Grand clear-out

It's that dead-of-winter, too-cold-to-go-outside kind of weather that brings out the urge to clear cupboards and refresh the house in anticipation of spring. Not for me so much, but my son, who loves nothing better than an orderly, impeccably tidy, aesthetically pleasing look to a room, both visible and hidden behind cupboard doors. How handy for someone who generally lives in organised chaos! My workspace is always littered with piles of papers and documents that, if I dared to rearrange or tidy up, would be lost forever in a file somewhere, never to see the light of day. My art studio has palette knives and brushes with paint on jumbled together in anticipation of inspiration. Tubes of paint are not in orderly drawers, colour coded and packed in neat lines. How awful that would be!
However, some areas do need organisation, and the kitchen is the best place. I returned home from shopping to find the kitchen looking like this:

It took a while, but after discovering useful pots, long-lost lids to unused Tupperwares, much-loved mugs from my long ago youth, and a multitude of useless (to me) knick-knacks and excess kitchenware, the cupboards were repacked with enough space to buy a whole lot of new stuff. Bags and bags of goodies went to Hospice where they will find happy homes, and glasses that had never been taken out of their boxes are now in use.

Best of all, an embarrassingly large number of expired foodstuffs have been assigned to their correct place! Who knew so many years could pass so quickly? Now I have to go out and get new ones - did you know mustard powder could expire?