I pulled the kitchen drawer open to get a teaspoon for my smoothie. Since I needed one with a long handle, I was digging around a bit so I saw all the crumbs and dirt looking up at me. I had been ignoring them for a while, but now they seemed to lock me with their stare. I opened another cupboard and saw some marks on the shelf where the coconut and date syrup was standing. Then I opened cupboard after cupboard and yikes, the dirt was now screaming at me.
I was also in a season where cooking was no fun. It was just a hassle to get everything out. The pots and pans were on top of one another, and I was always using the same bowls since the ones on the bottom were just too much of a hassle to get out.
I used the same boring wine glasses while the beautiful crystal ones never saw the light.
I want to feel good when I’m in my kitchen, and I want to enjoy cooking and spending time there, which would mean having it organised and making it easy to find the tools that I need right when I need them.
So, it was high time for a thorough spring cleaning and decluttering session of the kitchen. I marked the next weekend to devote to diving into the kitchen cupboards. And I wanted to do it on my own, with no help from my dear cleaning lady. The reason being, decluttering is something you need to do on your own. No one else knows what «Sparks Joy» for you – what you want to keep - to quote the lovely decluttering queen Marie Kondo.
Categorise your kitchen items like Marie Kondo and according to the KonMari Method ™
To work through the kitchen and all its items, start with categorising them into these groups:
Put all items in one category in one place- like the kitchen table - where you have a good overview. It’s important to pull everything out of the cupboards and off of the shelves.
Food
Let’s say you start with the food category. Take everything out from the fridge and the from the cupboard that stores dry foods, cans, spices, etc. Put it all on the kitchen table and go through every item one by one.
Check expiry dates and foods that you haven't touched and probably never will.
I’m sure you are one of many, many people who have started to cut down on animal products so you can have this in mind while doing your clearing out as well.
And what you don’t want to keep, give away.
Going through it all can also spark memories of dishes you love to cook that you have forgotten all about. Maybe you will be inspired to enjoy cooking again.
Cooking tools & Eating tools
Choose only the ones that “spark joy,” the ones that you really love and find beautiful or that you need for practical and essential reasons.
Find a home – a specific place – for every item and store them by category.
You should be able to see and easily access everything stored. The pots and the pans should be easy to take out and use and to put back again, every day. Also the mixer, the salad-bowl, the mortar, the wok, etc. And to be able to easily access everything, you probably need to have fewer items.
So, check how many bowls you have. Do you need so many? Go through all the items one by one and try to be quite firm in your decision-making process. Do we really need hundreds – ok exaggerated, but you know what I mean - of the same item? No, they just take up space and we tend to only use the ones on top of the pile while the ones on the bottom or behind, way in the back, are forgotten.
Try to catch yourself when your mind is saying - it might just come in handy sometimes - it probably never will.
Kondo says if you want a kitchen that you can enjoy cooking in, which we all want, aim for one that’s easy to clean.
The best way to do that is to make sure you put nothing on the counters or around the sink and on the stovetop.
Enjoying everyday time
While I was cleaning out my kitchen a few weeks ago I found my well-hidden box with beautiful silver teaspoons with ribbons in different colours that I got from my grandparents when I was half a year old. They have been there in the box since then, and that is quite a few years by now. I had never used them! That has changed now. The same with my collection of handmade crystal wine glasses.
Like, why always set the table with plates and glasses that are so cheap that “it doesn’t matter if they break,” while the ones that make your heart tingle remain in the closet, far away and only for “special occasions?” Let’s bring out the best cutlery every day!
Your shiny kitchen
So, if you reorganise this way, you won't just enjoy cooking and daily dinner times more, you will also enjoy cleaning more!
Who thought that was possible? Well, if you don’t have to pick up and rearrange objects before you dive into the scrubbing and dusting, or shuffle things around to get to the surfaces you need to clean, you will dance a happy dance while swinging that cloth. (And put on some music you love, preferably upbeat).
And of course, I want to suggest that you get a bidon of our all-purpose cleaning product Ecoclean. It contains no animal ingredients and it’s skin- and material friendly.
And it’s fantastic for your stainless steel in the kitchen and for your plastic or painted surfaces.
Wishing you a lot of fun spring cleaning, decluttering and sorting your kitchen!
And also newly sparked joy at being in your organised space!
