 Hey, I'm so glad you guys joined us today. Welcome to the Clutter Corner Live. We've been doing this for a few weeks and if you're just joining us for the first time, I'm so glad you joined us. The purpose of this particular session today is that we can have a conversation, one of those deeper conversations where we look at the stuff that we have and we say, why do I have that? And then we have to ask ourselves the question is what we have still serving us in a way that promotes the best version of ourselves. And that's a tough question because sometimes it's really hard when we look at the stuff that we have and we paid a lot of money for it. And then we say, well, there's still life left in it, it's still good. And then we have to decide, do we wanna keep that and continue the best version of ourselves with that thing. So today we're gonna look a little bit at the jars that we have in our house. We're talking about plastic and glass jars. We're also talking about food storage containers and how you store the food that's either in your pantry or in your refrigerator or maybe even in your garage as a backup food storage plan. I know lots of people are doing the food storage right now. So we wanna talk about those jars and containers that we're saving and is this serving us in the best way? All right, the next thing that we wanna look at if we have to recycle some of it and if we have to let it go on its way what are we gonna get rid of and why? And then in the future as new packaged goods come into our lives, do we wanna buy the packaged goods that have all of the plastic and all of the glass and all of the things that we may not be able to recycle anymore and should we be looking at different packaging? So we've got lots of things that we wanna talk about today and I have a short prerecorded video that's gonna kind of set the stage for us. So if you will join me in that short prerecorded video I'm gonna walk you through a pantry and just look at some of the stuff that's there and I hope it sparks some interest and maybe a conversation, maybe a question. We are here to answer your questions and so jump in and answer your questions and if you wanna join me live I would love for you to jump on with me as soon as we come back from the video we'll bring people up on stage here with me and we'll have a little conversation so that we can discuss and talk through some of those things. So here's that prerecorded video that I promised you. Clean and non-pinterest pantry and a non-pinterest pantry is what most of us have. Most of us don't have these beautiful, luxurious pantries where everything is color coordinated and has labels and it looks beautiful. Most of us don't have that. Most of us have pots and pans and containers of stuff that's just chuffed in the pantry and then we hope we can find it when it's time to make a meal, right? During the COVID era with lots of people staying at home and lots of people having more meals at home the pantries have just become these catchalls in many of the homes that we're going to. Now I wanna stop for just a second and say if you're a homeowner, there is hope and if you are a professional house cleaner the pantry is a special project, okay? We call it an upsell. It is not part of a maintenance clean. It is not part of an eat clean. It is a special project all by itself. So as a homeowner if you're going to hire a professional house cleaner this is a special project and you should be expected to pay more money and just have them spend one day and all they do is clean the pantry, all right? So what we're gonna do in a pantry is we're gonna pull everything out of the pantry and we're gonna make sure that everything is in like areas. So all the big mixing bowls are gonna be stacked together as big mixing bowls. All of the containers, let's say you have pictures that are used for parties or lemonade or summertime or whatever those are all gonna be stacked in one spot. If you have pots and pans the ones that will stack on top of each other will all be stacked so that they fit on top of each other. We wanna get all of the small appliances in one area. So if you have a coffee maker or you have like a juicer or you have a food processor or a George Foreman grill or whatever you wanna put all of those in one spot. You wanna put everything that's of like mind in one spot so that at a glance you can see very easy what it is. The next thing that we wanna do in a pantry is we wanna make sure that even if you don't have matching containers and they're not cute if they are plastic and they are clear we wanna put all the food inside. So if you have noodles or you have flour or you have oatmeal or things of that nature we wanna put all of those inside clear plastic containers so we can see at a glance what it is. Now in a perfect world even if you're just using masking tape you can write the date on it of when you put it inside. So at least at a glance you kind of know how old it is. If it's stuff that you're recycling on a regular weekly or bi-weekly basis you're probably good to go. But some of this stuff like flour, sugar that might last a little bit longer and then we don't know is it two months old is it a year old, right? We wanna make sure that we know. Now as far as going through a kitchen a pantry that we're gonna clean up needs to be cleaned out preferably twice a year. This is a special project we do twice a year. And the reason we do it twice a year is because what triggers it is the hot months of the summer and the cold months of the winter. And the reason being is if we are outside and we are uncomfortable it is also uncomfortable for mice. And so mice will try to get inside the homes and they will find their way through they come up through like the where the pipes come up through the sink if there's any space there they get underneath the crawl space of the house and they'll climb up the pipes looking for food, looking for water, stuff like that. Oftentimes it's because there are babies somewhere mice create lots of babies and so they wanna provide food for their babies and they're gonna find food inside homes. Now I note about mice they don't care if you're an Airbnb they don't care for your house they don't care for your new house if you're an old house if you're rich or you're poor they don't care. Mice will come into your house and they will try to find your food and then they will just help themselves to it. So there's no shame in having a mouse inside your house it does not mean you're bad or your house is contaminated it means we need to take precautions, okay? So I do recommend inside every pantry no matter who you are no matter how wealthy or how poor you are you have mice traps inside your pantry because if a mice comes in and he sees like some peanut butter on the mouse trap he's gonna go straight over there and then bam, you got him, right? And I'm not trying to be mean I'm not trying to kill mice unnecessarily but if they come inside your house we don't want them breeding and we don't want them creating a contaminated scene inside your home. That said, we wanna put everything we can chips, noodles, crackers anything that has a smell to it we wanna put those inside airtight containers with a lid. Now one of the interesting things is lots of people will have stuff scattered all over their pantry and then they forget that they have it because if it's out of sight it's out of mind. So in a clear plastic container you can see exactly what it is. Now the goal is to put all the like food together. You wanna put all the noodles together. You wanna put all the chips together. You wanna put all of the salad dressings together. You wanna put all of the soups together. This way at a glance what are you in the mood for soup? Great, it's all right here. We want chips great, they're all right here. And so you wanna organize everything even if it's not Pinterest looking so that it's all cohesive so that it's easy to find. The reason we want it easy to find is because if we have a house full of people we wanna make sure that somebody's not wandering in having a snack and then randomly putting it back in the pantry wherever they feel like it. Because the next person comes in and they look where they