Pantry Dreamin'

I mentioned this in the comments yesterday that I some day hope to have some built-in shelves in our pantry. It's a small pantry, about 6 by 6 feet, and would best suit an L-shaped layout. The door is a pocket door, so I can't use the back of the door as storage space. Here's what it looks like. 

It's overflowing with stuff. Not everything fits on shelves. This is how it looks most of the time. Periodically I sort through stuff and organize the shelves better.

To the left is a tall plastic shelving unit (from my childhood). The shelves are about 10 inches deep. Built-in shelves could be deeper and accommodate more containers.

The back wall of the pantry has an 18-inch deep metal shelving unit. There are gaps on either side of both units, gaps that could be filled with shelves that run from wall to wall.

I thought today I'd share some of my pantry dreams, the elements of other pantries that I like and why.

https://www.thespruce.com/pantry-shelving-ideas-7197799

I love the decorative shelf supports in this pantry. This type of built-in shelving would be do-able for my husband and I. Here's a close-up of the support.

I also like the deeply colored cabinetry. It adds a dramatic flair to the pantry. Of course, my own pantry doesn't have any windows.

https://www.thespruce.com/pantry-shelving-ideas-7197799

Here's another pantry with decorative shelf supports. I also like the counter work area and the bead board backing. The counter can be used as a work area or additional "shelf" storage for containers.

sitbacklounge.com

This pantry came up when I searched "maximizing food storage in tiny pantry." Okay, so the pantry isn't exactly tiny, but the jars of foods have been massed in there, and they've used every inch of space, all the way up to the ceiling. I love how there's not a lot of excess airspace above the jars. The shelves seem to have been tailored to the height of the jars. It's definitely a bulk food pantry dream. Not many packaged foods in there.

thisoldhouse.com

Here's a small pantry. I like the furniture trim where a toe kick in cabinetry would normally go. I like the open shelves beneath the counter area. I prefer to be able to see everything and not have ingredients hidden behind doors or in drawers in the pantry. I also think open shelves provide just a hair more storage space without door or drawer hardware.

roomyretreat.com

I searched "storage in jars pantry." I imagine my glass jars storage to look something like this, with a variety of sizes and shapes of jars. I'm not sure how I would aesthetically incorporate packaged foods, which we do buy, as well as the bulk foods. Again, notice how well the jarred foods fit inside the shelf spaces. Very little wasted air-space above lines of jars.

https://happyinteriortime.com/ideal-dimensions-small-walk-in-pantry/

This pantry uses baskets on the lower shelves. On the floor it looks like square baskets of produce. Our pantry is on the warm side (adjacent to the main kitchen work area), so I don't store produce in the pantry. But I do like that look. It's open enough to see what's there, but conceals and brings harmony to the lower shelves. Despite the good, here, they didn't do a great job optimizing airspace above jars and bottles. I see lots of wasted space here. With how much I stock up, I need a design that will allow me to utilize all the space.

https://wonderfulengineering.com/25-great-pantry-design-ideas-for-your-home/

This is a beautiful pantry. I love the rolling ladder to reach the top shelf all around. They've added crown moulding around the top of the wall, very nice. That's one of those small details that my husband and I could do, would take up next to no storage space, but would add a room-like feel to the pantry and would go with other traditional elements of our house. As much as I like the ladder, it wouldn't be practical in our small pantry. I keep a folding step-stool in the pantry that I can pop open with one hand. For the time being, it rests folded up against the wall as you enter the pantry. Adding a hook to that wall would keep the step stool off the floor.

https://www.linenchest.com/en_ca/blog/post/20-pretty-pantries

Here's my last pantry. this one has an old school apothecary look to it, perhaps from the addition of the scale combined with the lines of identical jars filled with ingredients on shelves above the counter space. It looks like they've used several square shaped jars, which make the most of space.

If you were to design a new pantry, what elements would you incorporate?

Pantry Storage That Costs Nothing: Using Repurposed Glass Queso, Instant Coffee, and Pickle Jars

I've been saving empty glass food jars and their lids for a few years now. What I love is that since I buy the same foods over and over, I have a good-sized collection of several sizes of jars, but enough of each type to have some uniform food storage. 

I've wanted to transition much of my food storage to glass containers. And using repurposed glass food jars seems like the first step in this process.

I have a whole bunch of queso/salsa jars from my daughters. (They love queso and buy it for themselves often.) The jars are small, round, have a large opening, and hold about 2 cups. I grow all of the oregano, thyme, sage, rosemary, and basil that we use in a year. In addition, I buy all of our spices from bulk bins. Till now, I've stored our herbs and spices in an oddball collection of plastic containers. Repurposed queso jars look to be a good size for herbs and spices. The labels on these jars peel off cleanly. My plan is to store all of our herbs and spices in these jars.

I'll need to label the jars, so I don't confuse ground cloves with allspice or oregano with marjoram. The easiest "nice" label uses chalkboard paint.

The jars above are on Mother Earth News, from the article, How to Label Glass Jars. My only cost would be chalkboard paint. Hobby Lobby sells a small bottle (enough for my labels) for $1.89.

Another jar type that I've been collecting is from our instant coffee. I've been buying Great Value Colombian instant coffee and saving the glass jars it comes in. The coffee is good and I love the glass jar.

The jars are tall, squarish, and are easy to grab and pour from. The only drawback is the top opening is not wide enough to fit a measuring scoop larger than a 1/4 cup measure. But I do like these jars and have saved about 5 so far. They hold about 3 1/2 cups by volume. I'm thinking pourable ingredients would work best with the small opening. 

These might be good baking "extras" jars, such as flaxseed meal, cocoa powder, chia seeds, coconut flakes, and chocolate chips (when I buy from WinCo's bulk bins or buy the super large plastic bag from Walmart). They might also be a good storage container for the grains and pulses that I buy in smaller amounts from the bulk bins, such as quinoa, steel cut oats, millet, wild rice, red lentils, yellow split peas, etc.

Since my baking ingredients and grains/pulses are rather obvious to identify, I don't think I'd need a label for these jars.

My last collection of jars are 32-oz pickle jars, again a purchase of my daughters. Go figure -- I make pickles from our own cucumbers, but still they want to buy more. I have 6 of these jars, so far (who knows when my daughters will get another pickle craving and buy more). 

Like the queso jars, the pickle jar labels come off cleanly. They have a decent sized opening, so scoop-able (1/3 to 1/2 cup max scoop) ingredients as well as pourable will work with these.

32 ounces is about the right sized container for small pasta shapes for my household, like rotini, macaroni, and small shells, and for some of the grains we eat but not in large amounts, such as cornmeal, grits, and barley, all bought from bulk bins. The biggest issue with repurposing pickle jars and their lids is the odor. I've had good luck with airing the jars and lids in direct sunlight for the day. I've also read that soaking the jars and lids for 24 hours in a solution of 1 teaspoon of baking soda for every half-cup of warm water will deodorize pickle jars and their lids.

The only type of label that I'll need on these jars for the above listed foods is cooking instructions. for example how long to cook the ingredient and/or ratio grain to water. Again, I like the chalkboard paint label as they can be changed when the jar is refilled with a different ingredient.

Am I the only one who saves empty glass food jars? Who, here, repurposes their "empties" for pantry storage? In your experiences, what sizes work for which ingredients?

My "Trick" to Get Myself to Do Work I Don't Really Want to Do

I'm not loving painting the deck railing. But they way things work in my household is the person who most wants a job done does it. The rest of the family really doesn't care that much what the deck railing looks like, but I do. So, this is my job. It's a good thing that I'm neat and can paint carefully.

Just how do I make myself get out there to paint almost every day when I don't want to? I do this with other challenging tasks and ordeals, too. I tell myself I only have to do a small amount, and I can decide not to do any more after that. When I was going through all my dental stuff, especially the four surgeries (not all were big surgeries, though), I told myself I only have to get through this one, and if I don't want to go any further, I can choose plan B instead.

