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Organizing Recipes: Paper & Digital

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Organizing Recipes Title Image

Organizing recipes can be challenging because you may have recipes in a variety of cookbooks, on index cards, on loose paper, or stored digitally on your computer or on a website.    Recipes can often add to the paper clutter in a kitchen.  Creating an organized recipe collection will streamline your grocery shopping, meal planning and cooking, saving you time and stress each day.  Getting your recipes organized is a time-consuming task.  Here are some of my tips on recipe organization.

Tips for Organizing Recipes:

Start by Decluttering Recipes

Gather all of your cookbooks and recipes together, and start by decluttering those you do not like or never use.  Reducing the overall amount of books and paper from the start will make the process so much easier.

Decide How You Want to Store Paper Recipes

The way you store your paper recipes is a personal choice.  Decide what works best for you, and stick with that one method.  Here are some options:

Determine One Place to Store All Paper Recipes

Choose a certain cabinet, drawer or shelf, in your kitchen, or close to it, to store this collection of recipes.  Once you’ve gathered them all together, and ecluttered and organized them, you will have a better idea of how much storage space is needed.

Digital Recipe Storage

You may decide it is the time to go digital with all of your recipes.  In that case, scan the paper recipes you use, and save them digitally.  You could store digital recipes on a folder on your computer, on Google Drive or in Evernote.

Retrieve Recipes Online

Search online and save recipes you like by using Pinterest boards, or bookmarking webpages and storing them in clearly labeled bookmark folders on your browser.

Use Apps on Your Phone or Tablet

Evernote is a great way to access recipes digitally.  Recipe specific phone apps such as Paprika or Cheftap are also great options.

Whether you use paper or digital storage methods, or a mix of the two, if your recipes are disorganized, it will be hard to make the meals you love.  If you need assistance with organizing your recipe collection, On Task Organizing is here to help.  We offer in-person organizing services in the Raleigh, NC area, and virtual organizing services elsewhere.  Contact us to get started on a plan to organize your recipe collection.

On Task Organizing, LLC is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to amazon.com

17 Reasons to Organize Your Kitchen

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17 Reasons to Organize Your Kitchen Title
Many of my blog posts are about how to get organized in various areas.  Today, I’d like to explore WHY to get organized.  Let’s talk about your kitchen, one of the most high traffic areas of your home.  WHY will an organized kitchen help lower stress and save you time and money?

17 Reasons to Organize Your Kitchen

1. Organizing creates open spaces and improved functionality in all areas of the kitchen.

2. Recipes become easier to access.

3. Ingredients can be found faster in your fridge, pantry or cabinets.

4. Organized countertops create more space for chopping and mixing ingredients.

5. The cooking process moves more smoothly with easy to access pots, pans, cooking utensils and appliances.

6. Meal planning can be streamlined if you can quickly do an inventory of your kitchen before writing a meal plan and going grocery shopping.

7. Dishwashing can be faster with organized cabinets resulting in a better process for unloading the dishwasher.

8. Setting the table can be easier with better organized drawers and cabinets.

9. Packing lunches will be simpler with snacks and other lunch ingredients better organized.

10. You will save time on your morning routine with a coffee station that contains the coffee machine, cups and coffee all in one place.

11. Less stuff means less items to store and maintain.

12. You’ll spend less time searching for items in your kitchen.

13. You will save money by not re-buying items you already own, but cannot find.

14. You’ll reduce cleaning time with organized kitchen cleaning supplies and fewer items on your counters.

15. Mail will become easier to process mail with an organized drop zone.

16. An organized kitchen drop zone also means no more lost keys or wallets.

17. A kitchen charging station can keep your phones, tablets and computers charged and prevent them from getting lost.

10 Meal Planning Tips to Save Time and Money

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10 Meal Planning Tips to Save Time and Money title
Organized meal planning can help you in many ways.  You can save time and money by making fewer trips to the grocery store, and being able to easily access your recipes and ingredients.  Dinner time is a particularly hectic time for most families. These tips and resources can help you streamline your meal planning process.

Organize Recipes

Declutter old cookbooks and recipes you dislike. Gather recipes in an organized way using a recipe rolodex, binders, folders or flagged cookbook pages.  If you prefer digital recipes, scan your favorites, or set up organized digital folders or online bookmarks.