thought the chips were and they say, oh no, my chips are gone. Someone ate my chips so they buy more chips not knowing that there are four different places in the pantry that have chips from four different members of the family, right? That's crazy. So we wanna put everything together and then train everybody to put everything back in its spot. This also works for the people doing the grocery shopping in your house. When they go to the store and they buy cans of soup, where do they put them? They put them in the soup section of your pantry. When they buy chips, where do they put them? In the chips section of your pantry, okay? So there are a couple of basic rules that we wanna follow. And if you follow the basic rules you keep the food up and off the floor in airtight containers, mouse traps and ant traps on the floor. What that's gonna do is discourage the rodents from coming into your space. You're like, no, no, no, this is my space. This is the food I feed my family, not your family, right? So we're making rules as far as the little critters that sneak inside our house. Now, if you do have mice that sneak inside your house and you're cleaning that up, you wanna get rid of the mice droppings and you wanna sanitize the entire area. So all of the containers, the floor, all of the area we wanna clean those with sanitization wipes or a disinfectant of some sort. And we wanna be very careful that we don't let contaminated areas where there have been mice droppings or whatever, go unnoticed because, again, that will attract other things that we just do not want in the house, okay? So as we're going through this process of reorganizing our space and cleaning up, even if you don't have a Pinterest looking pantry, you can sell a really clean pantry that's effective and it is useful to every member of your household. So that's the challenge for this week. Now, if you have a couple of free minutes, just go inside your pantry, look around, take an assessment of what's actually happening inside your pantry, because I promise you this, during the COVID era, lots of people got distracted with other things, it might've been Netflix or whatever, right, they got distracted with other things. It's late at night and they get food out, they put food back, and there's probably stuff in your pantry you don't actually know is in there or you don't know the condition or the state your pantry is in. Alrighty, this is really a sad conversation to have to have about mice. And I see that Judy asked the question, she said, we had mice and they ate everything except five or one, which is a high fiber cereal and I laugh at that because they'll eat all of your sugared cereals and they leave the healthy ones for you. I love that about them, but they will eat noodles. And so this is just a quick recycling that we've done and we've done this in lots and lots of homes. We're trying to reuse the containers that we have instead of going out and buying new fancy containers. I know the new fancy containers are like awesome looking because they all match and they're all cute and whatever. But we're now in an era where lots of the recycling centers are no longer accepting glass and even in America, they're not accepting plastic for the most part. So we have some issues going on now with the landfills and with the amount of plastic and glass that has been at one time recycled. So if we are buying large containers and I know lots of us shop at those big warehouse discount outlets where we get more for our money and that's kind of how we're trained to do is get a bigger bang for our buck, but then can we reuse these? And so if we have plastic containers or paper containers like that noodles come in, for example, we're just cutting off the label so we know what it is and we're just taping it with packing tape on the glass jars as a pickle container that we've just reused. And so with this, this allows us to keep this mice free in the pantry by locking it out of sight and out of mind. So I just wanted to highlight that as a solution if you don't already have a solution. I do have a couple of folks that have joined us already and if you would like to join us, I jump on that link because we will answer your questions in real time right now. And I'm super excited that you guys have joined us today. I see that Heather has joined us. Hi, Heather, how are you today? Hi, I'm great, how are you? Very good, it's good to see you again. Good to see you. So today we're talking about our pantries and the different types of containers that we store our food in. And one of the questions we have today for storing our food is, do you have a plan in your house and is it working for you? So that's my question for you. Do you have a plan and is it working? No, I don't have a plan and it is not working. I did clean out my tub board cabinet not too long ago and I did find things that I didn't even realize I had but I just don't know how many we need and what we need specifically. Like do I need a plastic egg holder? I don't know, like do I need a plastic pasta holder or can I, that's my problem. I get them and I don't use them but I could, so I keep them. So are you using those containers for anything right now? I mean, do they have stuff in them or they're just empty? They're just empty, taking up space in a cabinet. Okay, so do you have, do you- There you go. This is it, oh wow, okay. So just lots and lots of storage containers. Okay, awesome. Well, I love the fact that you have the storage containers because that removes the need to go out and buy some or to go looking around like, hey, when this jar is done, I'm gonna reuse it and I'm gonna use it for something else. So I love the fact that you have some and that they're clean and that they're in the right place. Those are already inside your pantry, so that's thumbs up. What we wanna start doing is we wanna start looking at everything that comes prepackaged to us and it already comes in packaging but what we wanna do is we wanna repackage it then in sealed tight containers. So if it comes in a cardboard box like the cold cereal, if it's like noodles for example where we put the label on it, we wanna package it inside a tight container. Now I know that for my breakfast smoothies, I buy flax seed for example and the flax seed comes in like one of those Ziploc bags but every time I go to take a scoop spoon out, I spill it and so I repackage it inside a container. This is just a reused peanut butter container and I just labeled it by saying flax. I don't know if you can see that. I can, yeah, that's great. This keeps it away from having like little bits of crumbs and stuff because though the mice don't particularly like the flax like Judy said, they're gonna leave the healthy stuff for you, the ants like it. And so they'll cart it off on their backs and you'll notice a little trail of ants and you're like, where did the ants come from, right? And so every crumb, everything that you have that gets left behind then has the opportunity to be picked up by a mouse or a rodent or an ant or something like that. To join us in this conversation, we have Zachariah joining us. Give us a thumbs up if you're ready to join us on stage. You're ready and we're gonna bring Zachariah on. Hi, how you doing? Good, how are you? Hi. It's good to see you today. And I see that we have Rita joining us again. Rita, give us a thumbs up if you're ready to come on. We got a thumbs up from Rita as well. We got a whole group here today. This is awesome. So let me ask you Zachariah, do you have a plan and is it working for you as far as storing the food? Storing food, yeah, I normally use like zip lock bags when it goes into the refrigerator or like we have Tuberware that like seals it. So that's mainly what I use. And is that program working for you or are you storing containers maybe that are not visible that you can't see through? So you have food that then gets left too long in the fridge because you're not seeing it in order to recycle it or use it on time? No, actually we actually have clear ones. So yeah, they're real good. I'm gonna give you a thumbs up for that. That's awesome. And I do recommend the clear ones. I know growing up my mother saved the butter