Kitchen Clear Out

I spent the majority of my Sunday scrubbing, reorganising and decluttering my kitchen. Doesn't sound so strange except when you realise that when standing in the middle of my kitchen I can reach out and touch all 3 walls (it's open to the lounge, and is miniscule) and it took me nearly all DAY! The fact is I am so lazy and I have been putting it off for weeks now and we all know that the longer you put something off the longer it ends up taking! After doing all of the washing up I turned to the cupboards. There is one particular cupboard that I have been putting off for ages (years...) mainly due to laziness but also to an intense fear of creepy crawlies. I felt like it had gone on long enough though and decided it was time to tackle it!

Now, I am getting ahead of myself in the whole decluttering business. According to the 31 Days programme I'm following (kinda like the 12 step programme but for hoarders) I am meant to tackle one obstacle a day, and appliances is way down the list on Day 25 but after starting with my sock drawer I felt I was really ready for a challenge. Check out the series here: From Overwhelmed to Organised

A side note on the sock drawer... I very rarely wear socks, mainly tights or pop socks and if I do wear socks I wear long ones to tuck jeans into boots and the like. So why I had so damned many trainer socks I will never know. When was I buying the damn things?! I threw pretty much all of them out and went through my main underwear drawer too, getting rid of any ill fitting bras and old undies that had seen better days (we all have them ladies!!). I managed to cut down three full drawers full (albeit small bedside drawers) into one bigger drawer leaving me with loads of extra space. I also went through my husband's sock drawer, weeding out any that were too holey to be saved and those that had no friends. It was a relatively easy job and it's definitely given us more space, in our underwear drawers at least!!

So, the appliances. The deal is to gather up all the small appliances in your house and weed out any that are broken or you don't use. In the cupboard of spidery doom I had a blender that doesn't work, a George Foreman grill that doesn't work (both of which we had tried new fuses in to no avail) and a coffee machine given to us second hand by a relative that we hadn't used since we got it - well over a year ago!! I binned them all - they certainly weren't sell worthy or donate worthy so into the bin they went. I suddenly then had a whole free cupboard which, in the aforementioned teensy kitchen was a godsend!  I now had somewhere for pots and pans rather than on the precious work surface.

I also cleared out the medicine cupboard which mainly had expired meds or ones we'd never need again,  and a whole host of Tesco carrier bags. Why were we saving these things?! Having a few around for rubbish is always good, but we had so many we could never possibly reuse all of them, and certainly not before another Tesco delivery.  I've also now got Bags for Life for in store trips (I felt like I was ready for the commitment) so why we had so many stashed away I don't know. This again cleared masses of space,  and allowed me to put the tea, coffee, sugar and sweetener caddies into the cupboard off the work surface.

I moved the cups to closer to the kettle too. Why weren't they already there? God knows. But it's made a cute little drinks station in the corner and looks so much better organised. The meds are now in a storage box which keeps everything neat, even if it doesn't totally fit on the shelf it's on. 

I have skipped ahead so many days of the 31 Day challenge but I intend to carry on this week and if I am feeling motivated, I may do a couple of days worth (steady on!)