8 UHeart Organizing: Adding Storage Punch to the Pantry

If you are at all like me, one organizing project either leads to, or inspires another. So naturally when I cleaned out my fridge/freezer earlier this week, my pantry received a little attention as well. It is such a great time to tackle these high-traffic kitchen cabinets, especially with so many kids heading back-to-school.

Not only do I love to look at organized pantries, but I also love good before and after stories! I mean, isn't that why so many of us are here? For those inspiring "go get 'em" projects that show a before that many of us can relate to, celebrate a much more streamlined after, all while learning a few tips and ideas along the way? Yes, yes and yes!

I am so happy and honored to welcome Aniko back today, and she is happy and honored to share her recent pantry before and after story. I will let her take it from here. Enjoy!

Today I am sharing some tips on how to make your pantry organized and beautiful in less than a few hours. If you are like me, your pantry can become cluttered and messy in no time. I am trying so hard to get everything around me organized before the new school year starts in about two weeks. This year I will have two little kiddos riding the bus every morning, and I shared here how we are aiming to stay organized during this busy season. One child brought so much clutter and school paper home last year, I had to better prepare myself for two kids now! Luckily, we made some changes to our entryway last year that helped us immensely for storing school papers, backpacks, and for keeping our everyday clutter organized. I am not known to be the most organized person on the planet, but when I start organizing drawers, closets, cabinets and spaces, I seem to do alright. The hardest thing for me is being able to keep my spaces organized. As soon as school starts I would like to have meal plans made for each week and having an organized pantry is a must for planning ahead. I have to see what I am low on and what I need to refill when I go grocery shopping, right? I searched my favorite resource, Pinterest, one day for pantry organizing ideas and was so inspired that I started tackling mine while the kiddos were at the pool with dad.

I am almost uncomfortable to show you guys the before but just because we all know that our lives aren't always picture perfect, I will show you what I started with so you can appreciate the after pictures even more.

Ugh! That was a disaster! It took me at least 2 minutes to find anything in that pantry. But that mess is over now. My pantry is pretty small; I have about five shelves to fit everything I have.

As a first step, I took everything out of my pantry and purged things that had an expired date then I grouped things together; pasta, sauces, cereals, snacks, seeds, etc. to better organize them.

I used a roll of adhesive paper from Target to make my walls look beautiful and clean. Target has different designs, but I chose the modern black and white. This step is entirely optional; you can also use wallpaper if you have that handy, or you can just leave your walls paper free. I measured my walls and applied the paper.

I also used some empty containers that had on hand, and I prettied them up with the same leftover adhesive paper.

These containers are free and perfect to store straws, bamboo sticks, and other kitchen items.

I used canisters and containers to store pasta, rice, sugar, etc. I found great plastic and glass containers at Walmart, and I had some old ones from IKEA that I reused (the tall and skinny ones are from IKEA). And I stored open bags inside of baskets.

I labeled all of my containers which I find super helpful. I created my labels in Word using a free handwritten font, BROMELLO. You can download this free font and create your printable labels. I purchased clear shipping labels ( AVERY 15663) from Office Max, and I used the Avery templates 5163 to print them. You get the best result with clear labels if you use a laser printer (you can watch a short video of how to create your labels HERE).

I poured all the cereal into plastic bins, and I placed them low enough in my pantry that my children are able to reach. My kiddos are old enough to get up in the morning, walk downstairs and prepare their own cereals.

I found these metal baskets at Target's dollar section for $3 and I put all my sauces and canned food in there.

And of course I had some items that I could not hide, but I was able to sort them out and arrange them on my rack that I had on the inside of my door.

And because we all love to see before and afters, here you go! Now comes the fun of keeping it clean and organized!

BEFORE

AFTER

I am delighted to see how clean, organized and attractive my pantry is now. I created some fabulous watercolor Printable Recipe Cards that you can grab from my blog, and print them if you like to collect your recipes the old-fashioned way. And if you like to print out recipes from the web you can download my printable recipe binder pages I shared here last time.

As always, it's an honor to share my work with the IHeart readers. I will be back again at the end of the year.

Cheers for a great day!

Aniko

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Hello! My name is Aniko and I blog over at Place of my Taste. I am a wife, mother and business owner by day, and a DIY-er by night.  I love all things design, decor and photography, but I also have a passion for cooking, wine tasting, dancing and creating all things beautiful. I am so happy that I am able to share all of my joys over on my blog.  I also run an online shop and recently published a photography e-book filled with tips to achieve beautiful photography and styling.  I hope that you all come visit me there. Xo!