containers. I'm sure none of you guys have ever done this. Save the butter containers, they're awesome containers and they're still tightly, right? They're great for soup and stuff. Oh, this is yours Heather? That's awesome. So you've got the cool whip and the soup and the butter. I found those all in my Tupperware cabinet. I don't know why I kept them other than their decent containers and my neighbor sends food over all the time and she's from a different part of the country than me. So she had no idea that we used butter containers for things and when I would send them over to her house she was so confused by it but that's what my grandmother always did. We put it in our old butter container and sent it to someone else. So my mother saved the butter containers too and she justified it because she was homeschooling and so she used a lot of those recycled butter containers for things like crayons and buttons and Legos and different child-sized packs and she would just take a magic marker and write the name on the top. But as it turns out, we had hundreds of those containers and then the catch was because you couldn't see through them what it said on the top was not always what was inside because she used a permanent marker on there when she went to change out the contents we just assumed that they were Legos when in fact it could have been buttons or something for fabric or sewing or something else. So oftentimes it would get confusing and then stuff would get mixed around that wasn't the actual thing because she had labeled it and not with tape. I wanna stop for one second and I wanna show you the tape. I'm a really big fan of this tape and this is not to sell you on the tape but to share with you a solution. This is painter's tape and you can buy them in multi-colors and we use them for our food specifically but for also other things like I just showed you with the flax it is dishwasher safe. So on any lid that goes on any container if you're gonna reuse it for soup or you're gonna put something in there that you're gonna freeze you can write the date on it and put it on the top and then if you should change it out instead of just using the magic marker or the permanent marker that then doesn't wash off you can just peel the tape off and start with a new piece of tape when you have something new. So that's a solution that we can use if we're gonna recycle containers that are not see-through and that way we're not all like Zachariah where it's all like, hey, okay, we got it all figured out. It has a system and that they're clear because then you can see what's inside at a glance. Rita, thanks for joining us. I've got a question. Do you have a program for storing all of your food and is it working? I don't have any sort of program. I just kind of put things on the pantry shelf and I also have roommates. So we all have our own shelf and we just kind of shove things on there as we buy them. And I definitely have some stuff that's been sitting there for a while that I just have touched. And is it sitting there for a while because it's still good and the expiration date hasn't happened yet or because there's no system, you just have no idea? I am pretty good about throwing things away once it's expired, but a lot of what I buy is just canned goods. I'm just not using it. So the canned goods will last for a really long time and so it's okay to have the canned goods in there. We don't have to repackage those, but a lot of the stuff that comes in, I know because we do buy them, but I'm speaking about my family specifically. When we buy something like a great big bin of rice or a big bin of beans or something, I will take a recycled container and this is, many of you will recognize this as a salsa container if you like to make spicy dishes. And so when the container was done, I didn't wanna just throw it into a landfill. And so I washed it out and then I repackaged my beans in it. Now what I like about this, and I just label that I just cut the label off the bag that it came in, but I don't want loose beans coming around, falling out of the bag or whatever. And because there are just two of us usually having dinner, I don't wanna cook all the beans in the bag, but then I could just put them inside this plastic container that has, you know, you can pour out however many you're gonna cook for dinner, but the lid back on and then it goes back in the pantry. And so this is another opportunity for using or reusing a plastic container without, you know, just them loose beans or not repackaging them or just hoping that one day we're gonna get around to it and we don't, so then we never even open the bag at all. And I do wanna stop for a second and talk about food storage. I know a lot of people over the last couple of years are focused on food storage because we are in an era of inflation and food is more expensive. People are buying really, I don't wanna say yucky food, but they're buying food that they normally don't eat and they're storing it in the event that they're starving to death and then they're going to, I don't know what, you're gonna eat it then. So we're gonna wait till we're starving and then we're gonna eat the food that we don't like. So the goal for us is to still buy the food that we like, but package it in a way that it's gonna be edible now so that we can eat it next. And then as we buy new food, put that at the back of the food storage instead of eating the stuff that we're just buying right now and saving old food for a rainy day. Does that make sense? And so how are we packaging that? So let's go back for a second to the stuff that's in your pantry. Heather, you had, awesomely, you had these butter containers. Do you have any other kinds of containers that you are currently using? I don't use them. I don't use them, I just keep them. I forget that I have them or I'll put the butter container with something else in it, put it in the fridge and then there's 30 butter containers but none of them contain butter. So all of the food goes bad, but I don't use them. I need to use them more but I can't throw them away because they are good. They're so good. Zachariah, what advice would you give Heather for her situation? You got some good ideas? Honestly, I would just, I just use a lot of tub where really. Well, it's not even my idea, it's my wife's idea. I'm just taking the beans for it, but yeah. I usually just use a bunch of tub where even like for the rice and beans and stuff like that, I even set that on the counter and just have like a label on the same rice, beans, flour, stuff like that, just to keep it neat and organized. People come over and they're like, okay, your kitchen is, you know. Yeah, I think all going on. Yeah. So do you guys have any containers that are like stained? I know for example, like if we heat up soup in the microwave and I'm going to show you this because it's kind of gross, but like this is just one of those recycled tubs. And I think at one point there was like ice cream or something in it. And I love the containers because it's perfect for heating up soup as it goes on it. But then like it's all stained because of the tomato soup that we heated up. And so I don't want to ruin a nice Tupperware container. I want to ruin the Chippo container, right? But I have, and I'm embarrassed to say this, but like I have a stack of these stained tubs and I used to have like my mother, I used to have hundreds of these, right? Like every time that we had, you know, for years I saved them until we decided that, well, we only use like the same five or six. So I don't need hundreds of them. And then I stopped buying packaged foods like this and then just making the soups in the crock pot and then just using the ones that I have. So this is my whole entire collection now. And so I have plenty, but I've narrowed it down from hundreds to maybe 10. Definitely have those. So what is the magic numbers, Zakariah? What's the number for that? Just as in just have them Tupperware or just for stained Tupperware? What's the right amount for stained Tupperware? We'll start there. I usually like the butter containers, I have a few of those. So like when my son wants like some ramen noodles, or something like that, I can just throw