When I'm cleaning up the house after a family event, I tell myself I only need to pick up this one small space. What usually happens is I find the cleaning up isn't so bad, I get into a groove, and before I know it I've finished the house. 

I didn't want to make dinner for tonight. I was tired. But I told myself I will just get the pasta cooked and set aside (I made a seafood pasta salad), then I could go rest for a small while before finishing up dinner. As it turned out, I had enough energy to do all of dinner and have it chilling while I rested.

It doesn't always turn out this way. Sometimes I do just the small amount I've convinced myself to try. I'm okay with that. At least I did a small amount of work. This reminds me of parents asking their kids to try a bite of a new food. Their hope is the child will discover they like the new food and eat more.But if they don't, at least they tried and had some.

This afternoon after my dentist appointment, I told myself I'd just go out and put a final coat of paint on the small section I did yesterday. I did that and then put two coats on one of the 4 X 4 posts and washed the section that I'll work on tomorrow. I didn't go all crazy and paint for hours, but I did get some good work in on a day when I felt tired.

And now. as I anticipate a lot of painting yet to do, I've been telling myself that it's okay if I don't finish the job this summer. This is how I'm getting myself out to paint each day, by not letting myself think the job is overwhelming. If I finish the whole railing, that will be great. But if I don't, I've already decided that that outcome will be okay with me. I can always do the rest next summer.

Anyway, this trick has worked to get myself started on many tasks. Do you have any ways you get yourself to do work that really isn't something you enjoy?

When push came to shove, I discovered that we could get by on meals with what's on hand (or mostly so)

I'm now half done painting the main deck railing. I will still need to paint the railings for 2 sets of stairs. But I'm not counting that part just yet. This is very slow and very hot work. Our deck is on the south side of the house. When the air temperature for our area is around 82 or 83, the deck is around 100. And since I'm painting black over white paint, it's taking several coats of paint to achieve complete coverage. Slow and hot work.

Anyway, I thought it best to skip my big, two-week stock-up shopping last Friday and focus on painting all day. One daughter was going to Walmart for something for herself. I asked her to pick up a gallon of milk and a small block of cheese for the family. And that was it for shopping for the week for me. So, a grand total of $6.90 spent last week on groceries.

If I'm going to skip a stock-up shopping, this is the time of year to do it. We have so much fresh produce coming in right now. I eat several figs, apples, and tomatoes each day. In fact, when I'm outside painting and hungry, I pluck a fig off one of the trees or pick a handful of cherry tomatoes to snack on without even going indoors.

Here's how our kitchen fridge looks without any meaningful shopping in a couple of weeks. Don't ask me to tell you what's in all of the jars. We have a couple of mystery jars lurking in the fridge right now. I'll deal with those in a week.

As you can see, no one is in danger of going hungry any time soon. It's probably a good thing I didn't go shopping last Friday, don't you think? 

I have a dentist appointment mid-day tomorrow, so I won't get a full day of painting in. Which means I need to work as hard as I can on painting Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Monday. This will give me a few days of cure time before the next forecasted precipitation. 

I'll skip major grocery shopping this week, too. Perhaps I'll ask a family member to go get more milk and cheese for us. Any Labor Day celebrations at our house will use what we have on hand -- meat from the freezer, produce from the garden/orchard, grains and other baking ingredients for dinner rolls and a pie. 

So, what have we been eating since Friday morning (when I would have done the big stock-up shopping)? 

We've had versions of cabbage/carrot/green onion salads (cabbage and green onions from garden), apples, pears, figs (all from orchard), blueberries and blackberries (from berry patch), peanut butter, cheese, tuna salad, frozen sausage, frozen beef, homemade bread, homemade pizza, various frittatas, oven fries and baked potatoes, Spanish rice, cooked garden vegetables, tomato/lettuce/cucumber salad (from garden), smoothies, cooked oatmeal, blueberry pancakes. 

