Almost Kitchen Completeness!

First note:  We did finally get back one of our bids - and it was lower than what we were estimating!  Then we noticed it was missing a few things, so back to the drawing board for them.  But we did have a "Holy Crap" moment where we realized we might actually be able to afford this whole dream.
Then we started to look into storage units....the fun never ends here. 
We need storage for:

Several boxes from the kitchen ready to go somewhere....we're not sure if we want to get the garage sale stuff out of the house and just bring it back before the sale or what.  Tim still has to address our basement storage as there is a lot of items that can go.  And we actually do have a lot of basement closet storage to utilize so we'll see....something to ponder for the future if needed.

So where did all of these boxes get filled from??? May I present the before and after show:

We have a lot of glasses.  Ones that we never use, but have accumulated from beer festivals, Hard Rock Cafe's, sorority formals, college organizations, brewery tours, etc.  Tim is the only one that drinks coffee, very rarely at home and I drink hot chocolate during the winter - so apparently we needed 20+ coffee cups and random travel mugs as well.

So the cabinet was emptied, sorted, and refilled with this:

How about that!  There are still some pint glasses in there and our favorite mugs made the cut.  Wine glasses will probably take up the top right portion since they are in with our dishes currently.  Not everything went to the garage sale pile.  The "keeper" glasses are in a box - that will some day get opened when we have a bar in the basement.  Or give up and donate them to someones lake house or garage sale.  Maybe the shouse will be a "Man Cave" with "Ann & Tim GBS Formal" mugs in there.  The options are endless, but we couldn't part with all of them.

This cabinet is for baby/kids cups and dog medicine (top left - Gracie is 13 years old (91 in people years) so there are some vitamins and such to keep her going) baby food/bottles.

Made a little progress a couple weeks back.  I decided that sippy cups from 5 years ago needed to be trashed.  Emma would get the pleasure of new ones when it's time and it gets rid of the excuse for the girls to use them randomly.  A couple of Megan's favorite stayed just in case but everything else went to the trash.

This is what we are going with for now.  Dog items were gone through and consolidated to their own tote and take up a lot less space.  Still holding on to some fish items....but that could change if I get a whim.  So it's definitely better, but not great, but it's the stage of life we are in.  Some day, when we are bottle/sippy cup/baby food free we'll have 2 open shelves.....and we have about 3 more years until that will happen, at least with the Sippy cups.

This is the top of our refridgerator.  Craft items, Playdoh, candy bowl, grill set.  Enough said.

And here is the after.  Craft items went to the Baker's Rack (more organizing needed there).  Made a candy jar since I really wanted that bowl back as it's one of my larges plastic ones, and everything else (other than the fire extinguisher) found it's rightful home.  And there are cabinets back there!  Which have been cleaned out as well and the one on the right is empty.....for now.

Jar from Wal-Mart and some stickers I had since I'm all about the labeling now.  The jar top jingles though when you shut the fridge so I am going to have to do something about that before Tim throws it away from being annoyed with it.  Any advice would be welcomed on tips there - it's glass on glass now with a small lip on the top keeping it in place.

I did not take a before picture of this cabinet because I didn't think we would really do much with it.  I took out all the saucers and coffee cups that match our dishes (because we have 16 of those in addition to all of the other ones that we barely use).  They are marked for storage and someday might come out but for now were taking up space and accumulating dust with no potential use in the future.  So the Magic Bullet moved to the top, and the kids plates/bowls aren't stacked on saucers anymore.  The big girls use real plates now so those are just sitting around for Emma to use in the next couple of months and when friends kids visit.  Then someday we'll have more space...in 4 years or so.  Tim is trying to fit our new 14 cup food processor on the top shelf....not gonna happen.  So the top will remain empty for now.  The gravy boat, butter dish, and dip bowl will just hang out up there unless things get moved around.

So that pretty much wraps up the kitchen other than the pots/pans cabinet which is an ongoing "discussion" on what we need and don't need so that will happen later.  The pantry is a work in progress, still.  Everything else has been addressed.  Unfortunately that included the towl/washcloth drawer, and our storage container cabinet which I did not take before/after photos of - but they look fabulous!  Although the counters aren't much less cluttered and all of the progress is behind doors there is still a sense of more organization.

AND - Tim has given me permission to tackle this:

I "had" a pile, he still has a pile.  I am allowed to address this as long as it's not to girlie.  "None of that paisley crap, camo if you can find it or black."  So my search for coupons and good ideas/deals is on.

I have a goal of working on my closet and bathroom drawers for next weekend....but plans change.