it in there real quick. Spaghetti, sauce, stuff like that. That's the kind of stuff I put my, like my sauces in and stuff like that just so I won't mess up with stuff that I actually paid for, yeah. One of the things that, and this goes back to something that Rita said, she has roommates and with Rita's situation, are you, do you guys share food at all or do you only eat your own food? How does that work at your place? At my house, oh. I'm sorry. First we'll do it at Leenakariah because I know everybody has a different question and this is a great question. We share all our condiments and things like garlic, spices, like all of those little things, everything in the fridge, generally we share. And then our like actual pantry shelves is just ours, but we all have different storage systems, which is part of the problem. Like sometimes like chia seeds, for example, we all use them in our Spoonies, but like some, we have two packets and one is like in a Mason jar and labeled and it's like super nice and the other packets just open and like sitting or floating around the pantry because people put it back in different places. So there's definitely issues with that. So, and I use the chia seeds too and mine is like a recycled, I think this is also a peanut butter container. I like the powdered peanut butter from my smoothie but I just type chia on there on one of those painter tape labels. And so then this just keeps it airtight and it keeps it from whatever. But I like having it in a container, like you said, having it in a Mason jar because that way everybody can access it and it's not spilling out and it's not loose. Is it possible you could package the other one up and put it away until you've used one and you guys just share that or go in collectively? Yeah, I mean, we definitely just need a better system for like inventorying like what we already have because we end up with doubles and triples of a lot of spices just because we have no idea what's in the house and then you wanna cook, you're already at the store, you're like, I might as well buy it. So, yeah, I don't know. Awesome. Zachariah, I was gonna ask you the same question. So can you ask me one more time? I forget what Rita's question was. Rita, I asked you a question, what was it? You had asked me like, since I have roommates. Oh, if you share food. Yeah, all right, all right, thank you. I jumped off and I talked about chia seeds and I jumped in your rabbit hole and then I got in my way back. Thank you, Zachariah, for asking the question. I mean, we share food, I mean, it's me and my wife and then we have a five-year-old in a four-month-old so I really don't have to share food as much. I mean, once we're done eating it, we either put the rest up for lunch for the next day and then, but I mean, how we do that is we put it in the clear containers. That's mainly how we do it. And you all eat at the same time? Most of the time, yeah, yeah. Okay, and Heather, how about you? Does your family all eat at the same time? No, no, everybody eats at a different time which I started thinking might be a better idea or a good idea for my butter containers because I couldn't just separate them out the dinner and then say, hey, everybody's butter dish is it for dinner or is it for tonight? That could be something that I use it for. But I was curious with you saying that you wanted to repackage. What do you do about bread and tortillas? Do you repackage those? Because I'm wasting a lot of those for them going bad. Well, we do use a freezer at our house. We have a freezer and a deep freeze. And so if we're buying bread, for example, my question to myself, and that's, I love that question. How much are we gonna eat this week? And so if I'm gonna eat like some bread this week, I might leave some bread out and I'm talking about maybe four or five pieces. But if I'm not gonna eat a whole loaf and I have to start thinking through what are the lunches look like for today? Because at the top of every day, I pack breakfast, lunch, and dinner for everybody in the household. And so what that looks like for me and my system are little tiny four and eight ounce containers. And I break up all of our food when I make the food. And I usually cook one day a month and I put everything inside crock pots. And then when I break it up and it's little soups and little yams and whatever, it's usually in one individual sized portion because unlike Zachariah's family, we don't eat all at the same time. And because our schedules are hazard and people are coming and going and whatever. If there are two of us and we're eating at the same time, I mean, it sounds kind of silly but I just take out two portions and then I heat them up in the same, in on the microwave at the same time. And they're literally two portions and they're already portioned out which keeps us from like gaining extra weight by just eating whatever or finishing off the last of the whatever is there. And then when I put the plates out and I get the plates ready, I just dump them upside down on the plates and now we have the servings and they're hot and whatever and there you go. So that's the system that we did but one of the things that we did that was really intentional is aside from this size and I have no idea what this size is, this is probably maybe, I don't know, 16 or 20 ounces, 28 ounces, this is a large container but this is the largest dinner container in our home. And I say this because I don't want anything that's bigger than this because if I'm gonna heat it up for dinner, we don't have five people eating for dinner. If there are two of us eating dinner, we're never gonna eat more than this amount. And so even if it's only half full, we're never gonna need a bigger container. So if I have enough for two containers or three containers then I'm packaging it up so that it's meal ready so that when I put it inside the freezer, all I'm thawing out is the stuff I'm gonna use. Does that make sense? And so one of the things that we do have and I said, I just lied to you guys. I hate it when I lie. Oh, I hate it. I just lied to you guys. So that was the biggest container I have in my house. I actually have a big series of containers and these are bigger containers. These are those great big glad containers and I can fit a half a watermelon inside this container. And so this is not necessarily for the individual food but like if I go to Costco, for example, they have these awesome muffins. Have you guys ever had the muffins from Costco? They're cool but they come in a pack of six. And so I wrap those up individually and I can fit six of those in one of those great big tubs and those go right in the freezer. So back to your question, Heather, about what do you do if you're not eating at all? I only take out the one muffin if there are two of us and we'll cut it in half and we'll split it so that we can each have half. That will be our dessert, for example. So it's not, oh, we have all of these that are gonna go bad if we don't eat them. Let's each eat two today. Right. It's kind of spaced out and because of the freezer that lets us freeze some of those. Zachariah, do you have a freezer rule about your house? Do you freeze anything or is it most deep in the fridge? I definitely freeze the bread. Like we buy like three loaves at a time when we go grocery shopping and we throw the two that are too late to expire we'll throw those in the deep freezer and then we'll just have one in the pantry. But other than that, that's about it. And Rita, how about you? How do you utilize your freezer? Do you guys also share the freezer? Yeah, I mean, we share everything. But sometimes when I go home, my mom will make me like homemade dishes and she knows she's making me way too much to like eat in one sitting. So I'll usually put like the soups or curries or whatever she's making me in the freezer so that I can eat them like in a future week or whenever I'm able to eat them. But then when I'm done with those containers because she always uses like the cheap plastic ones I always wash them and store them even though I know I'm not gonna use them just because she gave them to me and I feel bad throwing them away I guess. So they just stacking up my cupboard. Heather