Getting Things Where They Belong

I have way too many kitchen gadgets but really, we both have way too much stuff. At least I use most of my kitchen gadgets. There are looms and spinning wheels and a longarm and lots of fabric and yarn that are not getting used. 🙁

You may remember almost three months ago when we bought the cabinet base at the Rehome store. It was brand new, never been used. It even had the drawer pulls with it but we’re going to have to find those. At first, Vince’s plan was to put a thick board on top and then he’d put tile on it. I wasn’t crazy about that idea but he wanted to do it. He bought the board, bought the tile, then decided he didn’t have enough tile. Since the tile came from the Rehome Store, there was no more of it so the project just sat.

Last week, we had a discussion about getting that cabinet finished. I had seen the premade countertop pieces at Home Depot and told him I’d rather have that than tile and it seemed like something that could help get that project finished way faster. So, after nearly three months of no progress, I said “It’s time to do it!”

So, we got the countertop piece for it this weekend and Vince finished it up this morning . . except for the drawer pulls.

The sun room has no heat or air so in the summer, it’s boiling hot and in the winter, it’s freezing cold. At first, Vince said he wanted to put furniture in there and sit out and have his morning coffee. Then he decided that probably wasn’t a great idea because so much of the time, it would be too hot or too cold. That’s when I came up with the idea to put shelves in there for extra kitchen storage.

We did that and it worked out quite well but, you can see the extension cord there where I was running the Instant Pots and other electric appliances. That wasn’t working out so well so I thought this cabinet would be perfect.

At first, I put three Instant Pots out. Believe it or not, there are times when I have three of them going at the same time. I also put the Bosch mixer and a FoodSaver. Then I started thinking about it and the sun and heat is not going to be great for the Bosch mixer and I don’t ever want to replace that thing. I use it mostly for kneading whole wheat bread. The whole wheat from home milled flour is sticky and has to knead for a long time. The Bosch is great for that. It’s not so great for cakes, cookies, whipping egg whites, etc. It also has a food processor and is great for slicing, shredding and grating. I use it more for that than for mixing. And, it has a blender that attaches to the back and it’s nice to have it sitting out because my other blender stays put away.

But, the sun . . I didn’t want to leave it in the sun room so I thought I could move the Kitchen Aid over and the Bosch could share the appliance garage. Nope! The Bosch is too wide. No matter which way I turned it, it would not fit through the opening. So, I moved the wheat grinder into the garage and put the Bosch where the wheat grinder had been sitting on the countertop.

I’d prefer to have nothing sitting on the countertops but that’s just not the way things work around here. You can see that in the midst of all the moving things around, I still have two batches of bread going and before it was over, Vince told me he was out of Anadama bread so I started a batch of that, which means I’ll be baking two loaves of sourdough today, AND three loaves of Anadama bread.

Back to the cabinet in the sun room . .

I ended up putting a waffle maker on there, which I’ll probably bring into the kitchen when making waffles, and attaching the Flic Floc on the side. I use it a good bit and don’t like attaching it to the table. I can always take the inserts from the Instant Pots into the kitchen, fill them and bring them back out to the sun room to run them, then take the insert back into the kitchen, serve the food, wash the insert and take it back out. That won’t be a big deal.

I put all the food saver rolls in the top drawer but so far, haven’t put anything in the bottom drawer. There are a couple more Instant Pots in the cabinet. Don’t ask me why I have six of those things. I guess I bought one or two when I had the apartment in MO. That still means there’s no reason I should have more than four but . . I do.

I have this little thing on one side. It’s what I had potatoes and onions and garlic in when we lived in Texas but I don’t want those things on the wood floor with no way to catch drips if a potato or onion goes bad. I have jar rings – wide mouth on the bottom, regular in the middle and the plastic ones that I use for storing leftovers in the top area.

On the left side, the blue Tote has plastic storage containers that I’d like to toss but am not quite ready to do so yet. The cast iron pieces I use most are on the rack. There are other racks in the garage and some stay in the ovens.

The basket on top has fermenting lids, sprouting lids and extra rings that wouldn’t fit in the other baskets.

The sun room isn’t being used for its intended purpose but it’s being used in a way that works for us. Having things organized and a spot for everything helps me not have such a huge mess all the time but . . I still have a huge mess most of the time.