More Kichen Organization: Pantry

Although I have posted about kitchen organization before, I still have more to show you! Truth be told, I'll probably always be posting on kitchen organization, it seems that the kitchen is a living, breathing being in our house, ever changing, ever evolving. Just when everything is perfect you turn your back and you're back at square one, but once we have kids keeping the kitchen organized will be easier, right? haha just kidding.

We recently lined our pantry cupboard shelves (check it out here) and I thought it would be the perfect time to re-organize the pantry, seeing as it was already emptied out.

Seeing the contents of our pantry laid out brought out two feelings in me, one, it made me want to simplify, cut down on duplicates, and really just keep the basics on hand. And two, it made me feel grateful, we are very blessed and there is nothing like literally seeing it laid out in front of you to make you realize it. We are very lucky to have more food then we need, but not more food then we'll use (I think there is an important distinction there).

 Lee is a big tea drinker, most people don't believe us but Lee is the tea drinker of the family, he even has a tea cup and saucer (although you didn't hear that from me). Mostly he drinks green tea but we also have a decent collection of tea bags for myself and for the days Lee's feeling a little crazy and has a peppermint tea instead. This tea bag organizer from ikea (linked here) is really handy, it's nice because you can see what you have and saves us from keeping a bunch of tiny half empty boxes of tea in the cupboard.

The bottom of the pantry stayed fairly similar. I grouped the baking goods together (flours, sugars etc...), and am still storing my serving platters on the shelves. The onions and potato's are still staying nice and cool in the same stop.

An old part of the kitchen becomes a new addition to the pantry. We've had these glass candy jars for a number of years now and somehow I always find a use for them. One is being used to hold protein powder (for Lee) and the other holds Granola (costco brand in case you were wondering, they make the best granola).I wanted to make sure that I stored both of these items in glass and not in plastic, one because I worry about plastic's leaching chemicals and two because the granola is fresh and does go bad so I wanted it to be easily accessible so that Lee would eat it all before it expired.

 So, that's the newly organized pantry. It was a lot of work, there was a lot of trial and error, seeing if things will fit then finding out they don't and starting again! The the results are worth it for us! We love the green paper and all the extra space it feels like we have in the pantry now that it's organized and thoughtfully laid out.

Also, come take a look at our food poster we hung by our pantry to help us make better food choices. There is nothing like a sign telling you to eat better starring you in the face everytime you reach for a cookie!