As it turns out, we have lots of food in my house. Not that I ever doubted that. But we're no where near boring or repetitive meals. I think those would begin in about a month and a half to two months (as the garden harvest and our meat supply began to dwindle), if I did minimal grocery shopping of only milk, cheese, and eggs.

This will make my August grocery spending total rather low, with just one big stock-up shopping at WinCo and a few small stops at Walmart. The great thing is I've been able to put more hours into my painting project, hopefully finishing up well ahead of any rainfall.

Here's my question to you -- how long could you make interesting meals with just bare bones grocery shopping (like my milk, cheese, and eggs)? I know many of us could eat for a couple of months, but I imagine the last couple of weeks would consist of redundant ingredients.

Perseverance

I began repainting the deck railing last summer. I fell and separated my shoulder and had to delay finishing. So here we are, getting near the end of this summer and I'm just now painting the vertical parts of the railing. 

There are 13 sections to the railing, and I've mostly completed 3. When I began yesterday, I was grumbling so much to myself. Things kept going wrong. But I kept telling myself to be grateful I had work to do, and I was capable of doing such work. I grumbled on, all while working at the painting job before me. It was a day of me complaining in my head while reprimanding myself. It feels like this is an enormous task.

This morning, I wasn't looking forward to painting, but I no longer felt the need to grumble to myself. I don't enjoy this work, but I was able to do what I needed to anyway.

I think that's what perseverance is all about. Spending a vacation being entertained and fed wouldn't take any perseverance. The days would pass quickly, and I'd be feeling pretty pleasant about my vacation. Perseverance is when you continue on with a lengthy and often times burdensome task. You may not enjoy it very much, but you continue on nonetheless.

Saving for a big financial goal takes a lot of perseverance. My husband and I were extremely frugal for the first 8 years of our marriage. It was tough at times. We didn't take vacations, not even to camp. We paid for necessities and put the rest of our income into savings. It took 8 long years to save enough for a sizable down payment on our house -- 8 years of being extraordinarily frugal. But we persevered.

My progress on the deck rail painting job feels now much like it felt when we'd been saving for about 2 years of the 8. At that time, it was hard to see our progress. It mostly felt like we were working hard for little gain. As I look at all of the railing sections left to paint, it feels like I've made very little progress so far. But I know that in just another couple of days, the progress will be so much more evident. I remember a specific day during year 6 of our savings for a house journey. My husband and I were totaling our various savings and investments. We realized that we had saved a very big chunk of our goal amount. We could see on paper that our hard work was paying off. Buying a house was no longer just a hope, but something that would most certainly happen. That's the feeling I expect to have someday early next week. I will have completed enough of the railing to see that my hard work is paying off and it will most certainly be finished this summer.

In the meantime, I just need to persevere. I'll check back with you on the finished railing in a week or so.

Have a great weekend, friends!

It May Be Too Soon to Buy Your Fall Mums: How to Time Your Hardy Mum Purchase for Fall Decor

Where I live, the likelihood of 90 degree days has passed. I checked the long-range forecasts and we'll hit the low to mid-80s two days this week, and then next week and beyond our high temperatures will vary from low 60s to the upper 70s for the following 6 weeks.

Hardy mums prefer daytime high temperatures between 60 and 75, right where we'll be in my area after this coming weekend. Mums can tolerate temperatures that go above those marks for a couple of days, but heat stress beyond a day or two or three can cause wilting and impair flowering.

I bought small pots of yellow mums ($2.98 ea) while at Home Depot the other day and repotted them 3 to a large pot to use on our front patio. If the temperature is expected to go above 83 or 84 this weekend, I'll move the planted pots to the shade on the north side of the house for those days.

Most parts of the US have many more hot days to come than my area. Although it's tempting to buy mums for fall decor now, it may be better to wait until your forecasted daytime highs fall in the mid-70s, which for many parts of the US doesn't happen until at least mid-September.

