happy spring - kind of - and what i'm up to

February in Illinois usually isn't a kind month. It's typical to have cold weather and snow. This year is different. We've actually had a mild February, including some abnormally warm weather for this time of year. Today is 66F and sunny. Tomorrow we're supposed to reach 70F, then strong thunderstorms will move in (with potential for hail and tornadoes), with temps plummeting to 20F by night! Yes, a 50 degree difference in the same day. Wednesday will only be in the low 30's with snow. CRAZY!! 

This morning when I opened the blinds in the house, I saw two spring robins in the yard. The first sighting of the season! Usually I don't see them until mid-March. Walking around the yard, I saw Bleeding Heart poking out of the ground. That's definitely a few weeks early. And then when I went back in the house, I heard the beautiful sounds of Sandhill Cranes flying overhead. They're back from Mexico, Arizona and California! 

(Bleeding Heart emerging)

What I'm reading:

I can't say enough good things about this book. You can probably tell I'm finding nuggets of wisdom and information from all the page markers. If you're a woman 60+, you'll love this book. From Amazon ~

"Filled with unexpected good news about growing older, Winter’s Graces highlights eleven qualities that ripen with age―including audacious authenticity, creative ingenuity, necessary fierceness, self-transcending generosity, and a growing capacity to savor life and to ride its ups and downs with humor and grace. Decades of research have established that the catastrophic conditions often associated with late life, such as severe dementia and debilitating frailty, are the exception, not the rule. Still, the mistaken idea that aging equals devastating decline persists, causing enormous and unnecessary suffering, especially for women. Drawing on decades of experience as a psychology professor and psychotherapist, Susan Stewart, PhD, weaves together inspiring folk stories that illustrate the graces of winter and recent research that validates them, along with a wealth of user-friendly tools and practices for amplifying these graces and bringing them to life. Written primarily for women over 50 seeking good news about growing older, Winter’s Graces offers adults of all ages a compelling vision of aging that celebrates its many gifts, acknowledges its challenges, and reveals how the last season of life can be the most fulfilling of all."

What I'm listening to ~

Halah ~ Mazzy Star

Idea 10 ~ Gibran Alcocer

What I'm watching on TV:

Curb Your Enthusiasm

(Honestly, I'm not much of a TV watcher. We're just now into Season 2 of this series and still think it's just "meh" even though it has good ratings and our son and some friends recommended it. We'll slog along for a little while longer. Have you watched this?)

What I'm cooking (making this tonight):

Creamy Parmesan Ranch Chicken 

What I'm working on:

This mess!

We have small closets in this house. This is the closet in my office/the guest room/what-used-to-be Philip's bedroom. I use it for hanging my sweaters and hoodies, purse storage, and for my art journaling and scrapbooking supplies. Not shown: the messy closet shelf. 

While on a walk around the neighborhood last week, I found this tall, slim dresser at the curb of a neighbor's house. I thought it'd be perfect for storage in the closet. Brian got the dresser in the car for me and brought it home. 

I took everything out of the closet including the Sterilite drawers, went through every little thing, and ended up with three bags of things for donation. 

And...the after, so far! I still have more organizing to do. And then I have to tackle all the stuff on the closet shelf.

Have a good week!

💗

organizing kitchen cabinets and drawers

Good morning! I love when the sun streams into my house like this. Makes me (kind of) forget that it's really -15 with the wind chill out there.

Are you familiar with the blog, Apartment Therapy? I love this design blog. I'm following their January Cure where every day they email you a short assignment to do in your home - little organization projects that will lead to a cleaner, more organized, more peaceful home. Who doesn't want that, right? There were a few assignments to clean out and organize kitchen cabinets and drawers. Mind you, this doesn't have to be done all at once. Just one cabinet or drawer at a time. I've been working on this for several days.

Here's what I've accomplished so far. I don't have a walk-in pantry, so a lot of my everyday staples and baking goods are in cabinets. I am fortunate that we have an unfinished basement with metal shelving units where I keep other pantry items (broth, canned tomatoes and beans, tuna, toilet paper, etc.). This is my main food cabinet before. Not too bad, but still needed to be cleaned out and better organized. 

Here's the after. I keep a lot of food items (mostly grains and pastas) in jars. Takes up less room, is easier to see what you need, and keeps these items fresh. 

The bottom shelf holds my spices. Since I have so many, I find it easiest to keep them organized by category. For example, one basket is Italian spices and herbs: oregano, basil, thyme, rosemary, parsley, bay leaves, dried shallots, onion powder. Another basket holds Mexican spices such as chili powder, cumin, red pepper flakes, and cayenne. Additional baskets hold Indian spices - turmeric, curry powder, garam masala, cardamom, coriander and fenugreek seeds; herbs such as dill, Herbs de Provence and lemongrass; and seeds like sesame, poppy, celery and caraway. And still another basket holds fall baking type spices such as cinnamon, pumpkin pie spice, nutmeg and cloves.

