The perils of moving over a six-month period: stuff, stuff and more stuff...

Last night, Tom and I went to The Container Store and spent $$$ on Elfa shelving for our dining room. There's an alcove where his parents' hutch fit perfectly, but alas ours does not even come close. Tom decided, given our storage constraints, the best plan of attack was to install shelving and cover it with curtains. We sat down, figured out exactly what our storage needs were, and found ourselves happily designing a space that's 57" wide by 93" tall by 18" deep. Yes, it's the little things in life.

A few swears later this morning, our shelves were in place, and I spent most of the day going through boxes and bags of stuff yet unpacked from our frenetic move from Plymouth.

So here's what happens when you put your house on the market, move over a six month period, then decide to rent said house semi-furnished: you can never remember what's at the house, what's buried in the apartment, or what you simply don't have. This is why I uncovered the following this weekend:

• 13 sticks of my deodorant, and at least 8 of Tom's
• Cans and cans of beef and chicken broth, at least half of which expired 1-2 years ago
• Several opened boxes of crackers that didn't need any further investigation to determine staleness
• 4 bottles of Frebreeze air freshener
• 2 boxes of Saran wrap, 3 boxes of freezer bags, and an extra box each of sandwich bags, tin foil and trash bags
• Unopened flour (yup, re-bought up here for Christmas baking), vanilla (same), honey (probably the same), and the bottle of key lime juice my father picked up for me two years ago when I had intended to make a cake for one of our Pig Roasts, then ran out of time. Now that, I might use next weekend....
  

Yikes! Tossing half of the canned goods really killed me, but as Tom said, they were probably bought when we lived in Somerville the first time, brought to Plymouth, then brought back. Sigh....

So, with our new and improved shelving system, I went through our cabinets and reorganized everything. The things we tend to keep buying are now in plain view, whereas the things that I don't mind collecting because they get used up so quickly (marinades, pasta sauce, BBQ sauce) are in the cabinets. We're already off to a good start: Tom was reacquainting himself with the basket of sauce and seasoning packets and discovered one for herb roasted potatoes which will nicely take care of the potatoes from last week's CSA delivery.

I swear, when the day comes when we consider redoing the kitchen, we have a good case for using glass doors just to keep track of the "stuff."