Use Digital Recipe Apps

All Recipes

Big Oven

Paprika 

Designate a Recipe Area

Create just one area to go to when you need a recipe.  This can be in your kitchen, dining room, somewhere near the kitchen, or on your laptop or tablet.

Involve Your Family in Meal Planning  

If you feel overwhelmed, you can delegate a part of meal planning to another family member as a chore.  Some chores that children can help with are selecting recipes, searching the kitchen for ingredients, writing the grocery list, gathering coupons, checking the weekly grocery sales, assisting you with grocery shopping, or unloading the groceries.  If you give other family members ownership in these activities, it can help build teamwork skills.

Use a Shared Calendar 

Use a shared family wall calendar or a shared online calendar.  This will help track your family’s schedule around dinner time to determine if there will be time to cook and eat a full meal.  Knowing your family’s schedule can help you plan for days when you need to eat on the go, have a crockpot meal ready, or eat leftovers.   Choosing nights for dinner out can also be a part of your meal planning.

Take an Inventory of Ingredients

Once meals are chosen, check your kitchen for the ingredient and add anything you do not have to your grocery list.

Monitor Grocery Store Sales

For more savings, plan your meals while looking at the current week’s grocery sales.  Choose meals containing ingredients that are on sale that week.

Make a Grocery List

Have notepad or a dry erase board on the fridge or wall so you can easily add items to the grocery list.

Collect Paper Coupons

Clip coupons from your Sunday paper, and use a coupon organizer or a 3-ring binder with baseball card holder insert pages to organize your paper coupons.

Use Apps & Websites to Help with Grocery Shopping & Coupons

Apps such as Grocery IQ can help with your shopping, and websites such as coupons.com or southernsavers.com can provide you with printable coupons or details on grocery store discounts.

On Task Organizing, LLC is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to amazon.com

Conquering Kitchen Counter Clutter

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Conquering Kitchen Counter Clutter Title
Kitchen counters are often a magnet for clutter.   Many times, a kitchen counter or kitchen island is the first flat surface you see after you walk into a house, making it easy to be a dumping ground for a variety of things.  Since the kitchen is a high traffic area and a gathering space, non-kitchen items also tend to land on kitchen counters.

How to Reduce Kitchen Counter Clutter

Assess what is landing on the counter

Gather up everything on the counter and separate into 2 categories: non-kitchen items and kitchen items.

Look at the non-kitchen items and ask yourself, “Does this item have a home in another room?” If it does, move it to that room. Cutter often arises because things do not have a permanent home.

Create other homes for non-kitchen items

Create a storage space for paper such as mail, coupons, school papers, magazines and newspapers. This could be in another area of the kitchen or in another room.  Creating a drop zone for these types of items helps to reduce clutter.  Use desktop file boxes, magazine boxes, baskets, hanging wall organizers or wall pockets to contain paper.

Other types of non-kitchen items found on counters may be pens, keys, wallets, sunglasses, phones, cords and other digital devices.  Continue to create homes for these items using a key hook, a pen cup, a charging station, and place these on a small table, tray or shelf in the kitchen or another room near the most used doorway.

Declutter kitchen cabinets, drawers and pantry

Once non-kitchen items have been removed from the counter, it is time to declutter all cabinets, drawers and the pantry to create more storage space.  Remove items you no longer use or need, and then make homes for any kitchen related items that have cluttered the counter.

Find a home for most of your kitchen items inside cabinets or pantries.  For appliances that aren’t used daily, make space in a cabinet, shelf, pantry or even a closet or another room to store those items.  I’ve seen lesser used kitchen appliances stored in laundry rooms, mud rooms, garages and hall closets.

Use space saving kitchen storage items

  • Trays
  • Cake stands
  • Tiered baskets
  • Under cabinet baskets
  • Hanging baskets inside cabinet doors
  • Hooks inside cabinet doors

Keep on top of regular chores in the kitchen

Put away all groceries as as soon as you return from shopping.  If a regularly used grocery item doesn’t have a home, make one.

Wash dishes and load and unload the dishwasher on a regular basis to prevent dirty dishes from piling up and adding to the clutter.

Regularly clear and wipe down counters after preparing meals.

Get into the habit of spending 10 to 15 minutes at the end of each night putting everything away and cleaning up the kitchen to prepare for tomorrow.