If you do happen to buy your mums before the danger of extreme heat has passed, if your plants are in pots, you can move them to the shade in the afternoons on hot days and keep them well-watered.

When choosing plants, look for tight buds, in order to enjoy the most bloom time. To prolong blooms, deadhead regularly, water consistently and at the base of the plant and not overhead (to prevent fungus), and choose a sunny location for your plant that doesn't experience extreme temperature fluctuations.

When your overnight temperatures begin to regularly dip below about 45 degrees, you can bring potted mums indoors to enjoy the blooms just a little longer.

For right now, mid to late-summer, the cheery yellow will be a bright spot of sunny color on the patio. When mid-September rolls around, I'll mass out some orange and white pumpkins next to the pot of yellow flowers for an autumnal vibe for the remainder of the harvest season. 

Will you be buying mums for porch decor this year? When does the weather cool down enough for mums in your area?

Rendering Meat Fat in Pictures

I cooked a large fatty piece of beef on Monday. I used the meat portion in both Monday's and Tuesday's dinners, reserving the fat to deal with Tuesday afternoon. I mention rendering fat often here. So I thought this time I'd take some photos so you can see what this task looks like.

The day after simmering the beef, I cut the chilled fat chunks into 1/4-inch dices. This is about 3/4 to 1 cup of fat dices in the saucepan. As you can see, some bits are meatier than others. But mostly these are dices of fat. The tiny amount of meat will add flavor to the finished pieces.

I cook the dices on Low heat, stirring from time to time to prevent sticking and then scorching. I'm usually doing something else in the kitchen while the fat renders. But I can also leave it to render for periods, just coming back to stir every 15 minutes or so.

It's important to keep the stove on Low. You don't want the fat to smoke and scorch. You want the fat to slowly liquify and render almost all of the fat out of each piece. Cooking over a higher temperature would cause the outside of the dices to cook but leave large amounts of fat on the insides.

after pouring off most of the liquid fat

After a couple of hours of rendering on Low, the fat was mostly cooked out. I pour off the bulk of the fat into a small dish, so the last bits can render more thoroughly. Otherwise, the dices are just sort of frying in a pool of their own fat. Any large pieces at the bottom of the saucepan I cut into smaller bits with the edge of a spoon.

When I think all of the fat is rendered, I pour the remaining fat and the browned dices into a mesh sieve over the dish. 

I use the back of a spoon to press out as much fat as I can.

The 1 cup of fat dices rendered into about 1/3 cup of liquid fat. I keep the rendered fat in the freezer and use in small amounts in cooking. Beef fat is particularly good for oven-frying potato wedges or sautéing onions to make French onion soup or vegetables such as zucchini, tomatoes, and garlic to serve as a vegetable side dish or tossed with cooked pasta.

The cooked dices are known as cracklings. I keep these in a container in the freezer. I top baked beans and soups with cracklings in fall and winter. They add a nice richness to both dishes.

"Use it up" is a motto I follow. Using all parts of meat feels respectful to the animal that gave its life to feed my family. And that's what rendering fat looks like in my kitchen.

I also render ham fat. The cracklings from rendered ham fat are salty and tasty, almost like bacon bits. I use those in salads, for topping bean soup, and stirred into cornbread batter before baking. I use the rendered ham fat any place I want to add smokey/salty flavor, such as for cooking greens or frying eggs or to add some ham flavor to bean soup or baked beans, just a spoonful or two of the fat.

One of the Dumbest Financial Things I've Done

Growing pumpkins is NOT a dumb thing.
It's a source of frugal fun for me.

I'm cleaning out some of my kids' stuff this week and came across a large set of children's books. Doing this brought to mind some kinda dumb financial things I've done in my adult life.