Baking cabinet before:

Baking cabinet after:

Moving on to drawers...

Junk drawer before:

Junk drawer after. 

I have two utensil drawers. Here's one that started out organized with bins, but over time got messy. I took everything out of the drawer, washed the bins in hot, soapy water, wiped down the inside of the drawer and went through the utensils to see if there was anything we never used. Those items went in the donation bag I keep in the basement.

Better, though I see I need a bigger basket instead of that little white one to hold the stray stuff.

This is the second utensil drawer which is right next to the stove. I didn't get a before picture, so this is the after. I keep spatulas, big spoons and a ladle in this drawer since they're easy to grab while cooking. This drawer used to be so crammed with stuff that something would get stuck almost every time I opened the drawer.

So what to do with the "extras" that I took out of that drawer? I found there were a lot of serving spoons and a couple of serving forks. I found room for those at the end of the cutlery drawer.

I also had wooden spoons crammed into that narrow drawer. Those went into a utensil crock on the counter.

My kitchen already looks and feels better. Next cabinet to tackle is the storage container cabinet. If you don't hear from me in awhile, I probably fell into this black hole.

Sharing with Cozy Little House Tweak it Tuesday.

organizing the kitchen pantry

 Are you lucky enough to have a pantry in your kitchen? My kitchen doesn't

have a pantry, so I keep most of my dry goods in one main kitchen cabinet.

This is where I keep all my grains, pastas, spices, and some other

items such as peanut butter, honey, raw almonds (we eat some every day; 

other nuts are kept in the freezer), and dried fruit.

This is the cabinet before. Not too bad, but a little sloppy.

I started by clearing everything out of the cabinet and wiping down the shelves.

Then I threw away anything that was expired.

I like to keep grains and pastas in glass jars ~ it keeps the items fresher when

you can put the lid back on a jar instead of trying to close a box or bag. Ever

try to close a box of pasta when you didn't use the whole thing? I can't tell

you how many times I actually used tape to keep a box closed.

 I also like how you can easily see what you need when items are in glass 

containers. I cut the  cooking instruction label off the original bag and put it in

 the container with the grain or pasta.

Honey, maple syrup, and molasses are obviously sticky, so I use plastic

lids underneath these types of jarred items to catch the drips and prevent

the sticky stuff from getting onto the shelving.

 

I ran out of glass jars for some of the goods, but I'm always on the

lookout at thrift shops. I also reuse salsa jars or any other food that comes

in jar that is big enough to re-use for dried goods. I then group things together ~

grains, pastas, dried fruit, dried beans, and spices.

 

I think I have every spice known to man. I don't want to be wasting time 

searching for a particular spice when I'm cooking, so I organized these in

baskets according to how they're used. For example, one basket holds Italian

spices - oregano, thyme, basil, rosemary, onion salt, garlic powder (though I mainly

use fresh garlic), and parsley. Another basket holds baking spices - cinnamon,

ginger, pumpkin pie spice, nutmeg, and cloves. How about a basket for salts and

peppers? I have a pepper grinder for coarser pepper and then a bottle of "regular",

fine-ground pepper. I have a little bottle of kosher salt, but I sometimes use Trader Joes

21 Seasoning Salute in my cooking, since it's a salt-free blend.

 

It's so easy to just pull a basket off the shelf and have all the spices you need

at your fingertips. Now I need to find my label maker and label these baskets!

 

And here's the after - much neater and more organized.

 Joining Cozy Little House for Tweak it Tuesday. 

Come on over and see what all these talented ladies have been up to!

 

convenient and simple

 This is such a simple tip, I wonder why I didn't think of it earlier?

I was using the inside of a couple of the kitchen cabinet doors to post cooking tips

and a short list of important (police non-emergency, doctors) phone numbers.

  Handy, but a little messy.

While browsing at Hobby Lobby yesterday, I found a large piece of cork board.

It came with adhesive squares and was only $4.99 - and I had a 40% off coupon -

so it was only $2.99!

I put the adhesive squares on the back of the cork board and hung it on

the inside of the cabinet. Then I tacked some of my papers on the cork board.

Looks so much neater than taping random papers to the inside of the door.

 Thanks for visiting ~ and happy organizing!

when it's too cold to go out

 When it's 5 degrees F. and the wind chill is below zero,

I stay indoors.

I really needed to make a dreaded Wal-Mart run, but I'm putting that off.

So, I started a project today. Organizing my huge pile of cut-out recipes.

I cleared the kitchen table to use as my work space.

I took manila envelopes and wrote a category on each one...appetizers,

brownies, cookies, muffins, cakes, breads, chicken, pork, beef, vegetarian, rice,

potatoes, salads, fish, veggies.

 And I went through each and every recipe and got them into the appropriate piles,

and then stuffed the envelopes.

I threw out a lot of recipes, too. And I still have too many.

Are you working on any projects around the house?

This is just one of several for me. But it's a dent.