Dishes Away

I've been thinking of getting rid of stuff and living a more "minimalist" life. Yesterday I started by cleaning out Corey's nightstand. I did that one first, cause it's always easier to see plainly what other people should clear out than looking at myself and all the stuff that I need to get rid of, huh! Well, doing Corey's night stand got me started and after that I was able to dejunk some of my stuff in our bathroom - I cleared out makeup that I don't or haven't used and some of my essential oils. So I didn't do much, but I made a dent in it. I still have a ton to do, but since I made a few steps in the right direction, I'll pat myself on the back for a job well done and will cheer myself on - "go me!"

This morning, upon seeing my kitchen sink, I was thinking again of how I need to implement more minimalism in my life. I was specifically thinking of the Minimal Mom. I was thinking of her advice on how to declutter the kitchen, cause we need to big time. I just rewatched it and laughed at her "dirty dishes" example cause it was one freaking pan!! I was inspired by seeing her kids washing their own dishes (at 1:40 and 2:38). If our family can do this, the dishes will not stock up, which would be great, because the kids don't have any dishes as their fall back plan! Seriously, they use so many dishes. Even when it's just for a drink of water, they'll come up and if the little plastic Ikea cups are gone, they'll grab an Ikea bowl, or a plate, or use the big dinner cups, or they'll break out the fancy dishes. We have enough dishes to last several days, which is why today is WEDNESDAY and I just barely washed dishes from SUNDAY and we've still all had plenty of dishes to use and get dirty and pile up during the ensuing 3 day lapse. And I also HAVE run the dishwasher several times these past few days. Sigh. Abi was commenting recently how the dishwasher isn't getting the cups clean. And I thought well, we're going to fix that! Cause we're going to start HANDWASHING! Yippie! OK - so her was my sink this morning: 

It is rather obscene, don't you think? So I've been working in the kitchen all day fixing this problem, hopefully for the last time. I obviously started a load, I did a lot of handwashing too. I got some boxes - two to fill up with things to donate, and others to store while we experiment with this. I am donating almost all of our storage containers, I'm just keeping two sizes with their lids, plus some ZipTops that Joseph got me for Christmas. I put away extra dishes that I like in some avocado boxes I grabbed at Costco yesterday.

I'm not donating these dishes yet but they are now boxed up and in the basement. And this is our new dish arrangement:

We've tried something like this two years ago, but now with "only eight" kids at home, and with other drawers freed up from donating their cluttering contents, I think we have a chance at making this work better than last time. And if it doesn't work and I want to go back to having a ton of dishes piled up, well hey, I can just go and bring all the dished back out of the avocado boxes in the basement. Here are the kids personal silverware on the right side there below -

The silverware was moved over from where they used to be on the kitchen island and I switched them with some family utensils (cooking, cutting, and serving things) which are now at the island along with the utensils for Corey and me.

We also have a pot of spatulas and whisks in a container next to the stovetop. I cleared out about half of those. Also, we had 5 can openers and I never knew which ones were good, but today I tried them all, and only one of them works and it works well, so that is in the drawer next to the measuring cups, yay! I am very pleased and am going to take a break to practice violin for a bit and then might go work some more. No wait! The next episode of The Chosen is on right now I think!! I'm going to go turn that on! Yay! Next on the dock for tomorrow: Laundry room, my bedroom desks, and I'll do a little bit in the basement too.