said something that reminds me of what you just said about your mom. Heather said something a minute ago about how she saved the butter container so that she could put food in them and give them to the neighbors and whatever. And I love that because it suggests that Heather is feeding those that need food and I just love that about Heather. I just love that, I think that's amazing. But that's a really great way to send some of that on its way. Like, hey, somebody needs this potato salad and I made extra with the intention of sharing it with my neighbor that is either maybe they're a shut in or they're just had surgery or something and they're not able to get out it might be a new mom or something like that. And so that's a great way to label it. And I would suggest once again something like the painter's tape where you label the date like this is potato soup and it was made on this day. So they can in fact, like Zachariah said I'll put it inside their freezer for a later time if they're not gonna eat it right then. And so I love that because if like you said Heather said her neighbor didn't know what it was because where she's from she doesn't recycle containers. But I think it's a really great habit for us to get in if we have extra containers and then make a limit on how many we're gonna have. We have a note and I have to just stop and say hey to everybody that showed up we've got Judy's bakery here we've got Violet XOXOXO we've got some Facebook users we've got Blue Star we have Evan Shelton we have KOS you guys I'm so glad you joined us we've got Glide and Glow it's so good to see all of you guys today thank you for joining me. As I look at this there are lots of really great comments and somebody said I have decorative mason jars on the counters with labels ordered on Etsy on the lid now that sounds fancy. I keep nuts in them trying to have us eat nuts and snacks rather than chips I love that and it's worked okay over the years but I'm probably gonna get rid of them and move them into a cupboard. I do have a pantry I don't have a pantry unfortunately. I wanna highlight this for a second because this is somebody that has taken mason jars and has reused them for awesome use putting healthy snacks in there and if we don't have healthy snacks we're not gonna take advantage of eating them right if they're not available to us we're not gonna use them. And so I really love the fact that somebody is willing to reuse those mason jars. I know growing up we had thousands of them we grew up on orchards where every season we would can about 2000 quarts of peaches 2000 quarts of pears 2000 quarts of apricots 2000 quarts of cherries and it was kind of like 2000 was like the limit and then we don't get sick of those items and that's about how much we've used but it was everything from potatoes to salsa to pickles to you name it. We lived on a great big farm and we had lots of orchards and then what happened is over the years as my family started moving away we had a surplus of those mason jars. And so I'm curious do you guys have mason jars kicking around that you're looking for new uses for? And that's a really interesting question. I have a mason jar here that I use and this is a bobbin of thread that I use for my selling and instead of just having the bobbin kicking around I just put it inside a mason jar and then it can unwind itself as I'm sewing and that's just, you know, just a use. I'm not gonna put any food in or anything but that keeps it from rolling around on the floor if it gets tugged the wrong way. Somebody sent me this the other day we announced that we're having a show and someone sent this to me as a gift. I have no idea where it came from so if somebody on this call sent this to me thank you so much this was awesome and this looks like a drink and it has like an airtight seal on it so somebody got creative and they poked a hole in this lid and it looks almost like a candle lid if you will and then it has a metal straw that can be washed with a tiny brush. So this is another way of getting rid of the plastic drinking bottles that I'm so guilty of using and just using a mason jar. So that's an opportunity for something like that. Rita, do you have any creative ways that you've used mason jars? Yeah, I have a lot of like pens and pencils and rulers and knickknacks like that and I free-purpose mason jars just as like little cup holders on my desk just to hold those kind of supplies and then besides that I drink out of them a lot like I use them for water cups or when I make matcha or tea I just kind of like them because they're a little fancier. Do they have a handle on them or like do you just hold the whole thing like this? I just hold it just like that. Does it burn your hand? No, I only make ice drinks in a mason jar. Oh, oh, oh. And then I imagine like what did you have like you walk on fire and stuff or like what? So cold drinks, I could get onto that. Awesome. Heather, how about you? Do you have any mason jars or any jar experiences that you? Actually, yes. I saw at Hobby Lobby they were selling these little attachments for your jars and you can turn them into hand soap or dish soap or... Oh, great idea. Yeah, and so I started using those and refilling them and putting them in all of, especially like to spare a bathroom and by the sink. I have one that says like dish soap and one that says hand soap and they're just reused from, I'm not even sure where I got them, but wherever I got them. I love that idea. Do you guys that are in the comments? Do any of you want to jump up here and you've got suggestions or solutions you want to share with us about mason jars? I would love to hear your input. If you do, we have a link. Hi, Amber. Hi, Joni. Guys, it's so exciting that you're here. I'm super excited. Joni says, I use mason jars for the bathroom for cotton balls. Yes, I love that. You can only have so many though. And so I'm curious, Joni, what is your limit and where do you draw the line? I recycled an old candle container. There's like a Yankee candle container and I put my cotton balls in it for my bathroom. And for me, I then had one for every bathroom. So I allowed myself to buy candles or I received them as gifts. Then when they were done, I heated them up and I pulled out the wax and then I use them and I have one in every bathroom and then that was my limit. So then I told people no more candles because I have recycled the jars and all the bathrooms now. Judy says they have, this is awesome. Judy says they have Dollar Tree plus lids with holes. I keep baking powder in the fridge, in the fridge mason jars with the handles. That's awesome. That's awesome because that's something you're gonna use and it's a small portion size and that would fit awesome inside your fridge. So thank you, Judy for sharing that. I love that. I also have a small mayonnaise container, also glass that I use for these little makeup wipes that we take our makeup off with. And they come in like this weird little package that is hard to get out. And so I just keep them inside the little glass jar in the bathroom and then that way it's easy access but it also keeps like if my hands are wet, it keeps my hands from dripping on them and keeps them nice and fresh. But again, one for every bathroom and then that's my cut off. So I'm curious the rules that you guys have and do you have rules for how many jars you're gonna keep? In the comments, do you have a rule for how many jars you're going to keep? My mom and dad, like I said, have thousands. And so now they're starting to outsource those to other farmers that also have orchards. So that's, you know, they're getting rid of some of that. Blue Star says they're nice as flower vases too. Yes, that's awesome, especially if you have a rose garden and you could just cut them fresh out of your garden. So that's awesome. Joni says, I have no limit since I use them at Christmas to gift various foods or crafts. That's a great idea. And that goes back to what Heather said earlier about re-gifting them to those that may need them and then you don't expect them back. So I love that, that's awesome. All right, do you guys have any questions so far? Heather or Rita, do you have any questions for me so far