Organize Everything - The Fridge

Hi guys!  I hope you are all having a good week.  I am continuing on with my kitchen organization and tackling the fridge today.  For those of you that have been reading for a while, you might remember this post where I was wishing for a new stainless steel fridge.

Well, the fridge didn't end up breaking down but our oven did.  And since we were out getting a new oven, I thought we might as well get a new fridge to match.  Matthew's school was in need of a fridge so it was good timing for everyone!

Our fridge space in our kitchen is rather small and, since taking out cabinets was not an option, our fridge choices were rather limited.  If we wanted to stick to a bottom freezer {which I did!}, we had our choice of about one fridge.  At least it made the decision making process easy!

So the fridge arrived and I was surprised to find out that it wasn't magnetic.  Um, aren't all fridges magnetic?  Connor was devastated to learn that his magnetic fridge toys had to be relocated to another location but I must say that I do not miss that Leap Frog alphabet song being played over and over again.  The Word Whammer served its purpose well and has taught both the boys their letters and sounds but its time was up!

The fridge front was looking a little plain so I brought out my Silhouette and dressed it up with a little vinyl.

Now...moving on to the inside of the fridge.  Organizing your fridge is all about maximizing the space that is available to make your food more accessible {think 2 week old leftovers shoved into a back corner} and prolonging the shelf life of the items stored.  The layouts of each fridge can be very different depending on what style you have, but here are a few tips to get you going.

• Remove all the items from the fridge and wipe down shelves.  Remove and wash any bins.  
• This should be obvious, but throw away all expired food items or items that will not be consumed before they are expired.  
• Sort your items out into groups such as produce, meats, breads, condiments, etc. Bins are great ways to organize similar food items together and make it much easier to find what you are looking for.  I picked up a few bins at Walmart for our bread items {bread, buns, pitas, tortillas, etc} and other jars/small containers. 

• I have read that the bottom shelf is usually the coldest but I think this varies from fridge to fridge.  In our last fridge, the top shelf was always the coldest and we had difficulty storing items here without them freezing.  Maybe this has something to do with where your freezer is located in relation to the fridge?
• Using white vinyl, I labelled our drawers for Proteins {My hubby is a vegetarian so a lot of our protein is not actually "meat"}, Fruits, and Veggies.  I think this would look really nice with the Silhouette frosted glass vinyl as well but I couldn't find any locally and was too impatient to order some in.  

• I also labelled the Cheese cubicle in the fridge door.

• Store items as much as possible in see through containers to make things easier to find.  
• Store your most used condiments in the fridge door {You can use the bins to store the remainder of them in the fridge}

• I store all my large drink items in the fridge door as well.  I have heard that it is best not to store milk here due to variable temperatures but my milk is always cold and I have never had any problems with it.  
• Bins can work well in the freezer as well to sort out your items.  My freezer has a little pullout drawer on the top fro smaller items and the ice trays.

• I couldn't do a fridge posting, without sharing one of my favorite little kitchen gadgets.  I got this for Christmas a couple of years ago but have seen them at Home Sense and Safeway.  It's a little topper to go on your frozen food bags such as peas and corn.

• The grey part comes out and you wrap the top of the bag over it.  Then you stick on the green part and you have a nice sealed bag with a little pour spout.  No more peas and corn all over the bottom of the freezer!

And here is the rest of the freezer.  I love how it came with a divider to create two bins.

Well, hopefully that helps you out.  Let me know if you have discovered any other great fridge organizing tips.  If you need to get caught up on the other kitchen organizing posts, the medicine cabinet can be found here and under the kitchen sink can be found here.  Next up, the cupboards!

I linked up with Chic on a Shoestring, The CSI Project, The Thrifty Decor Chick, I Heart Organizing, Tip Junkie, Tatertots and Jello, 30 Days, Fingerprints on the Fridge, 504 Main, Somewhat Simple, My Uncommon Slice of Suburbia, The Stories of A to Z, Today's Creative Blog, Skip to My Lou, Ask Anna, Craft-O-Maniac, Young and Crafty, The Girl Creative, The DIY Project Parade, CRAFT, The Creative Crate, I Heart Naptime, Under the Table and Dreaming, Be Different Act Normal, Whipperberry, At the Picket Fence, The Shabby Nest, Lil Luna, Org Junkie and  Blue Cricket Design.