Month: August 2018

Cleaning and Organizing – Kitchen – Making it Safer for Missy

On By jackiblosblackisIn Cleaning, House, OrganizationLeave a comment

I would have had this up earlier but I have been having modem problems. I am hoping new equipment solves this problem. So, going back to Update Part Two, I have moved around some of the cabinet contents. You can see the before pictures in the previous post but I am also going to include them in this post as well.

I needed to move some of my small appliances so they were not in such immediate reach when I finally unlock the cabinets in the future. I have a reason to be paranoid about this. I have a cousin, who was not so young at the time, that decided to stick his finger in a blender. Kids can do stupid things. Let get on with it though.

I am moving the small appliances into the cabinet were the serving dishes are. The serving dishes have been moved out of the kitchen and will appear in the dinning room post.

I have left the glass prep bowls in the cabinet as there is no other real place for them. On the bottom shelf I have all the mixer attachments. In the baskets I have the different paddles.

On the second shelf I have moved the Baby Bullet, the food processor, and the Ninja blender. In the back I have a basket that contains the cups for the blender, that way I do not have to worry about constantly knocking them over. The blender is a little heavy but not enough that I will avoid using it.

On the top shelf, I have a basket there. I have just left it there. This has stuff in it that Missy is still too small for and there is no point in moving it.

This is the before of Missy’s cabinet and her dishes that I wanted to move. You have seen already where I moved the baby blender to and I just want to move her dishes down. This cabinet does not have a lock on it.

I think this cabinet looks so much better! I left the food freezer trays because I am not that worried about them. In the basket on the bottom shelf are popsicle molds. She will not be able to use these for a while yet but she can play with them in the mean time. I have put the bottle liners down here as well. Her sippy cups (I had two more in the wash) will be there as well.

On the top shelf, in basket I have put just the smaller stuff. It has a few silicon self feeders and the formula to-go containers. Soon enough I will add snack pouches in there and what not. You can see her dishes are now accessible to her and behind those I have put her formula cans.

Now the cabinet that had the small appliances in it. I have moved the rice cooker in to here. I had it above the stove because there was no other spot for it. I expect I will use it more now that I can actually reach it. The water bottles and to-go cups have been moved in to here. I also put the spiralizer in here because it has just been sitting on the counter. It needed a place to go and this is where made the most sense.

A bonus cabinet that Missy will probably never be able to reach but I did it at the same time. This has vitamins and a couple medicines, vases, coffee and tea containers.

Again, another cabinet that looks so much better. I have moved the vases out of the kitchen. Them being there made me nervous every time I needed one. Plus, I want a to add a couple other choices. There was no room for that. I, of course, left the vitamins and medicines. They are out of reach and I take the vitamins with food. The kettle was in the small appliance cabinet and it should have been here in the first place. I only use it when I make full pots of coffee or tea. You can see my teapot and coffee pot. I put the grinder behind the pot. I had a french press in here and as much as I want to keep it. I HATE cleaning it, I have not used it in a couple years. When I make coffee, I grind the beans myself and my coffee never ends up with a burnt taste since I do not use a percolator. Maybe that is technically one but it does not have a heat source, I just have to heat it up the amount I want though out the day.

It is amazing how just having a few things done can make one feel so much better. Then I look around at the rest and I get overwhelmed again. One step at a time.

Cleaning and Organizing – Update Part Two

On By jackiblosblackisIn House, Organization1 Comment

I cannot believe how long it took me to think of something. Now that I have though, I can come up with a bunch of different examples. The kitchen is once again going to be the example location. I also have pictures to show for the beginning. I will explain later on why I do not have after pictures yet.

This bottom cabinet has worked well for me. Now, Missy is crawling and while she cannot reach the knobs on these door yet. I eventually will want to unlock the doors. As much as I plan on teaching her the safety of small appliances. I do not want to tempt her having them in immediate reach (at any small child age). These need to be moved.

In this top corner cabinet is serving dishes. Put up top because its a large cabinet for things like platters. A way from little hands too. I use my serving dishes proudly. At least half of it is from my china set. If I did not use it, it would be in the box with the rest of the set.

This bottom cabinet does not have a lock. The reason for this is because it is Missy’s cabinet. Stuff I am not worried about her playing with or breaking. Well clearly, there is stuff in there that needs to be moved. The baby bullet cannot stay in there and there are glass water bottles in there. These are kind of heavy so I should move them or she might break a toe if she dropped one.

This one is just because I want to move her dishes to her cabinet. There is no reason for everything to be off limits and she cannot break them.

Now the reason why I do not have after pictures. Up until recently I did not have a space that I could move the small appliances to. Somewhere that I am able to access with out a lot of extra effort. It might make me sound lazy but lets be realistic. If it takes to much work to put a way. One of two things will happen. The first being it will take work to retrieve as well and I just will not use it anymore. Or the second would be I use and do not put it away. Neither one of those cases is appealing to me.

I have a solution now. I came across a used buffet and hutch. Honestly I did not buy it to make the kitchen a safer place for Missy but my cows need a new home ha-ha. I only just thought of this solution. So the reason I do not have after pictures is because I am getting a new glass shelf cut. When I went to view the hutch one of the shelves somehow got busted. Not a big deal. There will be a whole post dedicated to it since it is pretty much my entire dinning room.

Moving the content of these cabinets should be my next post in this series. That does depend on how long it takes for me to have the new shelf cut.

Cleaning and Organizing – Update Part One

On By jackiblosblackisIn House, OrganizationLeave a comment

So far this series has not turned out how I wanted it too. It is not that I do not want to post. The problem is I do not have my phone with me all the time to take photos. I always think about it after the fact. I want to catch my daughter growing up and I never have my phone to take those pictures either.

Not going to lie; I have no clue where my phone is at the moment ha-ha.

I also organize things as I go along. While something works in theory, it may not work in practical. This means systems need to change until it works the way it should. If it takes too much effort to put things back where they belong, than the system does not work.

An example of this would be my cookie sheets. I did have a system that worked. I have since consolidated three drawers into two. I needed a drawer for ‘healthy’ snacks that would be in reach of Missy. In this case unless I add another set of drawers in the pantry I will just get over it. It really is just a pain in comparison. So this one does not have an end yet. Until I find my happy place the sheets just keep getting shuffled around.

Another example would be….who knew this would be so difficult. I am having trouble thinking of a decent example. Even from the duplex before this place was purchased.

I will have to come back to finding an example. Rather than trying to do the full room, I am going to split some of the areas in to parts. I also have to go back and change what I have organized in the first place. I do not want to go over the entire room again if I have only touched a small area (which usually has a large impact). Breaking things up to simply just what I have done, if there is enough content, will make me feel less overwhelmed. It will also keep you feeling good about your place compared to mine.