about what we've just discussed or covered? I do, I buy a lot of like sour cream and things like that yogurt or not necessarily the big tubs of butter, but the smaller containers. And I mean, they're going to come in that container, you know, like I can't get it any other way. So what do, do I just recycle it or is there anything around the house that I should wonder about keeping it for or should I just be like, okay, this is another sour cream container and I don't need it? Well, it's a great question. And it's one that really bears us asking because right now we're in an era where there's more packaging. I don't know why there's more packaging. It seems like in America than in any other country. And it's really alarming to me. I order something from online, for example, and it's not just a box that arrives, it's a box inside of a box. And then like, whoa. And then I open up the box, take out the other box and I open it up and then there's all this air packaging and extra stuff. And I'm like, whoa, by the time I get down to the item, it's a very small item and a great big series of packages. And then all of that packaging either has to be recycled or it goes to a landfill. And a lot of the food that we're buying is the same, which is one of the reasons why I shop in bulk. It reduces the amount of packaging that I buy. And so if I go to, for example, a big discount store here in America, we have Costco, we have BJs, we have Sam's. They're these big discount warehouse stores. A lot of the stuff that we can buy comes in big bulk packaging. And then we can repackage it and we can re-freeze it. And I know this sounds like extra work, but I know for example, we can even buy spaghetti sauce. And Zachariah a few minutes ago mentioned the spaghetti sauce, which then just made me want some spaghetti. The reality is I don't need a great big bunch of spaghetti, but if I'm gonna make it, I'm gonna make it in a crock pot and I'm gonna make a bunch because like Rita said, where her mother makes some food knowing that there's more than they're going to eat, then you can package it up and you can put it in the freezer and you can utilize it for other meals. And so along with that, I'm gonna package a whole crock pot full of this spaghetti sauce, for example, and I'm gonna put in the meat and the spices and I'm gonna let it simmer and it's gonna just be delicious. But then when I'm done with that, those are gonna go inside eight ounce containers or four ounce containers. And the eight ounce container would be for spaghetti for two people. The four ounce would be spaghetti for one person. And so then if I'm making a meal and I'm the only one eating, then I'm gonna be pulling out of the freezer that one small container and I'm only gonna be heating up that one small container. The rest of it can stay in the freezer and marked with a label, painter's tape label, marked with what this is and the day that it was created. And that way I know at a glance how old it is so that I can recycle that. And then one of the cool things is we always ask ourselves when it's time to go shopping if we need anything, like what exactly do we need? And we keep in our house, we keep a Google Keep file. Do you guys know about Google Keep? Google Keep is, if you're not familiar with it, it is a spreadsheet basically, not a spreadsheet but like a checklist that is part of the Google suite of tools. You can access it from your phone, you can access it from a computer, a notepad, a tablet, whatever. And basically if you go to the little keypad up on Google, you can click on the keep, it's a little yellow light bulb and down at the bottom you just say add checklist, add check marks, check boxes. And so with that you can keep an inventory of all the stuff that you have in your fridge and your freezer and you can actually put a date out to the side. When you use that and it's gone, then you click it like, hey, this is what I need, you uncheck it where we need more, that becomes your shopping list. So for whoever in the family is shopping, whether it's the kids, whether it's, you've outsourced it to somebody that does shopping for a living, whether it's your spouse, whether it's yourself, everyone that's tagged on and you just add their email at the bottom so that they then can access that list. Everybody has access to that. At a glance you can say, oh, we're out of spaghetti sauce. And then you know that's gonna be on your next shopping, but if you wanna go shopping for it and you have some and it's not on the list, you say, oh, that's inside my freezer. Then you go shopping out in the freezer and you open the fridge and say, oh, let's see what would I like to have today? And you pull out those little items that you're gonna eat from today and this week and whatever. And like I said, every Tuesday, it just happens to be the day that I do this. I go through my refrigerator and my pantry and my freezer and I just take a quick inventory. What do I need for this week? And if, if, don't tell my husband this because I don't think he knows that I know this and that this is actually my strategy, but it's his day off on Tuesday. And so if he doesn't have anything to do, I can send him to the store with my shopping list and he can buy all the stuff that I need. But then I've done a quick inventory of all the stuff that I'm going to cook for meals for the rest of the week. So if I need anything, he can go get it while he's out and about. And that way I don't have to go out to the store, but I'm not buying extra stuff I'm not gonna use. I'm really keen on that. How do we, going back to your question, Heather, how do we not buy so much? We only buy the stuff we know we're going to eat this week. And because we're out and about, we have stores everywhere we live. It's not like we live 50 miles from the nearest store. So we can buy stuff at any time, but we only go shopping once a week. Do you recommend, when you do your freezer stuff, do you use that in glass or do you use the plastic containers? Do you use a baggie? Like what's the best? So you can do both, but I find personally for me, the plastic is better. And it's because I'm sort of clumsy. And if I open the freezer and I bump something, the glass hits the pavement, it's gone. It just shatters. And then I have a mess to clean up and then there's glass everywhere. And so for me, just the plastic works a lot better. And I like the big storage containers for the freezer because I can pack inside here. And I also have bigger tubs. Like the bigger tubs we put our socks in. I shouldn't confess this because we use those big tubs even inside our freezer because I can fit like 40 tubs, 40 little small tubs inside one of those great big bins and put that inside the big freezer and they stack so that they're easy to access. And I'll have like one of chicken and I'll have one of beans. I'll have one of yams. I'll have one of zucchini squash. And so just based on what I'm gonna fix for dinner that night, I can just open a tub of one of these, one of these and you can have as much as you want but they're all portioned out into individually sized meals so that whoever's eating, whether it's five people or 10 people or one person, you'll have enough just for that meal. I would be really curious if anyone in the comments or anyone watching has ideas for specific things that they use over and over and they know that that bottle or that container works really well for a specific thing. Like for instance, the, I use this Dawn flavor burst stuff it's like these little beads. Well, those work perfect to hold like little beads for my granddaughter or rubber bands for, and they just like pour out really nicely. So I'd be curious what all people have found that they're like, this container is reused perfectly for this. Uh-huh. KOS says I use black wide containers with the clear top so no staining issue. And I guess that's going back to the heating of the super. And so that's awesome because the black container is not gonna show the stains because I don't know how you get the stained out once it's kind of like cooked into the plastic. I don't know. Great question, Heather. I know for me personally and I would love to have you guys jump in and answer that