How To Organize Under The Kitchen Sink

Today I’m sharing how I organized the cabinet under my kitchen sink. If you’re house is anything like mine, or most folks for that matter, the kitchen is the busiest room in it! Being the hub of the home and such a hardworking room, every aspect of your kitchen will work best if it’s clean, organized and ready to do it’s job. I got the cabinet under my kitchen sink organized in well under 30 minutes, while keeping it super simple! I’m going to share my results with you, and some tips you might find helpful too.

Welcome to day 4 of the 4 Week Cleaning and Organizing Challenge! If you haven’t joined the challenge with Mom 4 Real and I yet, jump in now! You can can download or print the free Printable Cleaning and Organizing Checklist and read all about it [click here]. Our Checklist/Calendar lists all our upcoming projects and you can join in at any point. 

Our spaces are all going to be different, so we will require different tools and organizing solutions for our distinct spaces, but my goal in sharing my project is to inspire you! Especially if seeing tidy “after” pictures gets you motivated!

How To Organize Under The Kitchen Sink

• PLAN — HOW DOES YOUR SPACE NEED TO WORK: Even before you start cleaning and getting ready to organize, it’s good to determine exactly what you need your under the kitchen sink space to do for you? How do you need it to work? Because every kitchen and set-up is going to be unique!

• MEASURE & SHOP: Once you have your plan set, you can measure and shop for storage and organizing items that will best fit your needs and the space you have to work with. This includes shopping your home for things that might be a perfect fit and save you some money!

• CLEAN — START WITH A BLANK SLATE: I always remove everything from a space when I want to work on it. Clean your surfaces, let dry and apply shelf liner or even an under sink tray if desired (these can help prevent water damage in case of a leak).

• PURGE: I am a huge fan of purging. You don’t want to manage, organize and store things you do not use or need! That makes your job harder, your home unnecessarily full, and even costs more if you are buying organizers for things you don’t use or need. So cut deep and let things go that you don’t need or use. If they don’t belong in the kitchen, or under your kitchen sink. Re-home them.

• ORGANIZE: My personal goal in organizing my home is to actually have as little as possible to manage. The less you have, the less you have to manage. So try to keep it as simple as possible and only organize and store what you need on hand under your sink, and in your kitchen. 

• ORGANIZATIONAL ITEMS: I’m going to be sharing an array of organizing item as our Weekly Cleaning & Organizing Challenge progresses, many of which you can find in my Amazon Storefront [browse here] and at stores like Target, Walmart, Dollar Store, etc…

• SUGGESTIONS: I suggest hard surfaced organizers for under the kitchen sink. I love baskets as much as the next girl, but something that can be cleaned and sanitized is optimum. 

How I Organized The Cabinet Under My Kitchen Sink 

For me, I started by taking everything out of the space, and gave my shelf liner a nice wipe down. I’m going to be 100% transparent here and tell you that I bought new shelf liner. Something very muted & mellow. And then I realized that putting it in was going to be a problem. I had a knee replacement about 18 months ago and I’ve had a few challenges since. One being I can’t get on my hands and knees. So… my old Dollar Tree shelf paper stayed put! It’s a good thing it was still in perfect condition. Whew. Just sharing that in case your world isn’t perfect. Neither is mine 😉 

RETHINK THE RULES: There are no hard and fast rules as to what goes where in a kitchen. I knew that in my kitchen, I needed efficient storage for our trays, and cutting boards. Vertical storage was desired, but I had no where to do it. Or did I? Don’t forget to re-think your spaces and be open to shifting things around. I myself don’t store much under my sink, and found I had ample room to use a “pots & pans” lid organizer as an divider/organizer for our trays and cutting boards. It’s perfect for us!  And the cutting boards being right at the sink makes perfect sense. We use them so much, that having them right next to the dishwasher for quick unloading is nice too. 

When I mentioned that shopping for your organizers included shopping your home for things that might be a perfect fit and save you some money, I did just that. This project cost me zero dollars. Seriously, ZERO dollars!

I had something pretty specific in mind for my kitchen cleaning tools & supplies so I went through some things I had on hand and discovered a metal caddy with a wood handle that I picked up at least a year ago at HomeGoods. 

I love that it has divided sections, and it’s easy to get to. Plus, the handle makes it easy to grab and pop up on the counter. It’s got my ceramic cooktop cleaner, scrub brushes and a supply of sponges. Just enough, and not too much. Oh, and the small bottle of Palmolive I keep here because my mom won’t do dishes with anything else.  

The second smaller caddy holds my counter cleaners, my dish gloves. It is also white metal. That worked for me. Matches well enough and functions. Done. 

Something that I think makes people hesitate from starting an organizing project, is being intimidated by spaces they see that are almost too perfect. Inspiration is one thing, but it’s not helpful if it paralyzes you from beginning. You can use anything to start. You can use shoe boxes or clear Dollar Store bins.

Just the simple act of starting is beneficial. It doesn’t matter how much your organizers cost. I started very slowly and I’ve built and bettered my pieces a little at a time over the years. And sometimes a Dollar Store bin is still the perfect fit!

ON THE DOOR STORAGE: Going vertical with door organizers can utilize space that is otherwise lost, and is so vital for taking advantage of all possibilities, especially in small spaces or where storage is at a premium! This on-the-door storage was a happy accident. I don’t recall exactly what I bought this for, but I found it in the drawers with my Command product goodies. It’s perfect for holding our dishwasher pods without having to over-stuff the cabinet floor space, or resort to something more complicated than what I doing now with the two caddies. Because it holds so many, I was able to tuck my two bins of back-stock dishwasher pods into the back right corner of the cabinet. 

And that’s it! Neat, clean, tidy and totally functional. I was really happy I was able to use things I already had right here on-hand, as well as stick to my goal of having as little as possible under my sink. Having less is a driving force in all the projects on our Weekly Cleaning And Organizing Challenge for me.

It’s not about how much I can stuff in a space, it’s how little I can get away with having. I know that will be the key to future success and my spaces staying organized, neat and tidy for a long time to come! I so look forward to seeing YOUR spaces and I hope you are joining Jess and I over in the community Facebook group to share your projects and ask any questions we might be able to help with. xo Shan 

I’ve included convenient clickable shopping links below for you. Some may be affiliate links. Click here for full disclosure.

SOURCES:

• I had tremendous luck shopping locally at Fred Meyer, Bi-Mart and Walmart for the organizers I’m using for this series.

• Many of the items I used are also available in my Amazon Storefront [click to browse & shop here] if ordering online is more convenient for you! 

C L I C K   TO   S H O P

SOME OF MY FAVORITE CLEANING & ORGANZING FINDS

QUESTIONS about anything I didn’t mention? — leave a comment or email me at foxhollowcottage@gmail.com

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