How to Organize Your Kitchen Cabinets to Prepare for the Holidays

It’s time to prepare a holiday dinner for 12, and you can’t find your favorite hand mixer. 

You check cabinet after cabinet, only to be met with a disorganized stack of dishes and piles of cookware that make it impossible to find what you’re looking for. 

At Cardinal Cabinets, we know that an organized kitchen is essential for hosting or entertaining during the holidays. 

Make it easy to find everything you need for your holiday gatherings by devoting an afternoon to organizing your kitchen cabinets. Follow this guide to get started.

Remove Everything From Your Cabinets

First, remove every single thing from all your cabinets. Your kitchen will feel like a disaster area for a couple of hours, but there are a few reasons that completely emptying your cabinets helps the organizational process.

By taking everything out, you can see exactly what you have. This makes it easier to identify duplicates or things that you don’t use.

Empty cabinets are much easier to clean. Begin by vacuuming your cabinets to remove crumbs, hair, and debris.

Then, clean and wipe your cabinets’ interior. If needed, replace the shelf liners. 

Decide What to Keep (and See What’s Missing)

Now that your cabinets are clean, turn your attention to everything you just removed. Get rid of anything you haven’t used in six months (or a year if the item is seasonal).

Have duplicates of some items that you don’t need? Donate or dispose of the extra ones. Throw away anything that’s falling apart or breaking.

Once you’ve pared down your kitchen supplies, see if there’s anything that you’re missing. Maybe you need to buy a new pot or invest in extra dishes for your holiday dinner. 

Keep any items that you need to purchase in mind as you move to the next step. 

Figure Out What Goes in Each Cabinet

Decide what you want to keep in each cabinet, and make sure that the placement of your kitchen items is functional.

If you’re purchasing replacement pieces or adding a few new kitchen essentials, see that you save some space for these items. 

Put baking sheets, casserole dishes, pots, and pans in the cabinets near your stove and oven.

Any kitchen appliances that your house in your cabinets should be stored near the location where you use them. 

Stow your food storage containers near your sink and dishwasher so that you can quickly store your leftovers when you’re cleaning up after a meal. 

Invest in Cabinet Organizers and Shelves

Now that you know what will be going in each cabinet, decide what kind of cabinet organizers and shelves you need to make it easier to find what you’re looking for or to quickly access your desired item. 

Adjustable cabinet shelves are a smart way to maximize the amount of vertical storage space in your cabinets. 

Then, you can store items where they’re easy to find without having to nest them or stack them so high that it’s hard to get to the items at the bottom. 

If you find that you avoid using certain dishes or small appliances because they’re too heavy to maneuver, purchase pull-out cabinet organizers. 

When you need to grab a heavy item, just slide the organizer out so it’s easier to access. 

Lids for pots and pans are an item that’s notoriously difficult to organize. Add a lid holder to a cabinet so that you can organize your lids by size. 

This also makes it much quicker to find that lid you’re looking for when you’re cooking.

Identify Any Remaining Cabinet Needs

When you’re organizing your cabinets, you may realize that your cabinets just don’t meet your needs. 

Maybe your cabinets’ layout isn’t functional for entertaining or perhaps your cabinets aren’t large enough for some of the items that you need to store.

Or, you might want to add more cabinets to your kitchen so that you have more storage. 

At Cardinal Cabinets, we offer a variety of cabinet styles and designs. 

Our team can help you design an entirely new layout that’s better suited to your culinary needs, or we can assist you with replacing or adding cabinets so that you have more functional storage space. 

Remember, a cabinet upgrade doesn’t have to mean replacing all your cabinets. 

Some homeowners choose to replace only the top cabinets. This allows for an updated look with more functional storage space without having to tear out your kitchen counters. 

Ready to revamp the cabinets in your kitchen? Contact Cardinal Cabinets today for a free estimate!