Garbage Bag Re-Org

Brilliant Idea!

At this point, I'm sure you're aware that my life is in complete and utter disarray. My under sink cabinet in the kitchen is no exception! It's basically a catch-all for anything and everything, including those dastardly plastic grocery bags. Isn't this 2012? Don't I have reusable grocery bags? The answer is yes! I have so many reusable grocery bags that I could make another one of these kleenex boxes to contain all of them! But that's another issue entirely. In all honesty, the reason I have so many plastic bags is because I'm an impulse buyer. Initially I go into the grocery store with the intention of buying one small item (why would I bring my reusable grocery bag when I could simply fit that ONE SMALL ITEM into my purse, right?)...and then at the end of the trip, I have a cart full of ridiculousness, which wouldn't even fit into my Mary Poppins purse if I tried. Thus, my endless supply of plastic grocery bags. Make sense now? Hardly an excuse, I know...but this is my life.

So now that I've explained myself, you'll understand why my under sink cabinet looks like this:

Gross!

When I saw the kleenex box photo above on Pinterest, I was instantly inspired to transform my under sink cabinet from kitchen hazard to kitchen harmony. I clicked on the pin to find that there weren't really any instructions (although I figure they just wanted you to stuff the bags in the open slot and be done with it.) I knew that if I was going to spend the time and effort pulling these bags out from that hellhole, I might as well do it right! I flattened each one out and folded them in half, then rolled them one in to the other to create an almost "baby wipes" type of effect (when you pull one out, another one follows, ready for it's turn). This is what it ended up looking like.

A little extra work at the beginning will pay off at the end I hope...?

I repeated this until all the bags had disappeared from the cupboard. YES! I shoved my bag roll into the kleenex box opening, et voila!

Now I had to move on to mounting this sucker to the inside of my cabinet door. The blog suggested that I use thumbtacks on the inside of the box, but I wasn't keen on putting holes into the doors (even if it was on the inside). I did, however, have some double sided tape, so I made a big square outline along the backside of the box and presto-chango, I had a lovely, recycled plastic bag holder!

Ingenious!

Ten minutes later, the double sided tape was no match for the weight of the bag holder. I knew it seemed too easy! I might have to go against my better judgement and just put some thumbtacks in...but I'll think about it a bit and see if I can come up with an alternative.

I showed my husband and he thought it was great (of course, he laughed at me initially because he knew that I'd been trolling Pinterest...), but he came up with a good point. What happens when you get another bag? Crap! I hadn't thought of that. If I'd stuck to the original blog's instructions, I could just stuff bags in at any point, but because I tried to be neat and tidy, that wasn't going to be the case. I think I'll just start to keep a new plastic bag roll and switch it up when the old one is done...(otherwise read as, stuff the bags under the counter until it gets crazy again...then I'll try this again? LOL!) We'll see!

Shout Out:

Find other cool DIY tips and projects (like this one) at The Family Handyman