Cleaning and Strewing

It’s been a busy week here at homeschool central. Not because we’ve had an extraordinary week – though we’ve done a lot of fun stuff. But because I have been tackling the avalanche – or in other words, cleaning. It’s been a long, slow process of stripping cupboards and boxes and shelves, and gloriously throwing away old bills, and receipts from before I was born (exactly how did that bit of flotsam survive 5 moves?). But I am finally seeing some results. How many bags of rubbish were removed? 5+ Maybe? I’m not sure. And that’s not including the bags of clothes and other items that went or are going to charity. But today I’m going to talk about my pantry.

Here’s my pantry.

The much smaller cookbook collection

Baking goods, and spices on a lazy susan!

 

Non-food and C’s “dangerous” craft cupboard

Aren’t they lovely? Lots of jars, with labels. Now, don’t get me wrong – I’m a hoarder – I have trouble letting go of anything – old toilet rolls (craft cupboard!), ripped sheets (sewing supplies!), even ratty old receipts that can barely be read (record box!). My DH has been gnashing his teeth for years trying to get me to throw things away. And then one of the lovely ladies over at Pamela’s Red, White and Grew Crew introduced me to Home Storage Solutions 101. I am a changed woman. Because if there’s one thing I love more than hoarding – it’s systems. You see, it’s not just about tidying, it’s about creating a system that’s easy to use and maintain. And as Steve McQueen says in the Magnificent Seven … so far so good.

By the way, these are carefully framed shots.

Kitchen mess!

Here’s a picture of the rest of the kitchen ….there’s an ecosystem in there. DH even found a spider’s nest on the wall the other day. It’s a pile I look at every morning, shudder and filter. Will I ever see the bottom? Will we ever be able to turn said space into C’s  tool shed / crafting depot? Well, yes. But when? Eternity is an awfully long time …

Now, back to the pantry. The lovely, lovely pantry. See the recipe books in those pictures? I love recipe books – but we moved most of them out of the kitchen – because we never use them. Some went to charity (the ones with Imperial measures, no pictures and 70’s style food – goodbye chicken l’orange!) When I said we never used them, C corrected me and said – yes we did! They were really good at propping up the cot!  Err, point made.

But even though there’s now not many recipe books in the kitchen … I kept most of them (remember – hoarder!)  Now I have a lovely ‘fantasy cookbook’ section in the bookcases (or I would, if the bookcases were working, but that’s a whole ‘nother saga.) This twice-over fantasy section is for looking at gorgeous pics of food I will NEVER make.

The kids’ cookbooks

And then, there is one more section for a homeschooling, strewing  mummy – kids cookbooks. We have so many small cookbooks with lovely pictures that we never use – each usually on a cuisine from around the world. So now the kids can easily access these wonderful cookbooks and learn all about different foods from around the world.

J has already spent a lot of time studying cake books. And C had me reading the Roald Dahl cookbook to him. Which was a lot of crazy fun. I can’t wait till they discover the other child-sized books – on Thai, Chinese, Japanese, Tapas, Vegan, garlic, Mediterranean, Italian, Lebanese, finger food. It’s going to be a lot of fun. And those books will finally do something other than look sad in the kitchen-of-doom.