Deep Freezer Organization Tips

A couple of weeks ago, we bought a 1/8 of a cow.  It was a big ass cow.  Our 1/8 was 99 pounds of meat.
We split the cow with several other people and my friend did all the organizing and picked the meat up from the butcher, which was so helpful.


We paid $324 for 99 pounds of beef.  That includes all the butchers fees.  So it came out to be $3.27 a pound.  And if you buy grass fed, organic beef from the grocery store, you know that is an AMAZING price.


We mostly got ground beef and chuck roasts, but we did get several steaks and ribs.   I am very curious to see how long this much meat lasts us.


When we got the meat home, my deep freezer looked like this:

NOT OK, in my organized OCD home.  Something had to be done, not only because it makes my skin crawl, but when you have organized home and know where everything is, you save time, eliminate stress and have more time for fun stuff.  


Organizing things happens to be fun for me, but I digress.


I decided to organize my deep freezer like it was organized when it was full of breast milk (at the peak, the deep freezer and our inside fridge freezer were full to the MAX).  


My husband, the Engineer (also a bit OCD), had the genius idea of putting the bags of breast milk into plastic containers and sorting them by month.  Then placing them in the deep freezer oldest at top (to be used first).


So I did the same thing this time, but organized it by cut.  So all my ground beef is one container, all my roasts in another etc.  I labeled all the containers and made an inventory list.  I will be able to glance at the list and know when I am getting low.


I have all my bags of slow cooker freezer meals in there as well, and I just lay them flat where I can.  Then I have odds and ends (salmon, pastry dough from Miami to make empanadas, etc).  I also put all those small odds and ends  into a container, so I don't have to pull out 50 million things looking for what I need.

We also have a fridge in the garage, with a freezer.  It houses all my homemade stock.  And our freezer in the house, stores all my frozen fruit to make Penelope's smoothies, her smoothie jars themselves and the random pint of ice cream for my husband (I am a cookie girl).


What is your best freezer organizational tip?  I am always looking for ways to take my organization to the next level! 





Or on Facebook!

My Craft Space

This is what my little craft nook looks like. It's in a corner of Peter's office, where he spends his time on important things like reading ESPN. And across from Penelope's playroom, our old dining room. Not that I can sit and sew while she plays in there happily by herself, but at least its an option for when she is older.
Peter got the desk for me at IKEA, after we sold our dinning room table on Craigs's List.

As for the top shelf, I tried to come up with a visually pleasing way to organize some of my craft supplies and scrap fabric. It gets a so-so in my book, but I can't think of anything else right now. It's a work in progress. I was thinking of maybe getting some those wooden hoop thingys that people use for embroidering and putting some pretty fabric in them...like this craft room, on the wall behind the desk.

Any other ideas would be appreciated!

DIY: Toy Storage Bag

 
I made a bag with a zipper to house some of Penelope's wooden blocks the other week. I used scrap fabric I had left over from when I reupholstered a chair when I was pregnant. I also recycled and used the pink zipper I tore out of the Lilly Pultizer skirt I made into a Pillow Case dress. So it doesn't really match but I figured reusing the zipper was more important.
 
I didn't take a super great picture of the bag, because Penelope was being so cute with her blocks. The girl makes some funny faces.
 

Here is where I learned to make this type of bag. I didn't double line it like the tutorial, because this was my first time using a zipper and honestly I just couldn't figure it out, maybe next time.

Oh and if anyone is wondering her dress is organic and from Sage Creek Organics. Pretty cute, right?