question for Heather. What do you use as far as the same containers over and over again? I know for me, like for example, my smoothies, I make smoothies every day. And it's a big part of my day. And so this comes from one of those zipper bags that is sealed, but again, I spill it. And so this is a saved M&M container from one of those big discount stores. It's true, we did buy the M&M peanuts. And I shouldn't tell you this because like we're trying to be healthy but every year for my husband's birthday he gets one of these big jugs. And so I love it because we've reused them all. And this is one of those things I reuse. These are the greens for the dried spinach and kale that goes inside my smoothies. And again, it's one of those containers. And this is one that I've cut the label off and it has the hemp hearts on it. Now I would have a label on this and I should have. This is from my dad's garden. And so it's organic spinach and the greens that he grows in his garden. And so I don't have a label for that. I should make one but we reuse these containers over and over and over and they stack and they store really well for the smoothies. And I just keep them inside a drawer in my fridge. So that's where I keep them but that I use over and over again. And I do recycle my peanut butter containers. Like I said, this one is for my flax seed. And so I like these containers because they're small and they're compact and they are plastic. So if they fall they're not gonna break. But I use those consistently over and over and over. When they run out I fill it up with more flax seed. When the chia runs out I fill it up with chia seeds. When the greens run out I fill it up with new greens. I do that over and over. And I also reuse these again when they run out. I fill them up again and again with cotton balls. And that's just kind of my go-to. But I've really started paying attention to the stuff that I'm buying and bringing in the house. And one of the things that we've done is like the mustard and ketchup containers and stuff are not easy to recycle because they're tiny, but it's plastic and it's, you know. And so we've really cut back a lot on the condiments that we use. We've gone with just whole foods. So I know that sounds like a cop out. But we've just kind of gone more simple with the eating style. Catherine says, do you reheat your foods in plastic containers? Glass is so much safer according to research. Can you address that or are you not concerned about that? Yes, I am concerned about that and that is a great question. What we've done on lots of occasions is if you have one of those little plastic tubs, if you take it out of the freezer and you let it air out for a couple of minutes, you can kind of like pop the bottom of it and the whole content will come out like a little popsicle. So like imagine a yams popsicle that comes out and you can put that on a plate and then put like a microwave lid on it and you can heat all of your food up about the same time if they are in those little containers because they're all about the same size and so they're all gonna heat up about equally. So that is the secret to that. But I have been guilty of also heating them up in the plastic containers like I do with the soup. So it's not a perfect world. I don't live in a perfect world. I make a lot of mistakes when it comes to recycling and stuff like that and using not glass instead of plastic or whatever. I try to make the better bad choice. And so oftentimes there are two bad choices. Like it's not really healthy for me to microwave food either. I should be eating it raw, I know that. And so if I'm gonna eat the microwaved food, the microwaved food is probably better than really processed foods that are, I don't know, just prepackaged and have like hidden preservatives in them. So it's a better bad choice. And so I don't know, it's not a perfect world and I'm not perfect, but I'm trying to do better. And I think that's the next question is are we trying to do better with our choices? Okay, so we have lots of questions here that are coming in. I wanna answer some of these and I'm gonna ask Rita because I know Rita is wicked smart. Rita, this one says, my pantry got completely out of control during COVID because I was buying a lot more shelf stable stuff. So much of that ended up expiring. I know that you said there's a lot of stuff that you don't use, but what advice would you give or recommend for processing stuff that could expire in a pantry or in your cupboards? I mean, if things are close to expiration or even if you've had it for a while and it's still a couple months out from expiration but you know you're not gonna use it, I would recommend going to a food pantry or there's a lot of local shelters in every city that you could give that food to and it would go to good use, like they would use it immediately. Or even meal prepping too, that's something I've tried to be more conscious of. If I know I have a lot of like chickpeas or something and I'm like, I'm gonna cook chickpeas for myself tonight, I'm like, I might as well make all the chickpeas I have and then store it in various containers for use throughout the week. And then I know I have my meals covered and I'm going to be eating all of those ingredients. That's a great idea. I love that idea. I just remembered that at the animal shelters, they always say that they can use any of those plastic containers for dog food, cat litter. And I have started doing that because you said about the mice and all that, I switched to using containers for my dog food and my cat food. Cause I used to just keep it in the bag, you know, just sitting in the pantry or whatever, but now I put it in an actual container and seal it so that no mice or bugs or anything like that are trying to get in. Well, and I think that's really important. One of the things that we've seen over the years cleaning houses, and this is every walk of life, every type of home, if there's a small breach and it can be just, I mean, I don't think mice actually have any skeletal bones and stuff. I think they can like squish themselves flat and like get in the tiniest little crevice. But if they can get inside your house and they find food, they're gonna come back again and again, and I don't know why, but they're gonna make friends and bring friends with them. And so it's easy once a mouse has gotten inside your house to come back again and again and again. And so if you eliminate the want to come back by putting stuff in really tight airtight containers, even if it's just stuff like, I know noodles, for example, noodles don't seem like they're very fun, but they will eat them. And they love potato chips and Cheetos and weird things like that that we love as well. Here's the secret. If you love it, so do mice. If it's like the gross stuff that's really healthy, they'll probably ignore it. But if it's stuff like potato chips, if it's cold cereal, if it's the delicious stuff and they'll eat through cardboard, they'll eat through potato chip bags, they'll eat through all kinds of stuff just to get to the food that's inside. And if you have some like chips, for example, and it's on your fingers and you close the bag or you put a clip on it, they can smell that that was on your fingers and they will attack the bag. And so oftentimes, even if they can't get through the bag, you'll see like it'll be knocked off on the floor and there will be nibbles at your food. And so even a bag of chips, I know this sounds really silly, but even a bag of chips inside a big container like this, is gonna be really awesome because you can seal it and that way they can't get in even if you have a bag of chips. So we store like anytime we have chips or popcorn or things like that, you can also store it in a big container and these also stack on top of each other. And so whether it's inside a cupboard or it's inside your pantry, there are ways you can do that that then kind of discourage mice from coming in. But I can't say enough about mice because once they get inside, they can just wreak havoc and that's not very sanitary. I've noticed that more than anything else at my house, the chips last a lot longer now that I am putting them in something. I used