Welcome to Day 14 of my month long series “How to Organize Your Kitchen Frugally in 31 Days”. Every day during the month of October I will be sharing an organized space in my kitchen with you. My goal is to inspire you and give you ideas on how you can organize your kitchen.
If you missed it, you may want to read why I’m embracing my outdated kitchen. It might give you a little perspective on why the pictures of my kitchen organization won’t be “magazine worthy”, but helpful for real life organization.
Today I’m showing you how I organize cookie sheets, baking pans, regular and mini sized muffin pans, and stoneware.
I used to keep my cookie sheets and stoneware in the drawer under my oven. But it was always a pain to unstack them every time I needed a pan.
Since that drawer isn’t very deep, I had to keep my bakeware and muffin pans in the back of another cupboard which wasn’t ideal. I wanted to keep them all in one place near my oven (in my Cooking Zone).
Then one day I had an idea. I realized that the small cupboard next to my dining room door was a forgotten place. I was using it to store large pots and few things I clearly didn’t use very often. After cleaning it out and doing a little rearranging, I came up with a solution that works great!
****Note: Part of this solution may not work for you, especially if you have beautiful new cupboards. I don’t, so I wasn’t too worried about “ruining” them if my plan didn’t work. My goal in sharing this is to give you ideas that might work for you.
The first thing to do when organizing a space is to purge what you don’t need. I moved my crockpot out of the drawer next to my oven and away from my cooking zone since it doesn’t have to be used right by the oven. Then, I put my large pots in the drawer. Voila! Empty cupboard, ready for organization.
I found this cookie sheet organizer at a thrift store for about $1 and it fits perfectly in this narrow cupboard. You can find a similar organizer here (affiliate link).
Here is the part that may or may not work for you. I wanted to store my baking pans on their sides in this “new” organizer, but the existing shelf in this cupboard was too low. Instead of cutting the shelf, I decided to put it in our garage just in case I didn’t like the idea after living with it for a while. I guess it’s time to get rid of it, because it’s been working wonderfully for months now. I wish I had done this sooner!
I asked my hubby to cut a “shelf” for me out of plywood. It’s not the prettiest sight, but it’s hidden away in that small cupboard, so no one ever sees it but me.
I didn’t want the shelf to come all the way to the front of the cupboard so it would be easier to slide my baking pans in an out more easily. We used some scrap wood to make the shelf supports and screwed those into the existing cabinet.
When we made the shelf, I deliberately planned on it being shallow, but still deep enough to hold my muffin tins and 9 x 13 metal pans. These are not pans I use every day, but they are SO easy to get to now when I need them!
I didn’t want to screw the organizer into the floor of my cupboard, so I just set it near the front. It’s been working great. The weight of all the pans holds it in place even if I’m taking one out. I also discovered a neat little place to store my ginormous cutting board that I use once in a while.
If you own stoneware, you’ll understand why my pans look so “dirty”. They’re not dirty – just seasoned (a.k.a. loved). 😉 It’s also a very good idea to store stoneware on its side to prevent cracking since it is so heavy.
Now I have a super functional, easy to access storage cupboard for my baking pans. And the best part is – the whole project was nearly free!
Tomorrow I’ll show you what I did to store my large stand up mixer.
Ginny,
I have had to remove shelves that have gotten in the way…I just drop them down to the bottom of the cupboard and that way, if I do need them again, they are right there but out of the way if I do not.
I am really enjoying this series! Keep up the good work on getting me organized!
Great idea, Laura! Thanks for sharing it – I’m sure it will be helpful to lot of people!
What a great idea! When we redid the kitchen, I copied a cookie sheet storage cabinet that my sister had and put one in ours. It’s small, but does the trick. I think I will clean it out and use it just for the super flat things like cookie sheets, cutting boards, pizza pans, and . Moving the muffin pans to the baking section might be a better place, since it’s a pain to remove them from cookie sheet cabinet where they are stored now. Who knows…I might even bake more! Thanks again for the inspiration to move things around to be more useful. By the way, I didn’t know about storing the stoneware on it’s side. Hmmm…will have to find a solution for that now…
It’s fun to think of new ideas to make life simpler, isn’t it? Enjoy figuring out your plan. 🙂
Thanks so much for sharing! I have an old kitchen and this idea would work perfect for me. 🙂 I have an old file folder holder (very similar to the cookie sheet holder to linked to) that would work great.
Great! Way to use what you have. 🙂
Just wanted to say I have really enjoyed your Organize your Kitchen posts! I moved my muffin pans and smaller cookie sheets to a cabinet beside the stove instead of stacked in the bottom drawer of the stove and love it! It is so much easier to grab the one you need! Thanks for all the great and frugal ideas 🙂
You’re welcome, Jamie! I’m glad to know my tips have inspired you! 🙂
Where can I buy the 7 inch cookie sheet storage rack?
We did the same thing to our cupboard, and it was actually my hubby’s idea to tear the shelf out 🙂 I’m hoping to get an organizer to keep them all upright so it’s easier for my kids to put the pans away; if it was just me putting them away, I wouldn’t mind having to move the pans over every couple days when I bake, but my 3 year old isn’t quite that strong yet. I love the idea of putting in a shelf again, just higher up! I’ll have to see if that’s feasible in our cupboard 🙂
Ooh – great minds think alike! I hope it works for you! 🙂
Thanks for this suggestion Ginny! We have an older kitchen and I don’t even want to think about the cost of tearing everything out and starting over, but the cabinets cause me considerable frustration when I want to organize them.
This was my husband’s weekend project and I am so excited to have my pans organized this way. Not only does make my pans all lined up and easy to access, but it also emptied out the drawer under my oven. It’s actually a warmer drawer that I was never able to use because I had to move all the pans! Since our microwave died almost a year ago and we never replaced it, the warmer drawer is a handy tool to have!
I’m so happy to hear that it worked for you! Thanks for letting me know. xoxox
I saw on Pintrest you can make a really inexpensive cookie sheet divider by using spring tension curtain rods. You put them vertical from the bottom of the cupboard to the top. You would need about 2 or 3 deep about 6 inches deep.
I’ve seen that, too, and it’s a great idea! I couldn’t do that because the top of my cupboard is open to the drawer above it. Thanks for sharing though because it may be helpful to people with different cupboards! 🙂
What is stoneware? And my hubby is not handy and we live in an apt. (No yard or garage) Can i get a plywood shelf at Lowe’s or have them cut one for me? What is the thickness of ur plywood? My dad made me a plywood shelf at my last apt. (Same complex so we have the same kitchen) but all my wood things and plastic things in my doublewide shelf (i only have one base cabinet!) And in my doublewide draw got moldyy from the humity here (i live in new england) and i threw the shelf away (the cupboard came with a half shelf).how can i stop that from happening again? We do not have a/c.
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I like how you added a top shelf! I have one VERY narrow, but tall, cabinet. It is only about 7 inches wide so it is frustrating. I currently have my narrow indoor electric grill, the baking sheets I use for bacon, an old glass microwave turntable (for use with pizza) stacked on their sides. This is better than when they were all stacked on top of each other in another cabinet. But, this cabinet is so narrow I can’t find an organizer to separate the items AND I’m wasting the space at the top where I would like to place a couple other items. (I, too, have a drawer on top.) I would love to add a shelf like you did, but I can’t afford to even lose the inch or two in width that the supports would take up. What to do?
I’m curious what you use the drawer under your oven for? It is intended for cookie sheets and cake pans …