Hanging Fruit Basket

With a family of eight, we go through a LOT of fruit.  The problem is where to keep it.  I have a large, leaf-shaped bowl, but it's nowhere near large enough to hold all of our produce.  So our counter usually looks like this:

As you can imagine, I was quite tired of this.  We have very limited counter space, and this reduced it even more.  We talked about getting a tiered fruit bowl, but this still doesn't solve the problem of using too much counter space.  

So my wonderful hubby took a look at it and realized that while we don't have a lot of usable space on the counters, we have a lot of space going to waste above the counters.  There's a lot of open space between the cutting board and the bottom of the cabinet here.

So my AWESOME Mr. Man took some measurements, cut some wood, stained the wood to match my cabinets, and stapled on some chicken wire.  After it was dry, he attached it to the underneath of the cabinet.

This easily holds all the fruit that was spread out all over the counters, with plenty of room for more!!

So simple, so easy, so fast, so practical, and so gorgeous!!  And this didn't cost us a cent.  He used wood scraps that we already had, chicken wire scraps we already had, and wood stain that we already had.  I LOVE it!!

Where do you keep all of your produce?

What do your counters say about you?

In many houses (like mine), counter space is prime real estate.  So anything consistently taking up precious square inches is either something I LOVE, or something I use a LOT.

One example of a love, which is also used nonstop, is my Longaberger mug tree.  My hubby's aunt sells Longaberger, and I once saw this mug tree in the catalog.  I fell in love with it immediately.  Not much later, I saw that they were about to discontinue it, and was saddened by it.  On my next birthday a few months later, his grandma gave it to me as my birthday gift!!

I also love my mugs hanging on it.  Each one has a story to tell.  I love that this mug tree holds so many LARGE mugs (we like mugs that hold at least 16 oz).  It also keeps them from filling up my few cabinets--another piece of prime real estate in my house.

Another thing on my counter all the time is my Blendtec.  It's also a well-used love.  We use it virtually every day to make green smoothies for the family.

I have another small countertop with outlets inside one of my pantries (thanks to my brilliant father-in-law).  On that counter--always plugged in and ready to go--are my microwave (not a love, but a gotta have) and coffee pot  (definitely a love!).

I also have a cutting board and a few decorative items, some seasonal, some not.

Other appliances are up in the pantry, ready to go when needed, but not plugged in all the time, such as my rice cooker.  Others, like my toaster oven, stay on a shelf in my laundry room until needed--typically, the further from the counter, the less used they are.

So, what takes up the prime real estate in your home?  What are your beloveds, and what are your simply-gotta-have-handies?