I’ve been on a cleaning kick this week, and I have discovered some alarming things. Remember my problem with frozen chicken br**sts? (Why the stars? I don’t want to be attached to a google-search for that word…..) I have shared with you that I keep buying bags of chicken, because I’m always sure that we’re “out” at home. Well, apparently that’s not all I tend to buy without reason. This week I attacked the pantry and guess what? I found 4 cans of evaporated milk. First of all, I can’t remember the last time I used evaporated milk. And secondly, the only thing I think I use it for is mashed potatoes and fudge, neither of which has been made in this house for a long time. So – weird. The next thing I discovered “en masse” was almonds. Seven bags of them, all unopened. At least I had the good sense to buy different types. There were whole almonds, there were slivered almonds, and there were sliced almonds. I’m good. I think that I had intended to make a few batches of this incredible recipe and couldn’t remember what kind of almonds it called for. But I know that I didn’t buy these packages all at once – they accumulated. I know this because they were all in different spots in the pantry. FPS.
Just so you don’t think my problem is limited to food, I also cleaned out my closet this week. (I took Monday off – remember? I got a LOT done.) I actually sorted my shirts by color (I know. Too much.) and guess what I found out? I have a problem with white shirts. You wouldn’t believe how many white shirts are in my closet. Now in my defense, this is a completely different situation than four cans of evaporated milk. None of these shirts are exactly alike. There are different fabrics, different necklines, different sleeve lengths, and different styles. But still. I don’t think that on the days that I’m going to wear a white shirt, I need to have that many choices to face in the morning. FPS.
So, here is where the contest comes in. I want to know that I am not alone in this lunacy. Surely there are some of you out there who have an overabundance of something in your freezer/fridge/pantry/closet, that you never intended to have in abundance. Please tell me I’m not alone in this. And yarn doesn’t count because there is no recognized word in a knitter’s language that translates to “excess” or “overabundance”. Fortunately. Leave your answer in the comments section, and I will draw a name next Friday, February 1st, for the winner. What does the winner get? A skein of Wollmeise Sock Yarn. 🙂 I thought that would be a good way to start out our monthly blog contests for 2008. And for those of you who don’t have this little problem? You can still enter the contest. Just leave a comment and say, “I don’t seem to have that problem.” and consider yourself entered. I will try to contain my jealousy.
Speaking of contest winners, thank you to everyone who cast votes for the Q4 Challenge this week! There were actually several entries that ran neck and neck with a lot of votes, but the one that got the most votes was the Anemoi-Inspired Mittens, done by Nicole. So Nicole gets the Knitters Choice Award – a $25 Loopy Gift Certificate. And the randomly drawn winner from all of the entries was the Monkey Socks by Karen! Karen also gets a $25 Loopy Gift Certificate. It’s always so fun to see the different interpretations you all come up with for the Quarterly Knitting Challenges. You still have over 2 months left to participate in the Q1-08 – I hope you’ll join us!
Monday we will start a new, regular blog feature called The Loopy Limelight! We have so many fun and interesting people who have become part of the Loopy Family (and that includes all of you) and I thought it would be nice to introduce you to some of them. Monday, I will introduce you to a longtime friend of mine, who has a wonderful recipe (it contains chocolate – yum!) that she is going to share. We’re looking forward to sharing many more people with you in the weeks and months to come, usually on Mondays. We hope this brings some fun recipes and tips and inspiration for all of you.
Sheri anyonehaveanygoodrecipesthatusealmonds,chickenbr**stsand/orevaporatedmilk??
Journals. (Love them… I think I’m a collector;) Most of them stay Empty. 🙁
Black slim fit t-shirts…. although really can there be too many?????????? T shirt + long fitted jacket or piece of knit lace=my “uniform” 😉
(I seriously need to toss out the oldest ones…)
BY FAR my very worst offense is makeup. I own so much freakin’ makeup, and I always buy the same colors, in different packaging, because I don’t think I have it. Then I get home and realize I own multiple brownish-pink lipsticks, red glosses, sparkly beige eyeshadows, etc.
(I’ve also accumulated several jars of curry powder, and untold quantities of black tights.)
