Motivation


Last night The Man found evidence of a Small Furry Friend in our pantry, and I suddenly found the motivation I had been searching for to clean out the entire cupboard, and wipe down all surfaces with eucalyptus oil. And it occured to me that a change has been going on in my brain over the last months. Years ago, when the older children were small, we lived in a wooden house in the forest, with little mice scuttling in and out with impunity. I remeber a friend ringing me and shrieking about a mouse, and how she had thrown out half her food, and was disinfecting madly. I thought about all the meals she had eaten and my house, and decided it would be kinder not to tell her.


But suddenly it seems to me that I would rather not have a mouse in my kitchen. I am not certain this is a change for the better (it isn't for the mouse, anyway), and it also means that I will be changing my gung-ho practice of bringing home purchases from the wholefood shop and slinging them into the back of the cupboard still in their brown paper bags. The Man has always been very rude about my need to keep every single jar that ever gets used in the house 'just in case'. In case I make jam, or my own herbal teas, or in case I ever store anything in something that is not a brown paper bag. Well, that time has now come. For three hours last night I listened to Radio National and took everything out of the cupboard, threw half of it away, because it turns out that brown paper bags are not such effective storage containers after all, and repacked everything else into jars. With labels. Oh, the heady feeling of efficiency and neatness. I know now why housekeepers of yore kept their cupboards locked, with the keys on their belts. Because otherwise someone might have messed with the jars.

Comments

Anonymous said…
Jo,

Do you remember my little furry things? Totally different feeling when they run across your rug in the middle of the night while watching a movie and they were not invited!

Bait is out and I am thinking this economic stimulus package is going to make my Tupperware lady happy.

I love your jars though. Wish I didn't have a baby who would surely crash them all down on himself. One day, one day!

Best wishes
Jen in NSW
Hi there,

Nothing like a neatly ordered pantry to make you feel like super organised!

We also go the glass jar route for storing our staples. I find that labelling them by writing straight on the jars with a sharpie (nikko) pen the best option. It does wash off, if you scrub a bit, and saves the labels going all manky when you wash the jars.

Glad all your "just in case" jars found a use.
Jo said…
Wash the jars? Darn, I didn't think of that. Perhaps not washing the jars would be an option. No, that is probably a bad idea. Thanks for the tip.

And Jen, my most useful plastic storage containers are two-litre plastic milk bottles. They are brilliant for rice, lentils, cous cous, sugar etc, because you can just pour them straight into a measuring cup, and they stack together beautifully in the cupboard.

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