How I Organize My Spices

Today’s post is yet another “helpful post”. It’s not necessarily filled with beautiful, jaw dropping pictures, but rather the simplified take on exactly how I organize my spices. In comparison to blog land with most people creating fancy labels, removing the “ugly” items and adding a whole lot of staging, my take is, well, simple. 

I find myself leaning more and more to this as I do projects and decorate our home. I’m not sure what it’s all about, but I just know I want one thing, and that’s simplicity. That doesn’t mean simple can’t be beautiful, but it also doesn’t mean every entire space, nook and cranny in our home has to be completely decked out just “because of the blog”. I’m not here to make you feel like your closets, cabinets, etc., need to be decorated. I don’t ever want to make you feel inferior, and things like that can do it. If we let it, something like that really makes you question every ounce of your being. That’s not what I’m here for, but rather to share who we really are, what our home really looks like, and what our spice cabinet looks like were you to come for a visit and decide to open the drawers. 🙂

No staging. No fluffing. No removing the ugly. 

And while I find myself also craving the “simple” style for our home, I’m also craving it from others. In the beginning, I was infatuated with entry way closets that looked like they were an actual mudroom, wallpaper installed in closets, drawers, baskets, etc. I loved seeing how amazing such a simple space could be… and I still do. The difference, is that I now know what’s important and what’s not. In real life, I really don’t want to have a drawer with wall paper, matching baskets, matching accessories, or coordinating colors. I’d rather put my money into something else. As soon as I would see an image of a highly organized and staged linen closet, I would look at mine in total disbelief. I’d agonize over the loss because my closet didn’t look that amazing. I’d stew over it, open the closet and think “well, this is a worthless space in comparison…”.  

But that’s just the thing. Who wants to compare linen closets? And why should we even want to? Life is not about pretty linen closets.

I feel like I’m a rebel just for showing you how I organized my spice cabinet. But, just like in real life, I am a rebel. I like doing things differently. So, in retrospect, my spice cabinet is being a rebel too! Ha!

Without further ado, and before I go on a complete tangent (more than what I’ve already done), let’s take a peek at my spice cabinets.

When looking at our kitchen, you may have noticed the two skinny drawers we have on either side of our cooktop…

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When we were designing the kitchen, I really liked the idea of having a designated spice cabinet. We also just happened to have the extra room in the cabinet design, so we paid a little bit extra and went with the spice cabinets. Knowing how much I love to cook and bake, it wasn’t a hard decision, and I absolutely positively love having a “space” for my spices. We don’t have a lot of upper cabinets, so that was out of the equation. And while we do have a large pantry, I didn’t really love the idea of packing spices back and forth. So, the spice drawers have worked brilliantly for the past couple of years. But, a problem has arose…

I buy most of my spices in bulk at Sams and Costco. Those big bulky containers don’t even come close to fitting in my spice rack, so our pantry has been filled with these containers. And what do you think happened? 

I was lugging all of those containers to and from the kitchen every time I used them. Silly Shayna.

So, I went on the hunt for something that would work. I wanted something that would fit in our spice drawers, but still have the ability to hold a large amount of the spices. Enter in these jars from IKEA. 

I bought mine in store, but they have them on amazon too! Love that, especially since our closest IKEA is 4+ hours away. I’ll definitely be ordering more of them online. 

They’ve probably sat empty for about… a year. Exactly. I was nothing but efficient! 

I had things all mixed together, so on one shelf you’d find poultry seasoning, ground cloves, ground ginger, and poppy seeds.  I knew where everything was, but it needed some TLC. 

I also realized I had several unopened containers of the same thing. Ha. No wonder these clear jars were calling my name the other morning. No doubt, I’ve spent more time thinking about doing this, than it actually took me to do it. 

First things first, I cleaned out the drawers, and started diving the spices into sides…

Then, I started filling the jars. To label them, I used my trusty black chalk marker. If you don’t have one of these, I highly recommend you get one. I use mine all the time. 

As I filled them, I wrote down what went into each jar. The chalk marker makes it really easy to wash and change up. Just wipe them down with water and you’re good to go! 

I spent a bit more time organizing them too. I really didn’t want to continue with the random theme. The left drawer was designated my “baking” side, and the right is more for cooking. 

I did have to mix and match the baking side with a few more cooking things… my other side filled up faster! 

And rather than organizing everything alphabetically, which I really thought about doing, instead I did it based on use. I have certain spices I like and use all the time, so they went on the top shelf. On the bottom, I used the glass jars to hold bulk spices and extra things. I really do love these little glass jars.

The lids aren’t metal, but are plastic. They seal really well, and I love that the opening is big enough to easily use my measuring spoons. Before, I’d pop the lid off of any spice I need to use, and it took a little bit extra time. Now, I can easily twist off the lid and get to work. 

Another thing I love, is that I can still easily dump in my ingredients. I have several recipes I’ve either made up, or learned from my momma. We cook as we go, so a little of this, a little of that, and before you know it, it’s all amazing and it tastes different each time I make it. Haha. In fact, every time I think of sharing some of our favorite recipes on the blog, I’m reminded that I’ll actually have to make it and use real measurements. I’ll work on that, because several of our favorites are entirely made up. 

But now that my spices are all organized, I might have the perfect excuse to do it! 🙂 

So, there you have it… our organized spice drawers. Such a simple and rewarding project. Next on my list, is the laundry room cabinet. We’ll see how soon I actually get to it. Hopefully it doesn’t take me another year…