Little boxes of Trader Joe’s Pad Thai (the just add water kind) … I’ve never actually eaten one, but I buy them regularly just in case I am shut in and only have access to hot water (really, thats what I think when I buy them).
We seem to collect Gluten Free, Amy’s salad dressing. I was looking for something else, and found 7 bottles in the pantry – in addition to the two in the fridge (all unopened) We had a hard time finding gluten free salad dressing in our area for a while, so when we found it, we stocked up – but it seems that everytime we empty one, we buy two more.
I seem to have lots of black pants – 4 pair last count (after tossing 2 pair) – all exactly the same. I found some that fit right… and am afraid I won’t be able to find them again, so when I do I buy more than one pair.
Nice to know we are all not alone. 🙂
and… coffee mugs… people keep giving them to us… an d dh travels— buys lame airport coffee mugs as “souvenirs” Keep telling him to buy yarn. (I even send him links to local yarn shops near where he travels…so he could send just send it via the web…no luck… just coffee mugs… ) Silly man.
My teen son’s empty the dishwasher every night… they break about one a week;)
PS why would I ever need another mug? I have a loopy mug! (Have you contacted anyone to make ceramic/pottery loopy mugs???? I would NEED one of those for at home……
ooops… maybe it’s not all the silly man buying mugs….
I’ve got two pantry examples, but one is intended! I have about 20 packages of White Lily biscuit mix – it’s simply not available in Arizona so I always stock up when we’re visiting the ILs in Georgia (as we were for Christmas last month).
However, I can’t explain the four bottles of chili sauce I found on Saturday. Since I have maybe two recipes that use it and I might make them two or three times a year, there’s some crazy chili-elf stocking my pantry 😉
My sad frequent overbuy is flaked coconut for baking. I don’t even like the stuff and yet somehow every single time I go to get the baking things out there are 2 or 3 bags waiting for me. I think I should let the toddlers make a collage out of it all!
I know that I not supposed to mention yarn (especially sock yarn, which doesn’t count towards the stash), however, 230 skeins and counting…seriously.
Hope I’m not too late!
I make a wonderful Grilled Chicken Asian Salad (it’s easy) — it uses chicken br***ts and almonds, but not evaporated milk. Let me know if you want me to tell you how I make it.
As for my freezer, I already told you before how it’s a morge for over-ripe bananas. Well, it still is. I really need to make some Banana Bread soon, or muffins, or banana pancakes, or banana waffles…
And I too collect white shirts — many the same type, but I wear all of them. I wear them under sweaters and sweatshirts. It’s my way of not having to worry if my clothes match or coordinate, etc. White goes with everything!! And I’m always buying crackers — different kinds. I think I have a fear of a cracker shortage!
I go through phases with different stashes. For a while it was black beans, with up to six cans in the cupboard for no known reason. Evaporated milk is something I use maybe twice a year, but I’ll often have three or four cans. And socks! I always think I need more socks, so I pick them up when shopping, only to come home to find that I have so many socks I can’t close the drawer anymore.
I don’t seem to have that problem. I live in an apartment with the world’s tiniest kitchen. Seriously. I have no counter space and only 2 cupboards, one of which holds my dishes. There simply isn’t any room in the kitchen or the rest of the apartment for me to stockpile anything (yes, this includes yarn. My “stash” fits in a single milk crate container with room to spare). I also live alone. So my other reason for not stockpiling anything is simply that such spending is not budgeted. You’re not saving money if you have no place to put anything.
Somehow lentils breed in my pantry. I have several bags of dried lentils!! I breed almonds too as my husband buys them whenever I do.
We usually knock out our almond supply by tossing them in the oven at 350 for roughly 20 mintues (or until it smells done) with mini-pretzels (or the sticks), chex mix, cheez-its, all combined together with melted butter, garlic powder, cumin, and ground red pepper (or cayenne or a shot or two or five of tobasco). It’s not a formal recipe and the spices change from time to time. That’s what we do to whittle them down, but it doesn’t take long to pile up again.
Lentils are another story. We make stew or soup with them and it’s not often enough. Yet somehow a bag ends up in the basket. Oh well, we’re prepared for any lean times that come around!
Sage.
Nobody in my house believes in a list (even though it’s right there; maybe they think it’s evil or something) and so I remember that we’re out of a spice and I’m sure it’s sage. Nope, this time it was marjoram.
