Pantry Living Year 8!!!

Pantry living part 8
Get this party started!!

My last grocery shopping trip! I
included a big pink pool floaties.

June 12th was my handsome hubby's last date of "teaching" for the school year. Way too much happened and yet very little happened during this pandemic. It has been hard to prep for pantry living because stores have not been fully stocked. Living solidly at home for three months has used a lot of our food storage. My stress baking has used a lot of flour. And my of for the past 3 months will make this summer especially difficult. But here we go ...

Basic rules of pantry living. 8 years ago was the first summer we were living on our own in our beautiful home with three children. My husband is a teacher and earns steady paychecks 10 months of the year. Usually in the summer we each have jobs but they do not equal the same salary from the other 10 months. So I decided to start what I call "pantry living" to help us use credit cards less and become more frugal but still eat well.
So my rules are
1. I do not shop from Dave's last day of teaching until Dave's first day of teaching in September.
2. allowable credit card purchases include gas and car repairs, fruits, veggies, bread, all dairy, and eggs.
3. all other purchases must use cash that I've tucked away.
4. If I use a credit card I refer to that as a cheat and hold myself accountable on here.

My five-year-old helped me inventory our pantry. During the last two weeks I've gone grocery shopping looking like a crazy person with my clipboard checking things off the list and comparing what I have in stock. But I think we're finally ready.

Brief recap of my inventory-

Cereals: 38
Toilet paper: approximately 100 rolls
Peanut butter: 3
Strawberry jam (store bought): 3 strawberry freezer jam: 7
Bags of flour: 13
Bags of sugar: 5
Pasta sauce: 10
Tuna fish: 9
Nutella: 3
Bags of tortilla chips: 7
Graham cracker: 4
Boxed drinks: 5
Hand soap: 7
Pickles: 5
Pasta :13

I forgot to inventory my freezers(I have three). So the meat for the summer will be a bit of a surprise. I know I have breakfast sausage, Italian sausage, chicken breast, chicken legs, hamburger patties, seafood, pork roast. How much of each remains to be seen.

In our freezer there's also my homemade freezer jam😋,  ravioli, tater tots and hash browns, a large turkey and a large ham, popsicles, ice cream, frozen rolls and frozen veggies.

Our garden is growing like crazy!! Super excited to see the growth so far. Last year I only used one garden bed because the other had been depleted of all nutrients from over planting on my part. This year I cleared both out and gave them lots of vitamin rich soil. We are growing cucumbers, cherry tomatoes and grape tomatoes, lunchbox peppers, and zucchini. Plus our raspberry bush might give us some fruit again!

I bought each plant from Home Depot. This is after one month in the ground 👀

So about every other week I'll post an update with info such as weekly cereal count, jars/cans opened, items I'm out of, cash purchases, allowable credit card purchases, gifts(my parents love to drop off boxes of cereal), garden harvest,  cheats (if any), and screaming deals that I couldn't pass up. Cheats usually happen because I don't bring enough cash on an errand.

This summer will be hard. My children understand that money is tighter than ever. Neither of us have our usual summer employment and I've been out of work since March so our cash stash is significantly smaller. But God has never let us starve yet!! We can do this! So follow our pantry living journey and maybe you'll get motivated to build your own food storage and see how well you can survive.

Happy Summer and may the odds be ever in our favor!

Playground Picks

I'm a South Jersey mama and I thought I'd share a few of our favorite playgrounds. We all have that one playground closest to our house that we frequent, but perhaps you are up for a short drive to find a new fun place to play. This is a short list of ones we are willing to travel to for some fun! They are listed in no particular order.


1. Shark Park, Brigantine
Great place to play on a cool day. This playground is not a place we visit when it's hot. There isn't much shade. But it has a younger low key section and a more complex side. Definitely a fav of ours!

2. All Wars Memorial Park, Linwood
New equipment located at the center of the ball fields. Very fun and beautifully situated near trees.  Climbing equipment is definitely meant for older kids.

