Like most people, I have never had enough storage in my kitchen. Unlike most people, I have dreams of the perfect pantry. I have held dinner parties in my mind’s pantry with Ina Garten, Martha Stewart and recently Clea Shearer and Joanna Teplin of “The Home Edit”. We dined, laughed and played games of “How Fast Can You Find An Item Stored In The Pantry”. Of course, Martha always won!
My dream has finally come true! Not the part about dining with all my heroes, but having a pantry! In our new addition /renovation, we managed to fit a pantry into the design. It is more space than I had ever had for storage in my entire adult life. Before, there was no rhyme or reason to how I stored things. I just put them where ever they would fit. With this new space, I want to organize it with a place for everything. The strategy being, it will be returned to said spot every time! When the time came to start organizing, I realized I had no idea where to begin. Where should I put canned goods, dry goods, paper goods, entertaining items, seasonal etc. etc.? After I sat down and did some deep breathing with a glass of wine, I remembered seeing a show on Netflix called the “The Home Edit”. The duo, Clea Shearer and Joanna Teplin, are organizing guru’s. They travel all over helping people take control of their homes. Lucky for me, one of their specialties is organizing pantries! They also wrote a book about what they do “The Home Edit”. I ordered the book and it did not disappoint. It had great ideas on organizing and guidelines to follow. Yeah!
The book that will help me organize my new pantry!
Here is a picture of one of the pantries they have done. It gives me chills!
As far as the design of the pantry I knew I wanted a lot of space on the top shelf to house all my extra dishes, glasses, platters used for entertaining. I also wanted enough space from the bottom shelf to the floor for paper products, water, and back up supplies. Look at all that space. I will never again run out of paper towels!
I had asked for an outlet in the pantry so I could have a coffee station. We ran into a little problem. The outlet for the coffee maker is below the shelf and the plug will not reach. We will have to drill a hole through the shelf and feed the plug through. I actually think this change will be better. It will give us more room!
We added a brace in the middle of the shelves when my husband saw everything I wanted to put on the top shelf.
Just one more coat of paint and the shelves are finished!
My coffee bar! We still have to drill a hole for the plug. I also want to get hooks to hang the coffee cups and storage to hold the Keurig coffee pods.
This is why we needed a brace for the shelves. Believe it or not there is more!
My budget for new storage containers is limited, so I have been looking for deals. I got the larger basket at Goodwill and the three smaller ones at Target. I will be heading back to Goodwill this weekend. I always see glass containers there and hope to come home with some!
Next week… another pantry update, maybe even a reveal!
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