That time it was tarragon.
Oh yeah, we still need thyme.
And could I please (FPS) remember to get the silly cumin???????
WE all must be in some kind of cleaning mood. I was cleaning in the downstairs pantry and lo and behold found 18 bottles of NONI JUICE. Pray tell, and what IS said NONI JUICE? It is some type of “BOOST the SYSTEM” drink, gives you more vitamins and minerals…tastes like bile. My husband was on a health kick and everytime we went to Sam’s Club he would say, “Gee, I need NONI JUICE.” and we now have 18 bottles of it. I asked him if he planned on drinking it, and he told me that it did not taste all that great and gave him indegestion…guess what? I put a bottle of it in with his lunch, with a note that siad,”Never tell me I have too much yarn..you have too much NONI!” Let’s see if he starts to drink it again.
Loose tea. I love tea, I drink it nearly every day, but I still have too much. In all varieties – white, green, oolong, black… while I was pregnant, the idea was to get a bunch of samples online to see if I could find a favorite in each category (since coffee gave me heartburn!), but never having bought samples, I wasn’t counting on them actually being enough for several cups. I ended up with a shoebox full of samples sitting on the counter. And then my husband decided he loved Twining’s English Breakfast and bought a whole canister of it; I tried and fell in love with P.G. Tips… soon we were using bagged tea almost exclusively and the loose ones languished. Now we’re out of bags, so we HAVE to use up the loose stuff, ha ha!
SALAD DRESSING! For some reason I always buy it, and have nineteen bottles in the pantry and on the lazy susan,But, I notice that I always migrate to the same basic four dressings and never open the New ones that I thought sounded like they taste really good! (Well at least I’m eating salads)!
I have an over aboudance of soup. I purchase cans of soup, thinking that a can of soup would be a satisfying lunch. However, when I go to chose out my lunch, I never end up with a can of soup. Part of this may be the fact that I’ve come to realize that I don’t like canned soup. Yet, I still buy it, thinking, this time, I will like it!
I love magazines, I have decorating magazines, monthly magazines, news magazines, knitting magazines (of course), cross stitch magazines, and it goes on. When I feel overwhelmed by the piles of magazines around, I start ripping out my favorite pages of the decorating magazines, recyle the remains, the other copies I farm out to friends or church or nursing homes…..but give me a magazine anytime and I’m happy!
You will never know what a hoarder you are until you move out of the country. My husband and I are moving to Costa Rica in about two weeksto li. We have two 20 foot containers that we are filling with “necessities”. We own the land in CR but we (he) is building our home so of course one container is filled to the top with his tools. We are taking very little in the way of furniture as we will be moving from SE PA to the tropics. I have nightmares about getting there and not having enough knitting or not having the right sized needles. Makeup was a breeze to get rid of (though I had tons). I honestly know that I can live without the so called “gourmet” (everyday things like mushrooms, parm, and everything else you find in a modern supermarket) —I consider myself quite a cook too. I’ve cleaned my cabinets of all such things that foodies love. (Very hard to do). It’s amazing what you find in closets that you had forgotten. Into the trash or goodwill. I’ve bribed all of our friends to visit as many times as they want. Just supply my knitting fix. It’s dreadful to be excited and still worried.
Confectioner’s sugar – 4 bags in various stages of use in the pantry. Bizarre; it wasn’t until after I read the blog that I decided to take a peek at the cupboards. While baking Christmas cookies, there was always the inevitable question as to whether we had any, and was there enough. I guess I see a lot of glazes in my future 🙂
I horde chocolate. I can’t help it. I loooove chocolate – there have got to be pounds of the stuff in the house (because I’m trying to work on my girlish figure 😉 so I try not to gulp it all down at once, though that has been prone to happen – especially with gift chocolates – because something about their giftiness makes them extra tasty).
I’m like Tammy – for me, it’s black pants. And for the same reasons – different fabrics, different lengths, different shades (so I have a pair that actually matches that black cardigan I have). They go with everything, every top I have, every pair of shoes I have. And I always buy at least two pairs every season.