3. Cape May Zoo Playgrounds, Cape May Courthouse
Free zoo! Two fun playgrounds. One offers some shade and is intended for smaller ones. The other is large and has a group of swings. My kids of all ages enjoy both playgrounds. We typically park, enjoy the zoo for 90mins or so. Eat a picnic lunch at a pavilion and then play on the playgrounds for an hour. The zoo holds out a bucket asking for donations when you drive in. Feel free to give $1 or $20. They don't turn anyone away.


4. Veterans  Memorial Field, Galloway
A nice small playground surrounded by ball fields. Our favorite part about this one is you can take a short walk down to the bay. There is a nice path that takes you out with beautiful views of Atlantic City. We often see little crabs scurrying and birds flying.

5. Field of Dreams, Absecon
A nice handicap accessible playground with a great turf ballfield that is perfect for a family game of kickball.
 

6. Birch Grove, Northfield
Plenty of equipment for a variety of tastes. Playground is spread  out so if there is a field trip attending you are not necessarily going to lose track of your child in the mix. Our favorite part is not the actual playground but the hiking trails to explore after we play.

 
7. Kennedy Park, Somers Point
Beautiful Bay front property. Playground is average size. There is lots of shade, beautiful scenery and a great spot for a picnic or bbq.

8. Tony Canale Park, EHT
Tricky to find. Definitely use your GPS. And even once you enter the sports area you will wonder if you made it to the right spot. Keep driving and you'll find it.


9. Ventnor Library, Ventnor
Such a great playground right on the beach. Perfect place to go to the beach and then take a playground break. Lots of fun equipment!



10. Margate Library, Margate
Fun playground next to the beach! Parking lot is limited but there is street parking. Great place to hang out after storytime Wednesday mornings.



11. Imagination Station, Galloway
 A huge structure with lots to do. Swings and smaller equipment around the border and lots of slides and places for playing levels of tag. This wasn't my favorite when I had a toddler because I could never sit and watch here. I had to be following closely because it is large enough they are quickly out of your sight line if you sit on a bench. But it is a favorite of my kids of all ages.






Note: we love playgrounds and trying out new places with new tricky equipment. I am not a helicopter parent. I allow my kids to try the new equipment and I encourage them to find a way to make it work. My two year old was a great climber but frequently other parents would try to stop him from climbing high equipment. He would run to me crying because he was told he couldn't do an activity meant for a 6 yr old. I would then come over and supervise him doing the difficult climb. Then the parent who had spoken to him would tell me "oh sorry. I thought he was too little and I didn't know who his parents were. " I told them thank you for looking out for him. I know his strengths and encourage the difficult tasks. I do think some parents find me too hands off at the playground. But in most cases my kids got themselves in tight spots they can usually finish the task or take themselves back to the starting line. The only time my child was injured was on our monkey bars at home and he was stubborn and made bad choices. So please know your children's limits and comfort level when using equipment. Don't assume it is always safe or that it is always dangerous either. Keep a simple first aid kit in your car, an old towel to dry off wet slides, water bottles, and baby wipes.

Be sure to leave a comment and tell us which are your favorites so we can check them out too!

         Have fun and happy Summer!!

Weeks 3 & 4

Wow! We are a full month into pantry Living and we are doing really well. I haven't been home much and I'm blessed with so many Wawa gift cards I've eaten out a lot. Ps- Wawa is the best convenience store ever.  Here are my stats.

After week 4

Week 3
Cereal: 29
Opened jars/bottles: spaghetti sauce, pasta, tikki masala sauce, green beans, cookies, mustard, yeast, Sprite, butter, mozzarella cheese, pepperoni, goldfish crackers,
Cash purchases:apples, bananas, swimsuit for Lily, stamps, salsa
Gift cards used: visa gift card(2nd swimsuit for Lily, underwear for Levi in 2 different sizes(excellent deal), candy bars, crackers, cookies, pickles, stroopwafels, (awesome clearance deals))
Wawa gift cards (hoagiefest!!), Starbucks gift card (pink drink withno ice. Order cup of ice. It is like getting two of them!)
Cheat: kimono for me on clearance $9. I was using a self checkout machine that only took cards. Chickfila(free day if you dress like a cow. We all dressed up and got $34 worth of free food but I also ordered drinks and fries and the total was a little more than the cash I had so I had to use my credit card.)
Allowable purchases: milk, cheese,
Items out of:napkins and SALSA! ok so I frequently make a fresh homemade salsa that has to be eaten within a day. I've apparently made it often enough that I had no idea that my pantry contained none of the mediocre salsa. So imagine my disappointment while watching Stranger Things and needing a snack to discover there was no ingredients for fresh or canned salsa. Have no fear. The next morning I went to the store and used cash to rectify the situation. And wouldn't you know I haven't had the urge to eat it yet. Sigh.
And I accidentally dropped my ceramic napkin holder and since then we haven't had a storage place for napkins so I actually forgot we were out of them until now.
Garden harvest: a single cherry tomato. It was delicious and I did not share. But apparently a small animal indulged on two tomatoes before me.
Free gifts: juice, milk, and free slurpee day at 7/11 and dress like a cow day at Chick-fil-A.

