What's in your pantry?

Recently I just had to clean out my pantry. Things were falling on me. That's a sure sign that it's time to get to work!

I'm blessed that the builders of this house put it a really big pantry, more like a small closet really. I love it.

But then again, I always keep my pantry stocked. Growing up my family spent three years in New Jersey and they were all bad winter years. I remember blizzards and getting snowed it and the panic at the stores when bad weather was predicted. The remainder of my life has been spent in the gulf coast when hurricanes are a threat a large part of the year. So I just hate the thought of getting caught with the pantry empty. My sister is the opposite, she can't take the clutter, so she keeps her pantry pretty bare.

She does have a lot less issue in keeping her pantry clean and organized, I envy that. But last fall when we were dealing the Katrina and Rita and there were unprecedented runs on the grocery store, she was there fighting the crowds while I stayed home and watch the stories about the grocery stores on TV.

Be that as it may, the pantry got cleaned out this week.

I like to get every possible useful inch of storage space out of my pantry, so I've added a few touches that really help. I have wire baskets that hang under the shelves so I can put short cans on the shelf and something else above it. I have wire shelves to add extra shelving for boxes ect. I have wicker baskets to put bagged items like pasta and chips in so that they don't fall on me. On the floor I have some stacking baskets for canned goods and I've mounted some small wall baskets on the little bit of wall space to squeeze out some extra space.





The wicker baskets came from the craft store, 75% off clearance bin. Some of them are actually pretty and it looks a little like I was trying to decorate in there, but really, they were all bought because they were cheap and the right size and shape.

Oh,and there are labels on everything too. Why? Not because I'm completely compulsive, really. But the kids used to get off putting groceries away with the excuse "I don't know where it goes". Well, now that it is all labeled, they know exactly where it all goes and they now have the job of putting away the groceries!