Make cooking easier: How to organize your pantry (reduce stress by not taking everything out first)

Have you seen the pictures of pantries where everything is so neat and organized.

The cereal is in clear containers, there are cute baskets lined up on the shelves with beautifully scripted labels? I’m sure you have. They do look really nice, don’t they? 

Those pictures, dare I say, of perfection aren’t what we should be chasing. They just aren’t functional. Let’s walk through it once.

You get home from the grocery store, you’re putting the groceries away. You’ve got the clear containers, you open up the box of Cheerios to pour in, but there’s still a little left in the container. You decide OK, I’ll pour that into a bowl so the container is empty. You pour your box of Cheerios into the container, but now it’s full. The rest won’t fit! What do you do? You put the box in the pantry along with the container. 

This is not functional. This is not a productive use of your time.

So, what should we be shooting for? Functionality. It has to work for you, for your kids, for your current season of life. I’m certainly not saying that your pantry has to or should stay a mess, but it can be organized, functional and effective.

Let’s dive into how to make this happen.

Pantry organizing step #1

Start small.

Have you ever carved out an entire day to clear out your pantry? Whether big or small, when you take everything out, pile it on your counters, it’s a lot! When you take everything out at once you have a ton of decisions to make and that can definitely wear you down. You know there’s expired food in there. You know you’ve bought exotic things for a specific recipe that you meant to make but never did. Those things cost more than the normal things you buy.

But now you need to decide if you’re going to keep them or throw them away. This can be a tough thing to expect of yourself. This is why I do not recommend that you empty every shelf and your entire pantry at once. Instead, you start small. You start with a section or a shelf.

When you download the free home organizing checklist at www.homeorganizingforbeginners.com, you’ll get extra information about decision fatigue. We have more than enough decisions to make in a day and when you organize any area of your home, you can put together a decision strategy. This helps you walk through the process of making the decisions before you actually get started on your project. When you have this in hand before you start, you will be able to sort through all the things easily and more quickly.

Again, you can download this checklist for free at www.homeorganizingforbeginners.com.

So, you’ve started small. You simply select a shelf or a section of a shelf. Then continue onto the next step.

Pantry organizing step #2

Sort.

As you take items out of the small section that you selected, you decide what you’ll do with each one. Will they go back into the pantry, trash, maybe you’ll give them to a food pantry or to a friend. Separate them into different piles. After your small section is cleared you can wipe it down or clean it as needed, then move on.

Pantry organizing step #3

Organize.

Now you have a pile of things that you are planning to keep in your pantry. These are the items that will go back into the space. Personally, I have very few bins or baskets in my pantry. Really just two. One for bags of chips and one for the kids candy. Again, I help you to focus on the function over how it looks. If it looks pretty but doesn’t actually function well for you, then it'll be a mess again anyhow.

Once the pantry is fully organized and has been functioning as needed for some time, that’s when you think about making it look nicer with baskets or bins and such. When you focus on the function, you think through how you and your family use the space everyday. If you put something in a bin, will the kids put it back in the bin? If so, great. If not, then why put it in a bin?

Let me address what you may be thinking… but now only part of the pantry is organized. Won’t it just be a mess since the full pantry isn’t done? No, because you’re going to put measures in place to keep it organized.

Pantry organizing step #4

Sustain.

Now that this portion of your pantry is organized. You’ll take a few moments to document what you are expecting everyone in your family to do in the heat of the moment so that it stays organized. This is part of the focus on the function. Whoever cooks in your home should be part of this entire process too.

When you’re cooking dinner and need to use something in this space, what are you expecting of yourself? You need to be able to put the thing away or find it easily, right?

I call this functional expectations. I like to use the example of spices. If you have your spices in your pantry or even in a cabinet, when you use them will you put them away as soon as you are done using them? CAN you put them away right away or do you have to take a cover off a container.

Do you see what I’m saying? Does the newly organized portion of your pantry work for you or against you? 

Another example would be cereal. I feel like with kids this can be a big challenge. Functional expectations for the area storing the cereal and the boxes of cereal themselves is to empty one box before opening another. It’s pretty challenging to put together an accurate shopping list if all the boxes in the pantry are almost empty. This has been a problem in our house, but I have 3 adult size teenagers!

In summary, here are your 4 steps that do not require you to empty your entire pantry and do this all in one day or at one time.

Step #1 Start Small
Step #2 Sort
Step #3 Organize
Step #4 Sustain

Are you to the point where you just want someone to come into your home to get it clean and organized?

I get it. Daily life so easily has us feeling like we’re running around like chickens with their heads cut off. What if you could learn how to clean and organize your home in a truly effective and lasting way? In the online course Home Organizing for Beginners that is exactly what I teach you. It’s so important when cleaning and organizing your home to consider how you and your family live life each day. It’s a must to set yourself up for success with a home that you can whip back into shape anytime life gets out of control.

Home Organizing for Beginners will give you:

• Confidence in your ability to organize your own home. Allow your new found confidence to show your children that they can be organized too. (even though they’ll fight you on it!)
• Fool proof steps to creating a clean and organized home that you will be proud to welcome others into even when they stop in unannounced.
• Time to spend how you choose. For me the extra time has been spent with the Lord. This has helped me bring true peace and joy into my home.

To learn more go to www.homeorganizingforbeginners.com.