More beach, family, and play rehearsals. But we booked our vacation to visit family next month so of course my four year old asks everyday if today is the day we go to the airport.

Week 4:
Cereal:30 (should be 26 see cheats)
Opened bottles/jars/bags/boxes: Mac and cheese, yeast, chips, Oreos,
Allowable purchases: milk
Gifts: milk, chicken sandwiches, ice cream at the beach, ice cream cake,
Gift card purchases: (Wawa) hoagies, (Starbucks) pink drink, breakfast sandwich and lemon loaf,
Cash purchases: Dickey's BBQ, taco Bell,  Chido Burrito, Bocca ($155 in restaurant bills this week 🤦)
Cheats: cereal 2 packs(Sam's had a screaming deal for $2 for a 2 pack of cereal so I bought two and was in a credit card only lane for check out.) Clearance towels for the family, quilt batting for gifts, clearance clothes for the kids at Sam's.

Garden harvest: lots of cherry tomatoes

Big news: we booked a cruise to the Bahamas for Nov!!! My handsome hubby and I are celebrating our 15 yr anniversary. We were way too busy back in May so now is our time to sneak away. This could be counted as a cheat but we set aside the money a while ago so I don't think it really is a cheat.

Last show week! That's why we ate out so much. Ugh. This next week my goal is no eating out! I was careful not to cheat when we ate out but that was a lot of cash from my stash.

Happy Summer!

Weeks 1 & 2

Busy Busy Busy! In my head summer is chill. Summer is a time to sit on the beach and relax. 
In reality, I’m running all over creation, thanking Heaven for my A/C, and occasionally, making it
 to the beach. I am a dancer, dance teacher and choreographer. I also assist with costumes, 
props and sets. Between January and the end of July I will have assisted/been a part of 8 
productions of one kind or another. I am spent. 

A few items seem to have slipped through the cracks before Pantry Living. I’ve been trying hard
 these last few weeks to only use cash to make up for my carelessness. And I should rename my 
produce drawer in my fridge the morgue because that is where fresh veggies go to die. We eat a 
lot of carrot sticks and fresh fruits on my counter lately but I’ve killed an awful lot of cucumbers, 
lettuce, and cilantro. 

Best part of my life lately is having family in town! My brother, Andy and his wife and their son came 
to visit. Plus my other sister in law and her daughter. Plus my sister and four of her kids. 
SO much fun! So much sun! So much food! My parents fed most of them so I actually got the
leftover food they couldn’t travel home with. Win Win!

Here are my stats: 

Week1:

Cereal after week 1: 35

Opened: spaghetti sauce, Italian dressing, chips, Oreos, bag of sugar, pasta, box of cheez-its, 

Allowable purchases: watermelon, gas

Cash purchases: candy and pretzels for gifts, Bocca (pizza place), flowers,  

Gift cards used: Starbucks (pink drink, lemon pound cake), visa gift card(two fancy dresses from JCP). 

Garden harvest: handful of raspberries everyday, one green pepper

Pantry After week 1

Pantry after week 1

Week 2

Cereal: 32

Opened: peanut butter, Nutella, Oreos, pasta, brownies, candy, pretzels, dog food, pepperoni, cool
 whip, tin foil, paper towels, Italian dressing, sodas, hot dogs, 

Allowable purchases: gas, oil change, costumes that I will be reimbursed for, milk, eggs(7.5 dozen), 
bread, English muffins, bananas

Gift cards used: Starbucks (pink drink, lemon loaf), Wawa(hoagies), ShopRite(diapers)

Cash purchases: ice cream at beach(technically I left beach and bought 25 ice cream bars at Dollar
 tree for my mini family reunion.) Costumes, 

Cheats: pizza for family dinner. My dad actually paid me back with cash but then I spent the cash on
 ice cream so it made it a cheat.

Gifts: cereal(sister brought a few boxes to share while she stayed with us.) A ShopRite gift card, a 
Wawa gift card, bag of little boy clothes from neighbor, hot dog and hamburger buns

Garden: a handful of raspberries

Holiday: I hosted July 4th but my parents supplied most of the food. All I supplied was some soda,
 paper products, a few burgers, cheese, brownies, onion, condiments, pasta salad and deviled eggs. 
My parents supplied hot dogs, hamburgers, buns, soda, ice cream, cake, potato salad, green salad, 
watermelon, chips, ice. They are awesome! We had 18 people and everyone left well fed! 

Pantry after week 2

Pantry after week 2

A few photos of our fun these last few weeks.

Plus Favorite beach treats: watermelon, pretzels and a cup of peanut butter, Oreos, honey roasted 
peanuts, snapple flavored lemonades.

And a few bonus photos of headpieces I made for our next show "Once on This Island Jr"

 Let me know if you've taken up the challenge. I would love to hear your experience!
 Happy Pantry Living!

Pantry Living YEAR 7

WHAT?! I've been doing this for how long??? Crazy town. This is my seventh summer observing Pantry Living.
If you are new here- welcome and thank you! If you are back for more- I missed you!

So back in 2012 we moved into our beautiful home. Prior to that we lived with my awesome parents for 5 years while my hubby completed his teaching degree and started working. While living with my parents, we had our first two children. We were able to save loads of money because of their kindness and generosity. With that money we bought our home! We moved in August and had our third baby in November that year.
My dear husband is a Self-Contained Behavior Special Ed teacher for middle school. He has great patience and is a special breed of human to work with such complex youth. Teachers in NJ make decent money but only for 10 months of the year. And our children like to eat meals all 12 months. Fast forward to June 2013. He does a summer program at his school and I teach dance and choreograph plays and together we are trying to make up the difference but we are worried. So I did what every mother who wants there to be enough food does. I stopped grocery shopping.....wait. isn't that what you guys do?
In April  2013 I realized what would soon become our struggle so I took advantage of every sale at ShopRite. I checked all the bargain buys at every Sam's, Ollies, Target etc. I loaded my walk in pantry with cereal to feed an army, bags of flour and rice. I stocked my freezers with chicken and sausage. I planted a garden. And I made a plan. I have money in the accounts now. If I stock up and stop using my credit cards for July and August we can make it work without debt. I follow this plan every year and so far we are doing well!

 So here are my self imposed rules:

• Live off my pantry stores and my freezer
• No grocery shopping
• Allowable purchases with a credit card: Dairy, eggs, bread, produce, and gas
• Any other purchases must be made with cash (I have a small stash I squirreled away.)
• Start Date: David’s 1st day of summer vacation
• End Date: David’s 1st day of school in September (usually 10-12 weeks)

And here I am 6 years later embarking on our 7th Season of Pantry Living. It started last week and so be sure to check my next post for updates. If you followed previous years you'll notice a few changes this year. This winter I cleared away storage clutter from the side of my pantry so now the food stretches farther around and will require two pics of pantry. You'll notice the shortage of cereal. My children have slowed down their cereal consumption. They currently eat a lot of toast. Hope they don't change too much on me this summer.

A few stats to start us out: BEFORE WEEK 1
 Boxes of cereal: 40
Rolls of Toilet Paper: 99
Boxes of Mac and Cheese: 9
Bags of pretzels/chips:13
Flour: 5
Jars of Spaghetti Sauce: 6
Other items:
20 lbs of Basmati Rice
6 jars of Tikka Masala sauce
9 boxes of Lasagna
2 bottles of Veg oil
2 bottles of Olive Oil
7 boxes of crunchy taco shells/bowls

Pantry BEFORE Week 1

I did not do the full inventory of my pantry this summer. I just ran out of time. In years past I inventoried the entire pantry and freezer (didn't post it. just for my own ref) and at the end would inventory again to see where we were overstocked and where we were under stocked so I could prep for the next year. Every year toilet paper has been an issue......let's see if 99 can get us through.

Wish me luck! Leave a comment and let me know what ways you save, good recipes, thoughts. And maybe this will inspire you to live a few weeks off what you already own. Maybe this is make you hungry. Maybe this will have no impact at all. But for my family it has been a blessing and we have stayed out of debt.

Happy Summer and Happy Pantry Living!

Pantry Living is complete!

Pantry Living was a success!!!
My documentation of pantry Living....not so much.
July was difficult because I was so consumed with work projects. August was spent on vacation.
For the record, I tried really hard to follow all of my rules while on vacation. I used mostly cash and only cheated with my credit card about 4 times. I actually saved all of my receipts with the intention of documenting it all. But after two weeks on vacation (Disneyland, family fun, mountain hikes, hot air balloon festival, lots of driving and visiting) I was so exhausted I put it off. And then I could never bring myself to actually type about it all.

All my receipts I saved.

My dear niece house sat for us and ate very little of our pantry. I told her she could but she is too kind and was trying to not inconvenience me and my pantry. Because of this we had way more food and stuff at the start of Sept than usual. Just for that I extended the Pantry Living and was doing a soft version. Once David returned to work I began buying food and using my credit card again but not for a full cart just small amounts, the essentials for school lunch and such. Thursday, Sept 27 was the first time since June that I spent over $100 on groceries. That is a huge win in my book.

Our first real grocery trip since June! It is amazing how little $100 buys.

We still have more food than usual in our pantry and honestly, I was disappointed with myself. I started thinking this year I must've made mistakes, not planned our meals well enough, not bought food our family wants, etc. But then the thought came to me....I felt very unprepared this summer but I have grown so accustomed to it all I was actually more prepared than ever before. I have learned how to do it effectively. I have actually been blessed with too much this summer. I wasn't a failure.

Pantry Living after Week 12

Pantry Living Before Week 1

Cereal before week 1 -60
Cereal after week 12- 14
Items we ran out of entirely- Parmesan cheese, canned corn, tuna, frosting, spaghetti
Items we nearly ran out of- Nutella, toilet paper and paper towels (in July we almost ran out but my in laws resupplied us), green beans, olive oil, cake mixes, marshmallows, flour
Items we have too much of- salad dressing, veg oil, Oreos(I delayed opening them and kinda forgot about them. No fear, we will eat them!), pasta sauce,
Regrets- not eating more Oreos, not documenting Aug and Sept better.

Lessons learned
-my children are becoming less about cereal. They enjoy bagels, toast, and oatmeal. And my oldest loves cooking eggs by herself. Next year I may decrease our start on cereal and see where it leaves me.
-Corn dogs are my kids obsession this summer.
- Lily hates corn and being told what to do, and loves cooking fried eggs.
-Max hates spinach and he eats standing up, but requires Tums every night before bed.
-Katy loves rice and hates corn dogs, and would eat ramen noodles and ravioli daily if I allowed it.
-Levi loves cereal and corn dogs, but hates all over meats especially ground beef.
- the hubs will eat everything I cook and his only complaint is I buy too many goodies and then he eats them.
-I don't eat much. I still hate bananas, but if you eat a spoonful of peanut butter first you can successfully swallow bites of banana without tasting it too much.

Garden lessons- next year my one garden bed will stay empty. It was a huge failure this year, it definitely needs a rest.
In the second bed- The peppers grew well but most rotted before being picked. Best guess is too much rain. My cucumbers were so bitter it wasn't worth it. But I know how to grow a cherry tomato like nobody's business. tomatoes were a huge success again!

Our family is happy and healthy and we survived our 6th year of Pantry Living. Many thanks to our parents and friends who brought us food, supplies and were so supportive of my experiment! Much love to you all and Happy Fall❤️