I've done a lot of dumb things. But there are two of them that stand out in my mind for costing more money than the value provided. Here's the first one. When my son was a baby, I signed up for one of those story book of the month clubs. They sent us the first 3 books for about $2 plus shipping. Then every month after they sent 2 more books for $5-something each plus shipping. The deal was I was free to return any book we didn't want to keep, but I would have to pay the return shipping. And I could cancel at any time. Anyway, I was busy with a small baby and didn't get around to canceling for many months. While we did amass a nice collection of children's books, it wound up costing a lot more than it would have if I'd bought books like Golden Books from the drug store. These monthly merchandise clubs are often financially wasteful.

The other stupid financial choice I made was before I was married. I joined a gym with a 2-year contract that wasn't remotely convenient for me. I went for about 3 months, then never made the time to go again. Meanwhile, I continued to pay off the 2-year contract, even after I'd moved out of state. In hindsight, I should have asked if there was a shorter term contract, or even a month-by-month payment. I also could have found a less expensive way to get exercise, perhaps a YMCA or parks and rec classes.

The most costly financial "mistake" my husband and I made jointly. When we originally financed the purchase of our home, we qualified for both a 15- and 30- year mortgage. As is customary, the 15-year mortgage had a lower interest rate than the 30-year one. We knew we could afford the payment on the 15-year, but we went with the 30-year out of fear something could happen and we'd have a difficult time making the larger payment on the 15-year mortgage. In the end, we refinanced to a 15-year mortgage in 4 years, paying new closing costs. This fear-based decision cost my husband and I substantially more than either of my/our earlier dumb choices. At least this "mistake" of ours wasn't on dumb stuff.

Can you look at your past and see dumb or costly financial choices? Can you see ways that you could have done things differently?

Microwave Blackberry Upside Down Cake

And for no related reason whatsoever, here's another microwave recipe. I baked this over the weekend.

Microwave Upside Down Cake

(The recipe calls for canned pineapple, but I use whatever fruit I have. The one in the photo is a blackberry upside down cake, using half the butter in the fruit layer and granulated, not brown, sugar, but the rest of the recipe as written. Peach or apple upside down cakes are also delicious.)

fruit layer

1/4 cup butter

1/3 cup brown sugar

1 8-oz can pineapple slices, reserve juice

4 candied or maraschino cherries, cut in half

batter layer

1  1/4 cups all-purpose flour

3/4 cup sugar

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup soft shortening (I use a mix of butter and oil)

1 egg

liquid from pineapple plus milk to total 1/2 cup (if baking any other fruit cake, use 1/2  cup milk only)

1 teaspoon vanilla

Instructions

In 8-inch round microwaveable dish, such as a soufflé dish or quiche dish, microwave the butter to melt. Sprinkle sugar over butter. Drain fruit and arrange in dish. Decorate with cherries.

Stir together flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt. Mix in soft shortening, egg, liquid, and vanilla until smooth. Carefully spread over fruit layer.

Microwave until a toothpick inserted comes out clean (6 minutes in my turntable 1100 watt microwave). Lacking a turntable in the microwave, rotate dish a half-turn midway through cooking. Total cook time could range from 5 minutes to 10 minutes, depending on wattage of microwave. Begin checking at around the 5 or 5.5 minute point.

Remove from microwave when baked. Cool 5 minutes in baking dish. Use a table knife to go all the way around the edge of the dish to loosen the cake. Invert onto a plate and allow to stand for a few minutes. Serve warm, if desired. 

This recipe makes 8 slices for my family. I place an upturned glass bowl over the plate of leftover cake as a cake dome to prevent drying out overnight. We finish the cake on the second day, and it's still very enjoyable.

The Frugal Person's Dilemma: Are You Still Frugal if You Spend More Than You Need To?

I had to show you this -- a licorice shrine.
Apparently, licorice is a very big thing in Scandinavia.

This may shock you: There are instances when I feel downright spendthrifty.  Our Wednesday day trip to Poulsbo, WA brought out my extravagant side. We spent more on a few purchases, some as gifts and others to enjoy by our family, that I definitely could have bought elsewhere for less. Surprising as this may be, you can even find souvenir t-shirts that feature the name of a town or attraction on Amazon for close to half the price as buying at that destination.  For these purchases, though, I wanted to support some local businesses, even if it meant I would spend more.

