Sorry for the interruption in posts. Hopefully you didn’t take it as an excuse to slack! Three kids and mostly solo parenting has left me with the 20 minutes to declutter but no time to blog.
How many spatulas do you really need? Our back-up spatula was a gift. It’s plastic and has had a few runs in with the hot side of a pan. It’s still in working condition but I just don’t need it working for me anymore.
Note: would you call the utensil you use to flip a pancake with a spatula? In the UK it’s called a turner. I think of it is a spatula but I would also call the utensil used for mixing a baking mix a spatula.
Task #2: donate unwanted and unused kitchen items.
The other things to go from my kitchen were a set of glasses that don’t fit in our dishwasher and some Pyrex containers. We have a microwave at the house we moved into this summer and so I don’t need as many oven safe containers. The glasses were falling over in the dishwasher and right now I’m keen to limit the number of dishes I hand wash.
Years ago I did a big kitchen purge and gave away a lot of gadgets. I simply didn’t use them enough to justify keeping them.
If you love fondue sets, cheese boards and browsing Williams Sonoma, you’re probably facing a big challenge with this task as I did back then. Take it slow. Every time you’re in your kitchen making a meal, look for one item you’re not using frequently and set it aside.
What about hobbies? Jo wrote quite poignantly about giving away her cake decorating tools. Life has changed and she no longer has the time, nor the inclination, to make cakes. If you haven’t made jam since the summer you bought those canning supplies you probably aren’t going to make jam this summer. If you do end up picking four flats of strawberries this June why not borrow a friend’s canning tools. It’s 2015: time to embrace the sharing economy.
Anyone decluttering like mad and on first names with the folks at the local Salvation Army? Some great stories on the Facebook page.
I edited my kitchen the same way recently. I’ve evolved from a “is this useful and do I like it” to “how many do I need”. Works for everything from spatulas to jeans to eye shadow.
I have several spatulas (both kinds) and wooden spoons and a few others large utensils in a jar on my counter. Every day, nearly half of them are in the dishwasher, so I am down to a good number. I did remove the ones I don’t use at least weekly, got rid of some, keep some in a drawer if I do need them sometimes.
We like the term “FLIPPER” as in a spatula that flips pancakes. And spatulas that scrape I now call Scrapper Spatulas. But, yes I think of them both as spatulas in my mind.
We’ve always called a turner a fish slice in my family, but my husband calls it a spatula. To me a spatula is a bowl scraper. Go figure!
I recently decluttered our cutlery & utensil drawer. A month on & I have not missed any of the duplicates I purged. Consequently it is much easier to put away & find things. Next up the Tupperware cupboard of doom!
What bugs me is when you want to buy, say a spatula or a spoon and they come in packages of two when you want only one. Wo needs two pressure gauges or two tweezers.
I have 2 turners and 3 wooden spoons (spatulas) – all different shapes. It might sound a lot, but I regularly use them all.
What needs to go are my boys’ art supplies. They are 11 and 8, and do not paint and use glitter etc anymore. So I’ll take the ‘art box’ into work, where I use it at times with my clients. I can always bring it home if the kids decide they need them for a project. …as the children grow my kitchen usage is changing too.
Okay here it is – oh boy am I going loopy?
I call it a spatula. Maybe it’s a UK regional thing?
We’re about to declutter our wedding china. We never use it. I’ll be posting about this soon.
I would love to know what you do with your wedding china!
I’ve been trying to figure out the best strategy for mine (and, hopefully, the way in which I can get paid the most for it). It seems that a LOT of people are downsizing their china and there is very little need for it. Best offer I got was from a high end consignment shop that would price my entire 8 place setting (27 piece) set of Wedgewood Wild Strawberry for something like $178.00. My share would be around 50%.
I’d probably be fine with one spatula (one turner and one bowl scraper) if I lived alone, but since I don’t, having 2 of each of each is nice.
I’m totally laughing out loud right now, because I finally gave up and purchased a few extra spatulas, and my life got SOOO much easier. I have been freed from the constant need to scrub them by hand when the one I need is dirty, because I now have enough to last between dishwasher loads.
I guess the lesson here is that the right number to have is the number you will regularly use!
But you bring up another interesting point – what you need is gonna change as your life changes, and that’s OK. For some reason that’s a hard lesson for me to learn, but I think I’m finally coming to terms with the fact that my kitchen usage is just gonna keep changing every few years, so I’ll need to change systems and purge or add things to keep up with what works.
So true: the right number for you is the one you will use regularly. I hand wash our spatula but it gets used a lot!
Not sure if I am losing the plot but cannot see where to add a comment without replying to you? It may be me, I’ve been away with the fairies lately…