Reorganizing the pantry is a great task when you’re cooped up at home and/or a major winter storm is coming. I actually divided my project in two, because I cleaned out one portion of the kitchen last year and updated the fridge, so this time I will devote some attention to the remaining cabinets.
Who says DIY projects can’t keep you occupied for a while? Back when Carlton Cards went out of business, I bought some of their display racks which I had hoped to turn into organizers for a kitchen cabinet. Just about then came the time I found myself pulling family care duties, and the bag of organizers got lost in the shuffle. Two weeks ago I found them, so now I have no excuses for not finishing what I started.
I do know that my mother, who was always one to save things, left a treasure chest of kitchen and non-kitchen things sitting in the back of some of the kitchen cabinets. I spotted what looks like four different boxes of old-fashioned first-aid kits in a corner of one of them. The only reason I didn’t go through them immediately was that I was summoned to my work-from-home job, and I was already sorting through some paperwork, putting them into trash collection, shredding or archiving piles. There is also something about working around the house after daylight hours, when the workday is over, which is probably why spring cleaning has become so popular.
Nobody likes winter cleaning.
In addition to the kitchen, I have some plants which have apparently eaten their own soil and multiplied like those obnoxious creatures in Gremlins. They are indeed green, anyway. Re-potting will mean a new bag of potting soil, and no matter how big your project, it’s bound to end up with several leftover small bags of soil from each category of plant for which you had to buy one: a recent cleaning spree netted a bag of African violet soil which had dried out, and a bag of lawn filler which looks like it was from 1975. The hardest re-potting will be two crown of thorn plants with spikes that show hands no mercy. It uses cactus soil. Since soils are sold in large bags, I guess I’ll either wind up being generous with the pots so I use more soil, or I’ll have to buy more plants to use up the soil I have. It’s a wasteful society when we have to buy too much potting soil.
Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we could buy just the portion we needed? Bring or purchase a recyclable bag and fill up on potting soil for so many pots or such-and-such a size. By extension, couldn’t our groceries come in dispenser form? Take detergent, for instance: instead of throwing out those strangely shaped jugs when they run low, simply bring them to the store and pay for a refill of the same amount, stick the pour spout under a dispensing machine and fill up. No more landfill issues. The jugs last forever in a landfill, so they should last for multiple trips for refilling.
Anyway, since a storm is threatening to shut down life for a day or two, I’ll try my best to do something constructive with my time. If I get wounded re-potting those thorny plants, at least I know there is first aid in the kitchen cabinet.
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