Watch Out - Mama's Organizing!

I can't speak to the driving force that has me sorting through piles, repulsed by cluttered areas of my home and organizing like a mad-woman.  I could theorize on a couple if instigators of this organizational force that has been unleashed on my surroundings.  In five short months, give or take a week or two, we'll be bringing a new little one into our home and family and there's quite a few things to do to get ready.  But really, it's too early for nesting, right?  I'm part of a book club this year that's reading through an "organize your life" book and we're responsible for before and after photos (this at least accounts for the kitchen chaos being attacked).  Short of those two items, I have no idea, because really, I don't like cleaning!

So this week I've gone after a couple projects as a woman on a mission.  One was to clean the pantry out.   The other was to organize the bins of children's kids clothing (more on this later).

The pantry project was instigated by the book club accountability.  On a recent Thursday morning I took everything out of my pantry, dusted, cleaned and replaced.  The honest words of G-Tot summed it up:  "Mommy, there's a lot of dirt in there!"  Yup, there was.  It was almost like it hadn't been completely cleaned out since we moved in or something.  Ahem.  I was concerned that there was going to be a lot of food that was going to have to be thrown out, but there wasn't.  And I was pleasantly pleased that there weren't too many surprises in my pantry either.

Organizing my spices was another project I tackled the same morning.  I had spices residing in two different locations in the kitchen and never really knew what was where.  So I sorted, combined and consolidated.  They still live in two different places, but I know what lives where.  Large bottles and bulk spices to refill smaller containers in the pantry and all the "normal" size spice containers are in the drawer.  It's a much better arrangement.

Here are some before and after shots of the pantry and spice drawer.

Spices Sorting:

Spices After:

Pantry Before: 

Pantry After: