Organizing Your Food Storage

When we first moved into our new home, one of the first things we did was build shelves in our cold storage and I set to work organizing it.  Then the case-lot sales happened.  And then it got cold.  And going down into the cold storage and spending time putting away all of the case-lot purchases would have required a coat, gloves, and hat.  And it would still be cold.  I do NOT like the cold.  I lived in Texas for 11 years and loved the heat there.  I dread each and every winter in Utah.  So, I put off re-organizing and putting away everything until spring.  Well spring has arrived and it was finally warm enough this week (and I had time) to spend some time down in the cold storage and tidy things up.

There was so much to put away, that it couldn't even be contained in the cold-storage and spilled out into the storage room.

It took me a few hours and lots of rearranging but I finally got everything put away.  And it makes me happy to have an organized cold-storage again.

One of the things I tell people when I am helping them organize is "Put the things you use the most closest and at eye-level."  Well that is exactly what we have here.  The first shelves when you walk in is toilet paper, paper towels, beans, condiments, breakfast items, and my 5-gallon buckets of flour and sugar. The items we use the most.

The next set of shelves has soups, pasta, and vegetables. The third set of shelves is baking items, fruit, drinks, and snacks.   Snacks are actually something that we use a lot, but I don't like to put them front and center or they tend to disappear.  So they get stuck in the back so they aren't as easy for the kids to grab.  

The end shelf has canning supplies, some extra household items, paper goods, packaged foods (which we don't eat very often), and drink and water storage.

It's so nice to have my storage room back.  Things are accessible and easy to find.  Make this organizer heart happy.

Do you have food storage? How do you organize it?

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Project: Master Bathroom Update with Shutters and Storage

Hello friends! We've made a few update to our master bathroom since we moved in that have made such a difference in the space!  I absolutely adore my spacious bathroom, but there are a few things that I knew we needed right away in order to make the space work for us; shutters and storage!

This is the giant window over the tub in our master bathroom.  It offers a beautiful view to our backyard, the horses running in the fields, and the equestrian/walking trail that runs behind our home.  It brings in so much beautiful natural light in the bathroom.  What it doesn't offer is a lot of privacy!  I am not a huge fan of blinds, and plantation shutters are a bit pricey, so I needed to find another solution for this window.  I considered cafe curtains, but found nothing that I liked.  Then, I saw my friend and neighbor's blog, Amy's Casablanca, with her homemade shutters and I knew Kevin could build them and I LOVED them! They were the perfect solution.  They looked beautiful, offered plenty of privacy when needed, and yet could be opened to let in more light, and we could build them ourselves for a fraction of the price of plantation shutters! Win! Win! Win!

When we moved in, we hung up a sheet in the window to get us by, but Kevin quickly set to work and had them built within a few months.  The first ones he built were the ones in the toilet room. With only one set, they were his test run.  He built them out of MDF Trim and board that was already primed.  He also trimmed out the top and sides of the windows to give something to attach the hinges to and make the window look nicer (I hope to do this to all the windows in the house eventually).

Kevin built the shutters for the main window after working out the kinks and I absolutely adore how they turned out! I love that I can close the bottom for privacy, but have the top open to let in plenty of light.  I love the black hardware he chose.  It goes perfectly with the room and really makes a statement with the stark contrast to the white shutters and trim.

Even with our bathroom being so large, we don't have much storage in there.  We each get two drawers and a small cabinet under our sinks and I have a makeup drawer in the middle.  I was finding it difficult to find a place to put our extra towels and toiletries.  With the 5 kids sharing one bathroom, a lot of their extras are in the linen closet in the hallway, and there really wasn't room for our stuff too.  For a little white we were putting it up in the top of our closet, but that wasn't working either.  Then I found this great cabinet at Target.com.

The cabinet was perfect for our needs.  It was tall and thin and fit in the space we had between the door to our bedroom and our closet door.  It had a cabinet with glass and a cabinet that could hide things. And it had another drawer! Perfect! I purchased it and as soon as it came put it together!

In the top section with glass, I store our extra bath towels, hand towels, and wash cloths.  It is so much more convenient to grab them out of this cabinet rather than have to get a chair and climb into the to[ of the closet to grab a new wash cloth (I'm too short to reach the upper shelves!)

The bottom cabinet holds a lot of my extra toiletries and items that I use on a regular basis, but not daily.

The little drawer conveniently holds extra razors, lipsticks, and my stash of Homemade Peppermint Lip Balm.

These couple of changes have really transformed our space and made it work much better for us.  I love that they are not only functional changes, but they look great as well!

What changes have you made to your bathroom to function better? I'd love to see them!

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