But I’m really trying to break out of the rut and add some color to my closet – maybe navy? 🙂
I recently cleaned out my linen closet and discovered enough sample bottles of shampoo and conditioner to fill 2 large shoe boxes. I think I buy a couple every time I’m thinking of taking a trip, and then just chuck them into the back of the closet. I now have a bunch lined up in the shower to get used up. At least I won’t have to buy shampoo or conditioner for a while.
I do that with mayonnaise…I rarely use mayo, just the occasional egg salad or turkey sandwich, but I’m terrified of having it go bad. I’ve never experienced bad mayo, and it’s not really something I want to! At this moment, I have 2 unopened jars in my cabinet, and 2 opened ones in the fridge! Egg salad bonanza anyone?
You know… I was thinking… oh bummer… I don’t really have anything odd like that that I keep buying. Then I was putting away groceries and realized I do. Dijon Mustard. lol!
Pens! I love pens of any type and color. I enjoy shopping for them and buying them but one really can only use one pen at a time so I have way too many. I also found I had the same issue with evaporated and sweetened condensed milk left over from the holidays. I couldn’t remember how much or which that the recipe I wanted to make called for so I bought several cans of both. I used the excess in my coffee for a nice desserty treat. You can also make rather nice cocktails with brandy and baileys out of them.
Black shoes.
It seems to be Mayo around here. I never can remember if I picked some up or not. So I grab another. There are like 4 large jars in the cabinet. And, I almost picked up another last week. Guess I need to make alot of deviled eggs.
Chopped tomatoes. Cans and cans of chopped tomatoes. It used to be beans, so I was pretty proud of myself when I noticed I was down to just a couple cans of kidney beans…and then I noticed the tomatoes. Oops!
i guess i went a little crazy during the Christmas holiday buying ingredients for my baking ’cause i have 6 (!) bags of white chocolate chips in my cupboard. anyone know any great recipes that utilize them?
Oh, you are so not alone here — I have a LOT of everything here — because I am always afraid I will run out in the middle of making something — and we all know THAT cannot happen — but there is one thing that even I am surprised about!
I have 96-8 count boxes of Knorr Chicken Bouillon. That is over SEVEN HUNDRED cubes of chicken bouillon. Even when I worked in the industry, I didn’t have that much — and I cooked for about 400 a day at that time…..So, your 7 bags of nuts is NOTHING! If there is a good sale on something — LOOK OUT!
I have eleven cans of chicken stock.
I seem to have that problem with sunglasses. I swear I have no less than 8 different pairs. (At least they were all cheap!) I know how that happens- I lose them, and then buy a new pair, and then find the old ones again…
Socks. And not even good hand knit ones!!!!
I live with my mom due to her health concerns and while she can’t get around much she does this thing she calls packing away. She takes reasonably useful things and “packs them away” until you need them at a later time.
Last year I bought socks. It seemed I bought home a bag every month. But come laundry day I would only find one or 2 pairs in the wash.
I started going through our storage room and found an 18 gallon plastic Rubber Maid tote filled with -you guessed it!- socks. Pairs and pairs and pairs…probably close to 100 in all. I asked my mom why on earth she would pack away all my socks. She replied, well you seemed to be bringing new ones home so I figured you didn’t like the old ones or something. I informed her that I kept bring new ones home because I couldn’t FIND the old ones. We had a good laugh over it and she agreed to stop packing away my clothes without informing me first.
Needless to say, I will never have to purchase socks again.
Weird. Weird. Weird.
At Christmas, I came up with (what I thought was) a Completely Original Thought: To make Auntie Beth’s recipe Caramel Squares. Made a list of ingredients, including sweetened condensed milk – I did not need to check the pantry because I knew there would be no way on God’s Green Earth *I* would EVER have sweetened condensed milk.
Came home from the grocery story and opened the cupboard to find, way back in the corner, FOUR cans of sweetened condensed milk. I believe I have been experiencing the Completely Original Thought to make Auntie Beth’s recipe for Caramel Squares every Christmas for 4 years. A little Holiday Tradition. 🙂
Oh! And then there were the Christmas cards. I bought them early this year to send them out early (I never sent them out at all! oops.) and when I put my tree up I found I’d bought some during Boxing week LAST year. Grrr…
well, my first thought was wool …. I’ve been going thru my stash, thanks to Ravelry, and trying to sort/inventory it. just when I think I have found every last bin of wool …. I turn something over, and find another bag of it !!! now, I’m not saying that it’s a bad thing … but oh my gosh, I think I could rival many LYS !!!
BUT .. you’ve said that this wont count … so, my next option is clothes ….. I’m replacing my bedroom furniture, and am going to have a serious problem. I have clothes dating back to college (actually I have a highscool football jersey, and a t-shirt from middleschool). by the way, if I was 24, this wouldn’t be too bad … but I’m 44 !!! I have 2 double closets full (double lined), a tall-boy full, a large 7-ft dresser, totes of too-small stuff on my closet floor and basement. clean clothes hanging in the basement laundry area. the front all closet is full of my coats (shoes & boots).
I’m sad to say, but it is necessary … I’ve had to lay down my knitting for a while lately and am digging thru my old stuff on a major closet/bedroom purge.
BUT …. one can never have too much wool … so I’d love to win 🙂
You aren’t alone. For me, it’s potatoes. I can never remember if we have potatoes at home. Nothing like having 4-10lb bags sitting there waiting to be introduced to the 5th. I’m sort of that way with onions, but I usually only buy a few at a time – not a big bag each time, so that supply doesn’t grow as fast. Anyone for Hashbrowns????
Well we don’t usually fear a “run” on the grocery for anything, but over the holiday month we ended up with quite an egg problem! We don’t generally eat eggs, but of course the holiday cooking and baking requires a good many in all sorts of things. When the four older kiddoes left for school and we were officially back to normal eating patterns, we had more cartons of eggs in the fridge than you could shake a stick at. I suggested to DH that we make an egg casserole to, and i quote, “use up at least some of the eggs before they go bad,” and guess what he did?? Picked up ANOTHER carton at the store just in case…
At one point I had eight bags of chocolate chips in the pantry. Now I have worked my way down to half that amount. Gotta keep all those bags on hand in case I get a cookie craving, right?
My gluttony involves pens. Even though I seldom write by hand any more, I still collect them–especially free ones. And my husband is even worse, so our house is overflowing with them. My favorites are the kind with a cushion and a fine point, with black ink. Any plans for a Loopy Groupie pen?
Canned tuna. I don’t know why, since there’s only one dish I make with it, but I see it in its little bins in the grocery store, and I’m seized with the urge to snag some.
Dove Soap. And even though I know I have this problem I am just sure I still need it. And then I buy it in packs with 4 or 6 bars. But I have to say my linen closet smells great because of all the soap in the basket on the top shelf. 🙂
Funny you should mention this subject! Recently I cleaned out my FIL’s pantry. Among other things I found 15cans of corn. I told him that he probably should not buy any more corn for a long time, but the next week it was on sale and he bought more!
It’s a good thing we don’t have a pantry. My husband cannot go to the store without buying more than we need of something. Last weeks list had pinto beans and black beans. He came home with 12 cans of assorted types of beans. We’ll eat them, but in the mean time I have to shift them around every time I need a can to find one!
I have 6 boxes of semi-sweet baking chocolate. I’m really not sure how that happened. I do like to bake, but that is an awful lot of brownies, cake, etc. Does baking chocolate go bad?
I seem to have five bottles of ketchup in my pantry and three bottles of barbeque sauce. I think these will last me two or three years!!!! I do have a lot of yarn – I just can’t resist buying it. Make fudge with lots of almonds – chocolate is a health food, isn’t it.
Dude. 545 comments? Seriously? I collect books. I buy them at the used book store (or the new book store), from automatic mail order shipments, from friends, and maybe flip through them once? I tried to get rid of a bunch but they are still in my garage. I keep saying I’m going to list them on half.com…
Hi Sheri,
I apparently have a thing for the “salts.” I find I want to try a new recipe and it will call for 1/8 tsp of celery salt or onion salt. I am never too sure which one(if any!) I have and then I end up buying new ones.
I guess all of us knitters have our quirks!
Before the yarn accululating, it was bags, i made bags, i’ve bought bags, i’ve been given bags, i find bags… purses, backpacks, totes, clutches. I have bags inside my bags. Literally, there is a clutch and sock WIP bag inside my tote at this moment.