The choice to spend more for ethical, sustainability, or community-driven reasons presents a dilemma for frugal people -- the question of are you still frugal if you spend more to prioritize non-financial aspects of purchases in place of maximizing savings at all times?

It may be ethical sourcing that's important, such as not patronizing brands that use child or slave labor, or don't pay their employees a fair wage, or do something damaging to the environment in the production of their goods. Sometimes it's about shopping at businesses that are locally-owned, or are small businesses. And sometimes making a purchase from a non-profit will benefit a greater cause than simply profit. This idea of being selective with purchases extends to restaurants and other similar establishments. A person may prefer to support an independently-owned restaurant to keep money in their local area.

In my family's case the other day, we bought a Christmas gift for an extended family member, a men's t-shirt for my husband, and some salty licorice, pastries, and ice cream/iced coffee for us to enjoy. The Christmas gift came from a store that features items from Scandinavia and will be appreciated by a family member who strongly identifies with the Scandinavian side of our family. I could have purchased a Christmas gift for this family member on Amazon. But I wanted my purchasing dollars to benefit a local business. 

This was my husband's first visit to Poulsbo. I took our three kids there many summers ago, and bought t-shirts for each of them then. My son still wears his t-shirt, and my husband has admired it a time or two. We found the same shirt in several color choices at the maritime museum. Their merchandise sales keep this museum open to the public with free admission. We saw other t-shirts at retail shops in Poulsbo for a few dollars less. And I even found a couple of Poulsbo t-shirts on Amazon for several dollars less. But I wanted to help a non-profit stay open. So we made the purchase at the museum.

The food purchases all came from independent and locally-owned businesses. We could have gone elsewhere for the ice cream, breakfast pastries, or licorice. But again, I wanted our purchasing dollars to stay in the area. 

The employees we interacted with all live within a short drive of their places of work. The owners also live locally. My hope is that this town continues to have the same small town charm for many more decades.

There was a time in our family's story when we couldn't afford to prioritize anything but paying the lowest possible price. I'm blessed and can say that we sometimes can now make decisions in ways that help small businesses or non-profits, or keep profits local, or prioritize the way that products are made or harvested that benefit employees or environments. It's a balance, however. We can't make our choices in these ways all of the time. But when we can, it makes me very happy.

Being frugal is not always about saving the most money. Incorporating thoughtfulness in spending has a place in a frugal mindset. Personally, I like to use my purchasing power to help local businesses and their employees. I worked in retail when I was younger, and I think I connect with people working in shops and small restaurants. I want to have an impact on their day in some very small way. Giving them my business is one way to accomplish just that.

What do you think? Do you think a person is still frugal when they spend more in order to prioritize other values instead of maximizing savings? Can you think of other reasons a frugal person would be willing to spend more for a purchase or service?

Summer Vacation Crammed Into One Day

With no possibility of a summer vacation this year, my husband took today off from work, and the four of us went to a small Norwegian town near us. My husband and I are early wakers. At 5 we were both up, so we decided to try for an early ferry.

We brought coffee with us, and then once in Poulsbo, we made a beeline for Sluy's bakery.

There's a park on the waterfront with plenty of seating. It's just a 2-minute walk from the bakery. So we enjoyed our pastries and coffee al fresco overlooking the marina.

Our favorite post-breakfast stop is the Marina Market. It's also the only store open so early. Marina Market is filled with interesting international foods. They're also know for their selection of licorice. We chose a container of salty black licorice, both a Scandinavian and Dutch confection.

We explored the town,

visited shops, 

had to stop in the children's book store for my daughter
who is a children's book illustrator and writer

took a walk on the boardwalk along the bay, and soon found it was time for a picnic lunch at the gazebo. We packed turkey and cheese sandwiches on homemade bread, apple slices, homemade pasta salad with garden vegetables, homemade cookies, and fruit juice and iced tea. It was nice to have some shade and a moment to rest our feet.

