Tuesday, February 9, 2010

The Organized Kitchen, Part 2 - The Spice Rack

I love organization. Yes, I am a freak like that. I'm fine with it. I have come to accept the fact that I will always be anal and there is no changing that.

I just thank god I can teach The Good Baby how to properly load the dish washer, since trying to teach The Good Husband is a lost cause. Poor little TGB, she will think all my organization quirks are normal and will either be completely anal like her momma or a total slob. Either way, there is therapy.

I find it the easiest to organize the kitchen. I spend most of my time in there anyway and I am always looking for something that will create less clutter and save me some time.

When we moved into The Good Home, I was about 6 months pregnant so I couldn't clean or organize the way I wanted to. TGH wouldn't let me climb on the counters and clean the top of the cabinets. I still haven't done it and I shudder to think what is up there. I spent the first day organizing the pantry alone. And then I had the rest of the kitchen to do.

Then I had TGB and was sidetracked for a good, I don't know, 6 months. Organization fell by the wayside.

I also had moved from an apartment that had only 4 cabinets to one with 3 times that space. The wedding presents we had from 2 years prior were all still in the box, unopened. So when my swollen pregnancy feet and stupid sciatic nerve started to bother me late in pregnancy, I threw miscellaneous things into various cabinets, closed the door and ate some ice cream.

Just now am I beginning to assess what I need to organize and implementing the plan.

One of the weirdly challenging things to organize was my spice collection. Before, in the apartment, I had this UGLY spice rack that housed all the jars. When we moved, I donated that thing and thought I would just put them in the pantry, since spices like the dark.

Well my spices took up too much space in the pantry, so I decided to throw them in the drawer and walk away. So when I needed something I had to dig through this mess:


There had to be a better way, I told myself. I wanted a cute spice jar collection. I originally wanted one that would sit on the counter, but decided against that since I had too many damn spices. So I decided to find some jars that would 1.) look cute; 2.) seal well and 3.) fit in my drawer.

I liked the look of apothecary jars and after a few searches on amazon, I found the perfect jars from Target. I had to order them online, so I waited for a Target coupon before finally buying them last week.

Here is the result:
I bought two sets (24 jars total) and I think I might need to buy 2 more sets since I still have some spices in there original jars. Each jar holds 4.5 oz, which is enough for most regular spices.


I love the clean look and I can easily and quickly find a spice I want. To be even more anal, the spices are in alphabetical order, so I know that sage will be in the last row, while chili powder should be in the first row. You can see a bit of the spice through the top of the jar, but I put labels on the bottom of each jar just in case.

I also put my powdered, light and dark brown sugars in separate glass mason jars to save room. When I get more spices I will likely move them to the pantry.

3 comments:

Wendy said...

So cute! I just posted on my blog about how I'm trying to reorganize my pantry. I love your spice solution, unfortunately I have more shelf space than drawers.

Artist4life925 said...

That is very cool! For some of the more commonly used one you can buy those magnetic one's and stick them to the fridge :) That's what we do since we buy in bulk!

BTW <3 Your blog!

The Good Wife said...

Thank you Artist!