Kitchen Counters - Top 40 Organizing

As part of my New Year's Resolutions I am purging excess STUFF in our house and organizing everything I can get my hands on.  I am following the plan outlined here: http://www.home-storage-solutions-101.com/organized-home.html

My first order of business was to declutter the kitchen counters.  We have a small, eat-in kitchen and counter space is at a premium.  Also, flat surfaces in our house tend to become dumping grounds for junk and paperwork (as evidenced by these pictures).  Warning: these are real, lived in pictures.

Before:

This is our main counter space. There's not much to it. The stand mixer and Keurig have to stay out on the counter due to lack of storage space (we use them a lot too).

Our teeny tiny counters next to the stove.

And after several hours of hard work and two full bags of trash we have the after...

After:

I eliminated the bread basket in the corner (the bread was moved to a drawer) and put the Keurig in its spot.  This makes it closer the coffee mugs and now the Keuring doesn't hit the bottom of the cupboard when we lift the top.

Same counters, but from a different angle.  I'm searching for produce storage solution that is better than one basket on the counter.  I haven't found anything I love yet though.

The stove area.  Another of my resolutions was to give up soda pop.  With the bottles gone, it looks a lot better in this area.

Though technically not part of the counter declutter, I thought I'd add this picture of our dining table.  I repurposed the old bread basket to hold art supplies for kids.  In an ideal world I'd love to have nothing on the table (except maybe some fresh flowers), but the reality is that my kids spend a lot of time drawing and coloring at this table.  At least the basket looks better than the paper piles they usually leave behind.

The next step is to organize the cabinets and drawers.  After that I may get crazy and even shop for some window coverings.  Ha!