If you need assistance in decluttering and organizing your kitchen, please contact On Task Organizing at nancy@ontaskorganizing.com or 919-561-0885 to schedule a free phone consultation to discuss your needs.  On Task Organizing offers hands-on organizing and do-it-yourself consultations in the Raleigh, North Carolina area, and virtual organizing services via Skype or Facetime to all areas.

How to Organize Cleaning Supplies

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How to Organize Cleaning Supplies Title
My home organizing clients often want tips on how to organize cleaning supplies.  Cleaning supplies are sometimes difficult to organize because they have many purposes in various rooms, and most people have many types and sizes of cleaners to store in their home.  Here are some suggestions on ways to organize and store those cleaning supplies.

Create a Home for Cleaning Supplies

Determine where you’d like to keep your cleaning supplies.  Do you have space under the kitchen or bathroom sink?  Is there a hall closet or utility closet that will work well?  Is there space in your laundry room for cleaning supplies?  Often brooms, mops and vacuum cleaners are such odd shapes that they need to be stored away from the rest of the supplies, either on wall hooks, or on a closet floor.

Cleaning supplies organized in caddies under the kitchen sink after an organizing session with On Task Organizing, LLC in Raleigh, NC
Cleaning supplies organized in caddies under the kitchen sink after an organizing session with On Task Organizing, LLC in Raleigh, NC

Some people like to store bathroom cleaning supplies under the bathroom sink and other cleaning supplies under the kitchen sink.  It really depends on your personal preferences and the way you clean your home.  Decide on a location (or locations) and then use storage containers to make the most of your space.

Use Storage Products to Contain Cleaning Supplies

An over-the-cabinet basket helps to hold dishwashing supplies under a kitchen sink
An over-the-cabinet basket helps to hold dishwashing supplies under a kitchen sink

For cabinets, there are great over the door cabinet baskets or over the door cabinet hooks that can be helpful in holding sponges, gloves and other frequently used items.  It is best if bottles of cleaning supplies are stored plastic containers to prevent cleaning fluids from leaking onto other items.  A cleaning caddy can make it easier for you to travel with the supplies.  You can even create one caddy for the bathroom, one for the kitchen, another for carpet cleaners, etc.

Inside closets, clear labeled plastic bins on shelves work well for smaller cleaning supplies.  If you store all similar cleaning supplies together, you will be able to find what you need when it is time to clean and prevent repurchasing or over-buying supplies.

photo of two clear bins containing batteries and flashlights in a storage closet organized by On Task Organizing, LLC
Batteries and flashlights in stored in clear labeled bins in a closet organized by On Task Organizing, LLC of Raleigh, NC

Other items that work well to store in utility or laundry closets near the cleaning supplies are bins of batteries, flashlights and lightbulbs.  These are things you may need frequently, and it helps to have an easy to access spot for these kinds of items.

 

On Task Organizing, LLC is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to amazon.com

How to Organize with Wire Shelving

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How to Organize with Wire Shelving Title
Builder’s special white wire shelving has been in numerous homes throughout my organizing career.  These are a standard in so many homes that I’ve encountered the same problems time and again.  Here are some of my tips on how to organize on those wire shelves.

 Shelf Liners

Install shelf liners like these to prevent items from falling through the cracks.  I’ve been in many pantries where bottles of oil are dripping onto other food containers because of these shelves.  I have seen clothing closets where shirts stacked on these types of shelves have permanent creases and indents.  I have found these shelves holding books and binders in office closets with paper falling through in between the wires.  In all of these situations, a shelf liner can be a quick and cost effective solution.

Bins & Containers

Use bins to contain clothing items. Choose from baskets, fabric bins, or plastic bins to help contain items and give you sturdier and portable storage on those wire shelves.

In the linen closet, try items from the collapsible brushed cotton linen closet storage collection or canvas fabric bins to hold towels and sheets on shelves.

In the pantry, try using clear plastic bins with handles, like these pantry binz to provide stronger storage, and to make it easier to see what you have.  These bins can also be labeled, making it easier to put away items.

Hanging Shelves & Hanging Baskets

The laundry room or laundry closet is another area where I constantly see one big white wire shelf. The shelf is usually too high to easily store laundry detergent and supplies.  Again, I suggest the shelf liner on the big shelf, but also a hanging shelf or a hanging basket can help to add reachable storage in the laundry room or closet.

If you are not able to replace these shelves with something stronger and more functional, try out some of these tips.  I hope that with these storage and organizing products, you will find it easier to access and store items on the wire shelving in your home.

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