Pimp my Cabinet

I know it's been over a month since I last posted.  But really, there's been nothing to post.  August in Wisconsin was unbearably humid.  The kind of weather where you can't even breathe outside and everytime you set out to do something you just turn into a slug.  I got a whole lot of nothing done.

It was too hot to be out in the garden.  So this is what I ended up with:

This is supposed to be two tomato plots, a raspberry bush, two separate flower patches, and a squash patch with beautiful grass paths dividing each.  The brown strip is my sidewalk that should be 24" wide, reduced to about 12 inches with all the overgrowth.  An urban jungle if ever there was one.  I was too hot to even go out and water.  But despite no water and the heat, I've had pretty good luck with just about everything I planted.

And my sewing room is upstairs.  I was infomred by my A/C man that my unit is too small to boost the cool air to the upstairs.  Since heat rises, it was to dang hot to be up there sewing.  Even though I wasn't up there working, my sewing room still turned into this:

Can you even spot the sewing machine in that whole mess?

But the heat finally subsided in time for my vacation and I managed to get some of the projects done that I've been putting off all through the heatwave.  Here's my first one:

I got this cabient from my friends Amy and Shane who rehab houses as a side business.  I had mentioned I was looking for a used cabinet to put on my enclosed back porch which is just off my kitchen.  My plan was to use it to store dishes and appliances that don't fit in my kitchen cabinets.  This was torn from a house they were working on.

Um, yea.  For now, it's doubling as a workbench for my miter saw.  My basement is a disaster.  As you see in this picture, the doors don't even close because there's so much crap in there.  Even worse...well...brace yourself for the inside view:

Yikes!  Everytime I go inside this thing, I have to prepare for an avalanche of dishes and appliances.  Time to pimp this cabinet! 

I have a lot of different sized cake pans, bundt forms, jello molds, tupperware, and holiday shaped cake pans.  The upper left is an attempt to stack all these but you can see how great that's worked.  I managed to find two pullout drawers for a buck a piece at the Habitat for Humanit ReStore.

Mounting them was easy-peasy.  After deciding to put one on each shelf, I just screwed the bases right into the main shelf. 

The the drawers slid right on.

I also have a lot of cookie sheets and cookie racks.  Those slide all over and are just a pain because they usually land up on the bottom of a huge pile of dishware.  I've even broken finger nails trying to separate them to pull one out.  A slash rack was the perfect solution for storing them upright - I can pull them out easier and I can spot each one easily.

I found some scrap wood and used L-brackets to attach one to the main shelf. 

I initially thought I'd need to make two, but one did the trick and left enough room in between the slash rack and the pull out drawer for two big appliances to sit.  The oblong pans nested nicely and also left room for two more bigger items. 

In the process of organizing, I even found four items to pack up for Goodwill.  I have two other casserole dishes I like already so I gave the peach one away.  I tossed the square cakepan because I can fit the same amount of batter in one of the many circle pans I have.  The cheesecake pan went because I have one that's almost similar that was a gift from Amy.  Why I have two , I don't know, but it was clearly time to clean because I also found TWO angel food cake pans.  I make angel food cake maybe twice a year so I hardly need two pans.  Geez!

The whole project took about 20 minutes.  Which is sad because I've been staring at this mess for two years!

When it was all finished this is what I ended up with this:

Isn't it beautiful?  The stuff I use most is near the front.  Less used stuff is in the back but easily accessible in the pullout drawers.  No heaping piles of dishes.  Here's an even better view:

Nothing like the  look of no clutter!  And now that I have organized my cabinet, I'm off to make a pie for the Conductor.