Ity Bity Kitchen

Today, I tackled the kitchen. We NEVER use the front door, except to check our mail. EVERYONE and EVERYTHING comes in the back door, which is the kitchen door.

With all the traffic that comes in through this area, also comes the dirt, so I am constantly vacuuming and moping this kitchen. 

There are a lot of weird things about this kitchen. First off we have the tiny hot water heater that was not properly vented when my husband first moved in. He had to fix that. The landlord supplied what he needed and she was very appreciative of his service. She had just bought this duplex, and it needed some work done to it. So this helped her out.

One other weird things is the washer hook up. Seriously? I'm not sure a washing machine would even fit there, lol.

When my husband first moved here, the fridge and stove were not in proper working order. Playing the part of a bachelor and not being home much, he never mentioned it to the landlord. When I got here, I NEEDED a fridge and stove/oven that worked....I like to cook, besides home cooking saves money and CALORIES.

Notice the bookshelf? I remember that from my childhood years. My dad made it and it is a very nice, sturdy bookcase, perfect for my cookbooks and other books we have here.

Again, I did not do much with this space, just used a lot of what I already had. I had made a wood wall hanging almost a year ago, and it fit perfectly over the washer hookup. Since we have three drivers and two cars, we are always playing musical cars, so I had painted a wood key hanger and put it in a central location. I added one other picture to that wall on a nail that was already there. Our landlord really doesn't want us putting holes in the walls, which I am having an issue with :P  Anyway, the picture I chose to put there is where we got married....The LDS Washington DC Temple. It is a reminder of our marriage covenants we made over 31 years ago.

I only have about 2 feet of counter space to do my cooking on, so the only thing I have on the counter are my knives. 

Not much cupboard space either, but I store some stuff over head. Mostly my Thirty-one thermal shopping bags.

Having a 72 hour emergency kit is very important. Even during our recent tornado clean up, I used it. We did not have to evacuate, but to save the food in our fridge from going bad, I chose not to open it and eat out of our emergency kit. It is now restocked and ready for the next time we may need it...hoping that will be never. It gets replaced every six months. This area kinda bugs me, but this is pretty much the best I can do. I have all my baking stuff...flour, sugars, chocolate chips, etc in the purple Thirty-one Square Utility Tote and Organizing Utility Tote. I find these bags great for storage.

We like to travel and when we do, we usually bring food to make sandwiches, etc on the way. That's why we have a couple of coolers, and they store nicely by the fridge along with my mop and broom.

The rugs I used at the sink and back door I brought from storage in Kentucky. This redo cost me ZERO. We do have to expand part of our kitchen into our living room. We have a small kitchen table where our microwave and small oven set. I tried putting that into our kitchen, but it was just too cramped. 

So, I guess my next room should be the living room? Hmmm....maybe? Not sure. This may take me some time to figure things out. Our living room is pretty much acting as a living room, bedroom, office, kitchen. blah! SO......my creative juices need to flow for awhile....