Do you have good stuff in your kitchen cabinets that never gets used? For years, I had the very best intentions of using all the cool tools and gadgets in my kitchen. I had a good mixer, expensive flour sifter, a food processor, seal-a-meal, pressure cooker, George Foreman grill, trays, bar glasses, and many other nice items. Year after year my intention was to use the tools in my kitchen. No matter how hard I tried to follow through on this goal, I continued to use the tools I loved best. I gravitated to my hand chopper, my good knife, my old sifter, the BBQ, my old wine glasses and the same trays and serving bowls that are pretty and easy to wash and put away.
One day I decided to take inventory of my kitchen tools and gadgets. I was curious. How many items was I storing in my already cramped kitchen cabinets? I took everything I had good intentions of using, but never used, and put them on the counter top. When I looked over the pile of tools and gadgets I began to wonder what else was in my kitchen that I never used. I began cleaning out every cabinet. The wooden sticks to use on the BBQ I had been storing for over 10 years. Why? Because I was always “going to use them.” I had cinnamon sticks “because my mom and grandma had them in their kitchens.” I had 4 aprons someone made me. I kept them because someone made them for me. I had new pot holders for right handed people. I am left handed. I had cloth napkins in colors from the 90’s and I now hated using mauve.
As I started piling things up, I started feeling very emotionally heavy. I was drowning in stuff. I usually have no problem giving to charity. In fact I always have a charity box in the garage ready for delivery every time it gets full. But, for some reason I didn’t want to give my treasures away to charity. Emotionally, I wanted this stuff. Analytically, I knew it was weighing me down.
I decided to ask my friends if they wanted or needed some of my kitchen tools and gadgets. Turns out my friends had items in their kitchens they no longer wanted and never used. We decided to have a “Kitchen Downsizing Party.” Everyone brought over their “extras” and we had a wine and dessert party. We put all our kitchen tools and gadgets on a table for review. We socialized, drank wine and had dessert. We talked about how we should divvy up the stuff. We decided to pick a number from a hat and as your number came up you picked one item off the table. We went round and round until everyone was finished picking. Later, people could swap with one another if they wanted to. Everything left on the table at the end of the evening went to charity the very next morning.
We had a beautiful evening socializing with friends, drinking wine, and eating dessert. We got rid of gadgets and tools from our kitchens that were not being used and got new tools and gadgets we wanted to try out. We also made a huge donation to charity and that made us all feel great because emotionally we knew it was time and OK to part with our unused kitchen wares.
