, seven projects seemed like enough.

I am going to share some of my progress to show you how to organize your kitchen in a fun and easy way.

Organize the Kitchen

#1 and #2 – Repurposing the Catch-All Drawer and Organize the Small Appliance Cabinet

Okay, here is the before photo. Yes, the hand sanitizer and masks were exploding. It’s sad but real life.

I bought my husband a new toaster for Christmas so this was a perfect solution.

The drawer underneath has been repurposed to hold lots of masks, hand sanitizers, and more.

#4 – Wall Adjacent to the Farmhouse Sink

I forgot to take a “before” photo but just trust me that this area needed some help.

This is what it looks like now.

This area used to store our really old microwave. But about a year ago I threw away the microwave as it was over twenty years old and way past its prime. I finally replaced it over the holidays because I couldn’t live without one. The blue screen is my friend Alexa.

Another item I moved from this area is our Sonos speaker. I found the perfect space for it.

Can you see it hiding behind the wire locker basket? I had forgotten that we had a plug hiding back there!

There it is!

This is such an improvement. And the music sounds just fine with the onions in front of the speaker.

Style the Kitchen

You have already seen the pink items styled in our kitchen. I don’t really use this counter space so I love using it to make my kitchen more festive.

I love my new rugs!

This has been a long time coming and I am so happy I finally found some rugs that I love. They are hand hooked premium wool and just like my older ones. They also have every color I think I may ever need in my kitchen!

I ordered two Safavieh Chelsea Collection rugs in two different sizes, 2’9″ x 4’9″, and 2’6″ x 4′.

I think they were very reasonably priced.

Don’t they look awesome?

Something New

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This is one of my favorite Christmas presents. It’s a glass washer. It works amazingly and is easy to install. It goes on your counter at the sink, often in an existing hole.

It is hooked up to our hot water and I can now wash twenty wine glasses in no time at all! The item is linked below!

I hope these kitchen organization tips are helpful. Remember to take little steps and focus on fixing things that aren’t working. You don’t have to do this all in one day!

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Live on Amazon

I have two Amazon Live broadcasts this week. They are Resetting For a Healthy New Year and Think You Hate Faux Flowers? I Can Change Your Mind! You don’t want to miss these.

It’s January, so it’s time to organize your kitchen. Below are some of the items I use to help me organize my kitchen.

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