CANNING CABINET WORK IN PROGRESS

Here is a new(ish) piece of furniture at the farm. I say newish because we already had it and were using it for something else that just wasn't working. 

So we decided to repurpose it. Well, by "we", I mean it was my idea to use it for something dedicated. 

We moved it into the dining room on a different wall than where it was.  We were using it for just a collection of extra stuff.  It's amazing how when you have space but don't really have a specific use for it, it just begins to hold random "stuff" without purpose. 

So we cleaned it all out...

     

Here it is after we emptied it out.  

It's a neat cabinet, a nice size and solid wood. When the doors are closed, it looks like a cabinet with separate upper and lower doors but they open the full length, which is kind of nice.  The only downside is the shelves are not adjustable, they are permanently attached.  So I guess I'll have to work with what I've got.  

So what are we going to use it for now?  Since we're going to be doing something different at the house in the next year or so, part of our plan is to make sure we have furniture that serves a specific purpose, in this house, in a different room or in a different house.  

The goal is to turn this into a "canning cabinet"!  I want to fill it with my empty jars, canning tools and accessories, rings and lids of course, even canning related cookbooks, etc. (I might even have a few canning themed dish towels, ha).  Right now, I'm making an inventory of what we have and getting it all together in one place.  This will make it easier to pack up if we have to move it into a new place later one.  Until then, we still need to make it look nice.

These are the jars that I used for the rings and lids a while back.  In hindsight, I kind of wished I had gotten colored jars instead of white (since it's a white cabinet) but hey, it is what it is.  I suppose I could paint the inside of the upper cabinet at some point.  That would work, right?  Or maybe even line it with wall paper or something?  I put them on the top shelf so they can be seen behind the glass.

There are two more empty "visible" shelves (behind the upper glass section of the doors) so I can use them for cookbooks (only have a few canning ones) and then maybe hang some tools or store them in a utensil holder of some sort. I can also keep pectin and other supplies like that in the upper portion.

These are the two shelves concealed behind the solid part of the doors.  There are most of the jars we have and my canning pot.  Inside the pot are some tools, etc.  It seemed like everything was scattered around the house in various locations, jars on the shelves in the mudroom, the canning pot in the kitchen, rings and lids in the storage jars on another shelf, etc and so now I'm just trying to get it all on the same place and then I can organize later.

I need to get some of those wire pantry shelves so that I can stack the jars.  If there are too many, I'll put as many as possible here.

It will be a great Summer project when at the farm and stuck inside due to the monsoon rain.

By the way, we got this at NADEAU, one of our favorite furniture stores. That's the National website link, for those in the Houston area, here is the HOUSTON NADEAU website. We don't get anything for mentioning them, but we like to call out our favorites in case someone might be interested.