Pantry Makeover - Organized and Pretty - On a Budget

(After Photo)

I have to admit this was actually done by Christmas but I'm just getting around to posting it.  I've always been someone who likes everything organized and front facing but now it's even prettier.  At least I think so.  After seeing all the wonderful pantry makeovers, I decided mine could use a little primping.   Look at the photo below and you can see why.

(Before photo)

We have a little of everything in there.  Flashlights, tile, floor cleaner.  And worse of all, just plain ugly walls.

I didn't have a stencil so I printed the pattern I wanted off the Internet.  Pattern, ha!  It was more like just one of the Moroccan shapes.  After painting the walls and shelves, I traced each one of those little diamond looking shapes in pencil.  Yep, one-by-one.  This was no one night job people.  I traced and painted one section of wall between shelves each day.  I used a paint brush to paint traced pencil lines.

I put popcorn in one basket for easy access, I've got Ritz crackers in another (we eat lots of those).  I have the instant grits in a little wooden bowl.  The big strawberry basket holds my potatoes. 

In the spirit up up-cycling, I took my old glass spaghetti sauce jars, pickle jars or whatever other jars I had and gave them a makeover too.  First I had to get rid of the mis-matched look by spray painting the lids red.  Then I used my cricut to cut some labels out of chalkboard sticky paper.  That way I can just wipe the name off the container and re-write it when or if I change its contents.  I used some ribbon to style them up a bit.  I would like to get some square glass containers later but I think these came out cute and will do for now.

I keep the un-opened boxes of cereal on the top shelf and we put the open ones in plastic pour containers.

The big black thing on the wall is actually the electrical breaker box. It was that old battleship grey metal and I painted it with chalk board paint. Since it's metal, it's a great memo board that magnets stick to. At least now it can be put to good use and used jotting down notes or shopping list.

I used my hot glue gun to glue shells over all the screws that hold the electric box up.  I just did a center shell collage for fun at the top.

So now I have a new pantry to go with my rustic market pantry sign I made this week.  Click here to see the sign.

I bought the paper organizer that's on the door several years ago.  I think I got it at garden ridge, it was under $10 and it's been one of my favorite organizing items.  It holds plastic wrap, aluminum foil, and paper towels.  The wire basket is actually meant to hold plastic lids but I thought it would be perfect for the plastic Ziploc bags. 

We keep the cat food in a plastic laundry detergent bin.  Perfect for storage.

Well that's my newly improved pantry.  What do you think? Not bad for the cost of paint and some elbow grease.  It feels so good to have everything neat and clean.  And since I did this in December, I can tell you, it's stayed that way too.  I still like to just stand there and look at it sometimes.  At least one little corner of my world is organized.

Have a great weekend ya'll.

Hugs...Tracy ♥

I've add the links below to some of the fun parties I've join. 

Organizing My Out of Control Fabric

I will be so happy if I ever get that much promised craft/sewing room.  For the longest time I've had my fabrics just folded laying on the shelves.  But not anymore.

Yesterday and I do mean all of yesterday, I made mini bolts and folded fabric.  Really, there was a point where I questioned my sanity and thought I would never see the end of this project.

When I had the fabric originally stacked on the shelf it was a big pain in the butt.  Every time I wanted to look at the fabric I would have to pull it out and then every other fabric wanted to come with it.  It was almost impossible to keep it color organized, which I'm a little obsessive with in the closet too.

I was really surprised to find out how much less room this took up.  More fabric actually fit on the shelves.  This makes it so much easier to get to and to replace the fabric in it's perfectly colored spot.


To do this, I just started out by planning way too little time, but with my schedule of do whatever, whenever I was able to knock it out in one day.  I then took Fed Ex (shhh, don't tell them) boxes and cut into the height of my shelves and smaller then the width (remember fabric room) to make my bolts.  I then folded the fabric the appropriate height and wrapped it around the bolt.  For those big pieces, like the cowboy flannel sheet (I love recycling) I used 2 bolts and started wrapping with one bolt on each end and meeting in the center like a book.  Worked perfect.  So there you have it, one full day of fabric folding + one happy, more organized me = future easy-peasy crafting days.  AAAHHHH.


What have you been organizing lately?  
Have a blessed day y'all......Tracy :)

Quote of the day:

[Jesus said] " I am the vine; you are the branches.  If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit."

                                                     John 15:5

I've linked to the following parties: