I was tickled when I read on Tammy’s blog that this week’s kitchen tip didn’t have to be a tip at all, but rather, a request for one. I am declaring the month of January the month of the kitchen, which means I’m going to work on making my kitchen what I really want it to be–organized, efficient, comfortable, pretty, and clean. Steady Eddie and I did some major overhauling of a few of the cabinets during his Christmas vacation, but it is still far from where I want it to be. One of my biggest problematic areas is the pantry:
The pantry (this is only the upper portion; the bottom now holds large containers and small appliances) is deep so that packages of snacks, bags of chips, etc. easily get lost back there. There is really no organization to it at all. What I really need is some way to organize the little containers of things that get lost so easily, as well as make the pantry easier to see into somehow. It’s at just about eye-level, so looking into the back of it is impossible without standing on a chair.
The other most problematic area is the gadget drawer:
It is just a hodge-podge of measuring spoons, a small cutting board, a grater, a couple of small strainers, mixer attachments, etc. I envision putting my measuring spoons into some sort of container (maybe a little tray or something), but I really have no idea how to go about organizing the rest of the stuff. As you can see, both areas need help!
So this is my question: what suggestion(s) do you have for me in making these two areas of my kitchen both more efficient and more organized? I am open to anything within reason (‘though I already know that getting rid of the junk food in the pantry cabinet would half-way solve my problem!)
Are you a whiz in the kitchen? If so, head on over to Tammy’s blog to offer your help to other bloggers!
I was busy in the kitchen tonight baking and cleaning and listening to the radio. The song “Breath of Heaven” came on, and since I had no distractions, I was able to listen to the words for the first time. Once again, there into the dishwater, I shed a few tears. Why is it that God so often seems to speak to me while I’m washing dishes? The challenge of modern parenting seems to be a theme here on my blog, and while I have very compliant children by all standards, I will admit that being a good mother occupies more of my mental time and energy than anything else. The lyrics of this song really spoke to me and the inadequacy that I so often feel for being the mother my girls need me to be. For a moment, I was able to peer back through time and realize that Mary, Jesus’ mother, probably felt all the inadequacies I also feel. Sure, she might not have had to worry about the influence of popular culture, technology, etc., but she, after all, faced the daunting task of raising the Son of God. I loved hearing what might have been Mary’s own heart cry in the lyrics of this beautiful song:
Synopsis: Vahan Kenderian, the son of a wealthy and influential Armenian, never expected his life to be anything less than it had been for his first twelve years: one of privilege and happy times, with his father a stabilizing force; his mother, a doting parent who indulged him; and his many siblings, playmates who provided a never-ending amount of camaraderie and amusement. However, due to the changing political climate in his homeland of Turkey during World War I, Vahan embarks on a journey that can only be described as a nightmare: his father disappears, two of his brothers are shot in the presence of him and his remaining family, his grandmother is murdered by a Turkish soldier, one of his sisters commits suicide rather than fall into the hands of the Turks, and he and his next older brother are forced to abandon their mother and only living sister to avoid the fate of their father and brothers. All of this happens within a two or three day span at the beginning of the novel. What follows is a heart-wrenching account of one boy’s personal experience during the Aremenian holocaust. Vahan is forced to beg, become the servant for a Turkish governor known for his brutality towards Armenians, and masquerade as a deaf mute boy and live among the Turks. He finally finds love and contentment in the home of an Armenian doctor, only to have the promise of the future stripped away through the death of the girl he loves and the woman who became like a mother to him. Through it all, Vahan survives and learns to have, as his father had always admonished him, ”steel inside [him] that made it possible for [him] to get out of that bed and pretend [he] was [himself],” despite all he experienced and suffered. 
