Cups, plates, and bowls, oh my!

My husband and I have quite the collection of cups, plates, and bowls in our kitchen. We started out with a normal amount of plates and bowls - well, about 12-16 place settings that we inherited from my grandparents when we got married. As for cups, we started out with those my husband already had and a few of my own. Over the years, kids' place-settings have been added to our collection in addition to many (and I do mean many) mugs and other types of cups. Sometimes I feel as though the cups are multiplying in our cabinets at night. Do you have the same problem?

Here are the steps I'm taking to get these dishes under control:

Step 1: Pull those cups, plates and bowls out of the cabinets.

Step 2: While everything is out, I may as well do a quick swipe of the shelves to clean them up a bit.

Step 3: Make three piles - keep, give away / garage sale, and throw away. We often end up with tons of plastic kid's cups from restaurants and mugs from various places. Plastic cups can often be used for other purposes such as scoops for pet food, cat litter, or potting soil. They can also hold screws and nails in the garage. Any plastic cups that we don't currently have a use for will be recycled (if it's recyclable), saved for garage sales, or thrown away. Those extra mugs we have laying around will be either sold at a garage sale or taken to a thrift shop. Since we still have young kiddos in our house, we'll have to find room for their plastic plates and bowls for now.

Step 4: Now that we've gotten rid of all of those extra cups and/or dishes, there will hopefully be plenty of room for what we have decided to keep. Look at everything you have and, like with the refrigerator and freezer, try to picture where you would like everything. If you plan it out, you hopefully won't have to pull everything back out to rearrange it so it will all fit. Which shelf will be for each item type? Keep in mind who will be needing to reach the dishes.

Step 5: Time to get all of those dishes put back away and enjoy your work!

Today's task: de-clutter and organize those cups and dishes, make a commitment to maintain those cabinets