to throw a half a bag of chips away all the time because they would go stale and no one would eat them. And now we're consistently eating them because I keep them in a container and they stay fresh. Well, and I'm so glad you brought that up because it comes back to an earlier question that you had, what is your suggestion for not having so much waste? And the answer is really to pay attention to what it is you have. And then instead of us just going shopping like, hey, I'm out and about, what am I gonna make for dinner tonight? I'll just pick something up and take it home. Really to ask yourself the question, what does my week look like in terms of food? And because I package our breakfast, lunch and dinner every day and I make lunches and it's for me for this reason, I work out of my house. And so if I pack my breakfast, lunch and dinner and I take it with me to my office, my home office, it keeps me from going to the refrigerator 10 times a day and go, oh, let's see the new treats or new things appear, right? Because if new treats have appeared, which normally it doesn't, but it's easy to just say, well, I'm hungry, I'll eat whatever. And then I just eat whatever randomly and it's not portioned out. So by deciding early in the day, this is what my day looks like as far as the food I'm gonna consume. I can kind of budget that throughout my day and I'm kind of hungry right now, but I know I'm gonna eat maybe an hour and whatever I'm gonna eat fits inside a little container, right? So by knowing what it is I'm gonna eat and I'm gonna budget that through the whole day, I can kind of train myself to not just be randomly eating weird stuff. And so along with that, then I'm making a decision, what does my entire week look like? And so it changes the way that I shop, it changes the way that I cook, it changes the way that I store things, it changes the kind of packaging that I bring into my home. I know for example, we love those great big bags of I think they're called Normandy vegetables that you can buy at Costco. And they come in a great big bag, it's like 10 bucks or something and it's got cauliflower and broccoli and carrots and squash and a whole bunch of things that are already cut up. And I love it because they're already cut up. It's like somebody did all the work for me, but none of us at the house are gonna eat a whole big bag of that at one time. So I bring it home and I dump it out in a great big bowl and I dish those out into those really small package size meals. And I didn't cook them, but when I do cook them, I'm just heating them up and that goes great with some rice and maybe a piece of chicken or something for dinner. There's your whole entire meal. And then I don't have a lot of packaging, I had one bag that all of that came in. And that's even less packaging than buying all of the fruits and vegetables individually and then cutting them up and doing all of the food prep and all of those things, right? So it's just being aware. And when you're aware, what do we say? We have choices. I've noticed that some of the, like I try to not buy containers because I have so many of the ones from the fridge or whatever, but there are some containers that are very specific to a certain thing. And I always thought they were just kind of gimmicky, but I got one of the berries, but my berries stay two weeks, three weeks now. I mean, like they stay fresh so long and my like mushrooms and you get containers that are specifically for them, they'll last so much longer. So maybe it is worth investing in some of those like specific ones. Well, Heather, in closing, because I know our time is up for today and I've really enjoyed you guys joining me today. In closing, what suggestions would you make to us moving forward through the next week of maybe things we can be conscientious of as we just pay attention to the types of ways that we're storing stuff? Well, I don't know that I can give anyone an advice because mine is bad, but I did find that I took all of my lids and started putting them inside of other containers, to hold all the lids together. And that helped so much in my cabinet that I hold them all in. Oh, what a great idea. Yeah. What a great idea. So this is all of your lids packaged together. Yes, it stays together so they're not flying all around and you're not looking in tin spots. It's nice, I like it. Okay, yours is way fancier than mine. I have mine right here and mine is a great big, just a box. And so it's a cardboard box, but when the lids come out of the dishwasher and they've dried out, I just grab a handful of lids and I throw them in the box back in and we're done, easy peasy. Rita, you're laughing at me. What is your solution or suggestion for us in closing today that we can be more conscientious of the ways we package our food or the things that we store them in? Just in terms of fridge storage, I like to use all the same size containers, like type of container. They just stack really well and I think it's the most conservative in terms of space. So I use all rectangular containers that are all like the same size and my storage is a little different when they're empty. I actually will put the appropriate lid on the appropriate container and just stack them up and recovered. So is that because you just don't have so many of them or yeah, I guess I don't have a ton and it also saves time. If I'm like in a rush to like put food away, I can just grab it and know I already have the lid that goes with it rather than searching for both parts, you know. I love that. And I'm guilty of hanging onto both pieces. Like if a Tupperware frozen Tupperware container hits the cement and it busts, I throw the bottom halfway, but I save the lid. And then other times when I go to pull the lid off if the lid cracks and breaks, then I have like a spare lid. So I do have extras and just kind of as a backup, you know, in case one bust, but with the Tupperware containers, and I hate to say this because again, gross, but like after you've used it for a while and you've used it in the microwave, if this is clean, it just doesn't look clean anymore and it's not pretty. And so do you keep the ones that are not pretty? And my answer is it still has utility. And so this might be used for other purposes than food, but I still use this as for all the little buttons and bolts and nuts. That might be a good starting point for someone though that it maybe has too many. They could say, okay, all of my stained ones, I'm gonna go ahead and get rid of because if you already have that many and you don't need that many, you might as well start somewhere and the stained ones. Yes, and in the vein of organizing, I agree with what you say, get rid of those that you're not gonna use. One of the things I'm doing right now, I'm trying to organize my garage. And so I'm using, I'm like taking the gross ones and I'm putting those for like buttons and nuts and bolts and things like that, like what in the garage that also stack, because they don't have a stackable plan right now. And so it's going from coffee cans, like just metal coffee cans that don't have lids and stuff, to airtight container lids that I can then keep the dust and the little bugs and stuff out of and then also label it properly so it's easy to find. So I think we covered a lot of really great ideas today on ways that we can use them. I really appreciate you guys jumping on stage and adding your two cents in your comments. I really am delighted that all of you guys joined us in the comments today. This is awesome. We're gonna continue the conversation below. And so if you have questions, just keep asking them because we're gonna be jumping in and out and we'll answer them over the next few weeks and we'll join it again next week. We're gonna be doing this same time, same place next Thursday when we're gonna be talking about our next topic. And I forget what it is off the top of my head, but we'll let you know very soon. So thanks again for joining us. It was awesome. I'm so glad that you guys were here today. This was so much fun. And I really enjoy spending some time with you guys on Thursday. It's good seeing you. Good seeing you too. You guys have a great week. You too. All right, take care.