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The one thing I don’t look forward to every year is Spring Cleaning. I capitalized it, because it’s definitely a “thing”. My mother made it so when I was a little girl and it’s ingrained into me. Now don’t get me wrong, I love the freshness in the air, the warmer weather and all of the outdoor activities, but the pollen is killing me and I never feel up to all of the Spring Cleaning that needs to be done. My Allegra has seemed to stop working so I will have to find something else to combat my itchy eyes, stuffy nose and dry throat.

My pantry has been on my mind a lot because I’m trying to get organized so I can find things easily but I can’t tell you how I organized my pantry without showing you how it started.

It began as a nasty looking closet with tile pieces missing in the corner and dirty tile. I took off the door, found some old plywood, bought some 1×2’s and got started building braces and cutting down shelves.

This black and white beer can wallpaper is from the 70’s and I got it from my Mama. Haha No, seriously, she had a few pieces left because she never throws away anything which is where I get it from. There wasn’t enough to do the whole wall, so I did a strip down the middle.

This is after I started painting everything white.

Caulking is next which I absolutely loathe but it is definitely a necessary evil.

I decided to paint the shelves a beautiful wine color. And this is before I knew that deep reds would be on trend. Wow, I’m good.

As you can tell, my Mom found more of this wallpaper so I could do the whole back wall. Yippee! I then screwed cup hooks into the wall in opposite directions.

Next is my favorite thing in the pantry. I don’t know where I saw this, but I loved the idea of taking a bungee cord and hooking it onto the cup hooks to hold paper towels. Whoever thought of this is a genius. I also took a piece of metal screening I had sitting around and screwed it into the wall to make a pocket for serving trays. Necessity really is the mother of invention.

So this has gotten me up to date with my reorganization. This is how I started off with my pantry. Not too inspiring, but I knew I could do better.

I bought little spice jars and started putting all of my loose spices in them. I thought they would look so much prettier out of those cheap plastic containers that they came in.

Labels came with them and also a chalk pen.

I started ordering things that I thought would make the pantry better and I’ve collected them as well as some of the old items I used below.

1. 4-Pack Blue Bungee Cords

2. LED Wall Mounted Lights with Remote 2pk

3. Large Food Storage Containers 3pk

4. Set of 2 Pasta Storage Containers

5. 18 Spice Jars with Labels

6. 20-Pack Black Cup Hooks

7. Bag and Wrap Storage Center

8. 2-Tier Lazy Susan

I bought these lights that are remote controlled. All you have to do is charge them and you get about seven hours of light at a time. The only time I’ll use them is when I go to into the pantry at night, so the charge should last a long time.

This wrap and storage bag center is clutch also. I don’t have to worry about all of those boxes and frees up shelf space. The painting is one my Dad did when I was a child. I’m always stealing things from my parents house that they aren’t using. It brings back memories and adds a nice touch to the decor.

The upper part of the pantry is for items I don’t use all of the time and empty containers for the future. All of the bags I’ve collected are put in a metal folder holder that I had in my office.

Drumroll please. This is what I ended up with. I love it and it doesn’t need to be perfect or have all of the containers match. I used baskets and storage boxes that I already had and got some things from my mother that she was going to throw away. There’s a dog section on the bottom right for all of the dog food, treats, toys and leashes/collars.  It works for me and I put a pretty curtain on a tension rod to close it off when I don’t want to see the inside.

I feel so accomplished and now I can start on my attic which is a hot mess.There are two rooms up there that need my attention desperately. Let me know in the comments if you’ve started doing Spring Cleaning and what you’ve done so far.

See ya next time.