This Unexpected Dollar Tree Find Will Help You Save Major Kitchen Space

Clutter is the enemy of kitchen happiness, and disorganization is the enemy of productivity. But it somehow manages to simply accumulate endlessly in the kitchen, in particular. Because this room is where many of us spend the most time, it's where mail stacks up, and recipes, takeout menus, coupons — even your kids' field trip permission slips that appear during morning breakfast — rush. All of it steals precious counter, cabinet, and drawer space, clogging up how fast you can accomplish tasks and get to the fun part of your day. Luckily, there's an easy, fun, and super cheap solution right at Dollar Tree: Teaching Tree Storage Pockets.

One of the many kitchen organization game-changers you can buy at Dollar Tree, this $1.25 item can hang over chairs or on the wall. Instead of having a junk drawer that stresses you out every time you open it, you can neatly organize recipe cards, menus, coupons, forms, receipts, shopping lists, bills, and more in one place. You can see everything in it easily, so you never lose track of anything, and it's a central location where you can quickly grab whatever you need in the moment. You can also buy fun stickers or create your own labels to assign different pockets, so everyone in the house remembers where they should place and can find various things. In addition to the necessities of the paper variety, you can dedicate a pocket to keys if the kitchen is near your door to outside.

Finding a neat solution to sorting multiple little items in one spot is one of the smartest organization hacks for clearing up counter space. Not only do you literally move papers, keys, and even odds and ends that just seem to appear, like paper clips and batteries, off the counter, for tidy, open space and room to meal prep and cook, but you can even transfer these things out of drawers and cabinets. You can then use those newly freed-up spots to store anything else on your counter that you don't use that often.

Once you buy a Teaching Tree Pocket Chart Scheduler, you'll wonder why you didn't think of this before. It's unexpected, since you're essentially repurposing a classroom item, but it does the trick so effectively and is less than $2. When you consider that you can stock up on food storage containers at the dollar store, and even use Dollar Tree letter trays for tidy kitchen storage, you begin to realize just how affordable it is to whip your kitchen into easy, breezy, clutter-free shape. Take the opportunity when you buy these to rethink your kitchen layout and make sure you're sorting everything close to where you use it, get the mess out of the way, and enjoy your cleared up counters that both look lovely and make it easy and stress-free to complete daily tasks.