Category: Corners of Our Home

Looking Almost as Organized

Time for a pantry update!

This fall I organized our pantry. To refresh your memory, here’s a shot from back in September before I whipped it into shape:

Here’s a view of it immediately after I cleaned and purged the pantry, got rid of the bulk foods baggies by organizing bulk items and spices in to jars, and labeled everything with chalk ink:

Here it is two months later after a big shop (so stuffed to the brim!) and not too disorganized:

There may be fewer items put in jars and neatly labeled, but overall it’s still organized and I find that finding items remains relatively easy. Success!

I had a feeling that since I promised to show you pictures of the pantry every few months the pressure would be on and I could keep it tidy. :)

As a bonus to this post, I thought it would be fun to give you a glimpse into our fridge, which truth be told is actually quite organized these days.

Top shelf: water, apple and grape juice, milk, sourdough bread (for David and Miss Leyba), goat cheese (behind) and leftover (really old) smoothie (whoops!).

Second shelf: eggs, juice boxes, leftover polenta, tofu, milk; cheese (blue, Monterrey jack, and cheddar), garlic, and ginger in the cheese drawer.

Third shelf: more eggs, yogurt, potatoes, yams beer (behind, for David), limes (behind, for squeezing into my water), veggie dogs (for David and the peanut; I haven’t been able to find gluten-free ones for me yet).

Crispers drawers: carrots, cauliflower, cucumber, celery, onions, lemons.

Can you tell I visited Costco this week?! (Hence the multitude of (mostly local) dairy products!) I think we’ll have to make a fritata to get through those eggs and I have plans for a veggie intensive cheddar mac and cheese with all that cauliflower (from an article called healthy comfort foods! Bring it!).

Nom nom.

What are your meal plans for the week? I need help. Easy, quick and vegetarian, please.

Morning Fog

One of the perks of living near the ocean is the fog that rolls in during most evenings, a buffer from the ocean that keeps us warm in the winter and cool in the summer. (On those sumer days when there’s no fog, we know it will be a very hot day.) This is the view we wake up to each morning:

Each and every time I look out the window and see the fog (before it burns off for the day) I think about this scene in the Keira Knightley version of Pride and Prejudice:

Stunning.

Autumn in Wine Country

In our Northern California life, autumn arrives in November with grapevine leaves changing colors. Never mind the 60 and 70 degree temperatures during the day, it’s starting to get chilly at night and the leaves are responding.

This colorful spread only lasts for a few weeks before the rain washes the leaves down or the automated vine cutting machines move in and trim the branches (I know, how unromantic).

I try to savor every moment as I drive about town this month.

I think that spread of yellow, orange and red is rather spectacular. It may not compare to the New England autumns that David and I grew up with or the transformation of Aspen groves in Colorado that we grew to love, but it feels like our version of fall, in this temperate California climate without real seasons, and we’ll take it!

Harvest Decor

Despite the heat, we’re busy pretending it’s fall here in Northern California!

We now have lots of pumpkins at our house!



We had to bring something back from the pumpkin patch, right?! I admit we may have gone overboard, but they were so affordable, we directly supported a local farmer (rather than the corporation he sold the pumpkins to, although we’ve done that too with itty bitty pumpkins, discussed below), and what fun they’ll be to carve! The white Cinderella pumpkin is mama’s favorite of the bunch.

On the front porch this bouquet of dried lavender, a gift grown by our neighbor, welcomes us home. How I love its fragrance!


Wee little pumpkins that Miss Leyba plays with, pretends to cut and eat, carries around, adores! Each time we grocery shop she asks if we can pick one up. We’ll have quite the collection by the end of the month if we continue at this rate. The truth is, I love them too (the small size! the varied colors!). I especially like how different they are from each other. Such a wonderful treat.

And, finally, what’s that hidden behind the super large pumpkin on our porch?!



Miss Leyba’s outdoor (see the dirt?!) matchbox cars! (Hand-me-downs from our neighbor with now grown kids.) Such fun to play with. And to make a big pile of, evidently. Clearly a kid lives at this house!

The Organized Pantry

Also known as the ONLY organized space in our house!

To learn more about this project, please read our posts Organizing the Pantry (gearing up for the project) and Pantry Organizing Supplies (including more info about those awesome liquid chalk pens we used to label everything).

To refresh your memory, here’s what our pantry looked like before:

Here’s what it looks like now:

Top row: teas for guests, ground flax seeds for smoothies, gluten-free flour, bulk raisins and quinoa, dried beans (garbonzo, black) and canned beans for when we’re in a pinch (pinto, black), tapioca flour and cornstarch for art projects.



Middle row: quinoa/corn pasta and Miss Leyba’s stash of mac and cheese, peanuts, split peas, lentils, corn meal, pistachios, grape juice, millet, brown and white basmati rice, sauerkraut, ketchup, apple cider vinegar, canned pumpkin, polenta, jam, wakame, sesame seeds, rice wrappers, balsamic vinegar.



Bottom row: every day teas, rice cakes, flax seed crackers, cheddar bunnies, chocolate graham crackers, bite sized peanut butter sandwich crackers, seasweed snacks, blue corn chips, raisins, dried plums, nori, pine nuts, pumpkin seeds, slivered and sliced almonds, shredded coconut, capers, artichoke hearts, bouillon cubes, puffed cereals, granola, and spices.

Wow, what a difference! And, wow, do we have a lot of food in the house!

Now the challenge: keeping it this way! I may have to post monthly photos of our pantry just so I have incentive to keep it neat and tidy… you all will be watching! ;-)