Tuesday, January 18, 2011

Be Prepared - Organise Day #1

 Yesterday's first tasks included organising a space to store a stockpile / emergency gear and to declutter to make space for such a space.

As I mentioned yesterday, we have had a stockpile for at least the last 5 years. But prior to that I had always worked on 1-up philosophy. We always had 1 extra of whatever we used, i.e. pasta sauce, mayo etc. I just did this as a matter of course as it was what my mum's family had been raised to do by my grandma. But we initially started our stockpile as a frugal measure. We had just bought our first house and were keen to pay our mortgage down as quickly as we could. So if I saw something we ate on sale, then I would stock up on it.

Then I had an allergy child. Not only was I a SAHM but what he ate was/is so limited, that I needed to have it on hand if we ran out. I cant always just run out to the shop and hope it is on the shelf. Plus he was so sick in the early days, I would have been lucky to even get out. So my stockpile grew.

But back to organising a space for your stockpile / emergency gear. We have always kept it in 2 shelves in the linen cupboard plus 1-up on a single kitchen shelf. Granny B had already taken this idea on board and it has been replicated at her house for the last few years. So yesterday I had no need to declutter, instead I just reorganised the pantry and noted what we were low on.

Which resulted in an afternoon of jam making :-)...I made 6 jars of pear jam after seeing some ripe pears at a local farm stall. As this is something I cant buy and the only jam Little B can eat, it doesnt hurt to have a few in the cupboard.

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