After lunch we visited the maritime museum and made a purchase to support this wonderful free exhibit.

We visited several art galleries that featured local artists 

and a few more interesting stores.

At the end of the afternoon, we stopped for ice cream cones for the other three and an iced coffee for me.

We made it home before sunset and had a simple dinner of peanut butter sandwiches and fruit. Our feet are plum worn out, putting over 9000 steps in for the day. It was a lovely time that felt like an entire vacation crammed into one day.

The Happy Side Effect of Grocery Shopping Less Often

30% to 40% of all the food produced in the US goes to waste. Of this waste, 43% happens in households. Household food waste is primarily produce, milk, and leftover components of meals.

As a basically frugal person, I have avoided wasting food for almost my entire life. And still, I find myself with food waste from time to time. 

And then I made one change in how I grocery shop, and I found our household wasting minimal food.

our fridge on Day 4 after grocery shopping at WinCo
It's easy to see how foods could get lost in here, isn't it?

I changed my grocery shopping from once per week to a big shopping trip every other week (choosing WinCo over any of our other grocery stores). In the off weeks, I sometimes go to the Walmart right around the corner, picking up only a couple of items that I prefer from Walmart.

When it dawned on me that I wasn't throwing very much away these past few months, I asked myself how this was happening.

What were the foods most likely to be wasted in my household?

• leftovers from meals
• fresh produce
• fresh and processed meats
• milk and cream cheese
• opened tubs of tofu
• opened cans or jars of foods, like partial cans of fruits or vegetables
• small amounts of fruit juice and lemonade

Here's how our reduced food waste played out. Shopping once every two weeks, I spend the last 4 to 5 days before shopping again scouring the fridge for foods to use up. We run out of our favored supplies and are forced to consume the less favored. As the fridge becomes more and more empty, it's easier to spot those foods that may have been pushed to the back. I may not have all of the "right" ingredients for cooking meals by day 10, so I make do with what I have on hand. 

How I'm wasting less fresh produce

I've learned to push the more perishable produce first, by using these foods in my cooking for the family and making suggestions to family members as they assemble their own breakfasts and lunches. Then days 10 through 14 we use the less perishable foods. Leafy greens, tomatoes, and bananas are used first and cabbage, celery, and apples are used later in the period. Some produce items have surprised me how long they keep, watermelon being one of them. We were finishing off our last watermelon about 3 1/2 weeks after we bought it. We kept it uncut in the fridge for a week and a half before cutting into it. And then it just kept for a long, long time.

Buying milk just twice a month

It's not all sunshine and roses. I've needed to be mindful of the milk. Two weeks is a long time to go between milk purchases. We could pick up more milk at our local Walmart, but we don't care for the milk from there. So we try to get by on whatever milk I buy from WinCo. Buying a couple of gallons at WinCo, and keeping both in the fridge, would likely lead to some soured milk. Here's how I've managed to buy milk twice per month, and how I want to tweak this. 

When we first open a gallon of milk I pour off about half of it into small freezer containers. A week after the milk is first opened, I'm thawing a container of the frozen milk to fulfill my family's needs. If we happen to go through all of the milk before my next WinCo run, I have a little bit of powdered milk that I mix up to tide us over. 

Hopes for not needing powdered milk

My plan on this next WinCo trip (in about 10 days) is to buy 2 gallons of milk and freeze 1  1/2 gallons, instead of just a half-gallon, in quart containers. This would provide back-up milk at a reduced cost of the powdered milk. Powdered milk is expensive compared to liquid milk. I wouldn't need all of that frozen milk in a two week period, but would have a little stash of milk for future weeks.

The other happy side effect is my fridge becomes reasonably empty by day 12 or 13 and I can do a thorough cleaning of the shelves. This was rarely possible when I did sizable shopping every week.

Anyway, I'm saving money, saving gas, and saving food by shopping less often.

How often do you like to grocery shop? Are there changes you've made that result in less food waste? What foods tend to end up as waste in your household?