Since this pandemic began, millions of people around the world had to adjust to what appears to be the new normal for a while. Some of us are now working from home, currently unemployed or just simply do not have many places to go when you are off from work. This caused many of us to have free time and tackle projects we may have always wanted to get done, or start on a project we never knew we needed. Case in point, my pantry organization project. I was scrolling through my stories and came across an idea of a pantry project from 2 a bloggers that I follow. They gave tips on how they were going to organized their pantries and even encouraged others to do the same. They called the project #Pantryaunties, a hashtag to use in order to show off your pantry and join the movement. I immediately knew I wanted to join. I am a pretty organized person by nature but this project was next level.
Let me be the first to tell you, organizing a pantry is not as easy as it seems and it can become very costly. Before anyone correct me, I do not have an actual pantry, I have cabinets for storage but for the sake of the project I will call it a pantry. This project took me about a week to complete due to the fact I had to wait for items to be shipped and scrambled to find things in store due to the current pandemic. With a little bit of patience and determination, I finished pretty fast and I couldn’t wait to show the outcome. Below are tips to use to make sure pantry makeover run smooth and easy.
Sort your things
It is important to sort through the items you currently have before you deep dive into organizing. Decide what you buy a lot of and things you don’t buy that often. This allows you to think about what you want to store permanently and the things you probably buy every now an then. Depending on your pantry or cabinet size, you may or may not have a lot of space to store things so sorting your items is key. When I began sorting my things, I realized I had a few items that had expired or items I never used. I threw away the expired items of course but the things that were not expired and I know I probably will never use, I plan to donate to my local food bank. After I decided the things I would not be keeping, I then began sorting by like items. I put my breakfast food together, grits, oatmeal and cereal. I put my canned goods together, followed by my pasta, snacks, seasoning etc. Sorting is a very important process because it allows you to decide the kind of containers you need and how many.
Select your storage containers
This was probably the hardest part for me due to lack of space. I knew I wanted a mixture of baskets and glass containers. I wanted to mix it up a bit and not get the same exact storage containers for everything. I also knew, if practically thinking, having all the same containers would not work. The items that I purchase frequently are different shapes and sizes, so finding containers that fit each of them was the goal. When shopping for containers, really think about the things you eat a lot of. For me, those items were pastas, grits and rice. Pasta and rice are my weakness but that is not what this blog post is about. I decided on the glass containers for those things because I hate opening packets or boxes that do not have a seal to them. Before getting containers for my pasta, I would wrap them in plastic bags which was so ugly to me. Also, for my cereal, I would get so annoyed when the box did not close properly. Now that I have the cereal containers, I no longer have that problem and I am beyond happy about that.
There you have it, my complete pantry reveal. What do you think? Leave feedback or questions in the comment section below and I will be sure to answer them.
Map & Place your items
So you have your containers ready, now it’s time for placement. Place your containers in the space you see fit. You will need to move them around a bit until they are exactly where you want them to be. I decided to store my items by like items, all breakfast food together, pastas, snakes and seasoning. I like to use the wicker baskets for one off items. Things that I don’t have a lot of but I plan to purchase again, mostly snacks. Wicker baskets are perfect to store these things because no one knows what are in the baskets until they look in them. This allows you to store random things and while keeping your pantry aesthetically pleasing.
Get Personal
Now that your containers are exactly where you want them to be, it is time to personalize them. This is something you can do yourself, buy online or print from Etsy or other printing sources. I decided to purchase stencil and a chalk pins to do it myself. With stencils my labels did not come out as perfect as I wanted them but I wasn’t about to spend lots of time doing them over again. Even though they are not perfect, I am very pleased with the way they turned out. The labels that I purchased are from Amazon. They come with 85 labels which is perfect for whenever I decide to switch things up in the containers. That is the main reason I did not go with customized labels. I change out the things I eat pretty frequently so I don’t want to have to purchase labels again, at aleast for a while.
Leave a Reply