Jodi’s Progress | Food Storage Made Easy

Where in the World WERE WE?

In case you’ve been wondering why the two of us fell off the face of the planet for the last 3 weeks, we will fill you in!

Usually when we take on big projects, vacations, and even having babies, we make sure to time it with each other. There’s always at least one of us who tries to stay relatively available. Well we mistakenly decided to take on the holidays, while one of us MOVED, and the other FINISHED A BASEMENT. Bad, bad idea folks! It left us merely capable of handling urgent emails and slightly comatose the rest of the time. Well, Jodi is mostly settled into her new basement (although her food storage is still inaccessible), and Julie has running water, gas, and internet at the new house, so we’re ready to get back in the saddle. We’ve missed you on facebook, and on the blog.

With it still being early January, we wanted to share with you our Food Storage Goals for 2012!

Put my food storage room back together after the move. I have my rotating racks set up, but the rest of the food is in open boxes. I moved across the street so I was spoiled in that, I didn’t have to “carefully” pack it. More on moving food storage later this month!
Now that I have moved into a different house, and I “practiced” a garden at my mom’s house last year. I’m going to try my OWN garden, in my OWN yard!
Make my own granola on a regular basis. I’m good at having my family eat oatmeal often, but I want to try and make a good multi-grain, sprouted granola to add variety in nutrients to breakfast time.
After living without gas in our new house for a couple days in the middle of winter (long story), I want to learn more about ways to STAY warm without power

Get a better system for my UPSTAIRS pantry situation. I have a great food storage, but I get a little tired of running downstairs for ingredients almost every single night. This has been extremely annoying the last few weeks as most of my food storage has been completely inaccessible. I would like to have a decent amount of things upstairs and have a good system for moving things up from the basement in batches every now and then.
I want to learn dutch oven cooking this summer. Last summer I had fun trying regular recipes in my Sun Oven, but that was pretty easy to do. I feel like dutch oven cooking will require getting some new recipes to try and learning to cook in ways I’m not used to. I think it will be fun!
I definitely want to get more into dehydrating this year. I like freeze-dried foods but it can save tons of money to dehydrate your own plus you can have a lot more options with the different foods you are dehydrating. It’s also great for preserving extra garden harvest.
My final goal is to start sale shopping/couponing again. Having three kids and another on the way, I haven’t done great at stocking up when things are cheapest over the past little while. It takes conscious effort and some planning to do this. I’m always buying extras of things when I run out, and my long term storage is well stocked and rotated into my regular foods, but I think I can get my 3 month supply a little more robust and do it cheaper if I am couponing. This may have to wait til things settle down after baby #4, but it is a goal for me this year!

What are YOUR food storage goals for 2011?

Stay tuned for more in depth posts about Jodi’s new refinished food storage room, and Julie’s adventures in moving a food storage!

Jodi and Julie January 9, 2012 8 Comments

Gardening Updates from Julie and Jodi

Whether you’re a Master Gardener, or you just plant a couple small plants on your kitchen counter, learning the skill of gardening is very important in Food Storage. Today we’re going to update you on how our gardens are doing this year.

For those of you who have followed our blog for the last three years, you’ll know that I haven’t been into the gardening scene all that actively yet. It hasn’t been for a lack of interest, but rather a lack of knowledge, space, sun, and courage! Well this year I decided one way or another, I WOULD have a garden. I spent a lot of time debating between 3 garden options for me this summer.

I was trying to decide between:

Using my yard that is tiny and gets virtually no sun
Renting a garden plot in my community
Planting my garden at my mom’s house which is about 10 minutes away

Each of these options had pros and cons. I wanted so badly to plant in my own yard so I could see daily progress, however it became pretty clear that the overhaul that would have to take place on a yard that may not see the light of day probably wouldn’t work. I decided I would monitor the amount of sun that comes in this year and maybe attempt it next year after having a year of good practicing in an area that actually gets sun. I decided to plant in a row at my moms house since she’s a great gardener, could help guide me, and I’d have someone to water for when I’m out of town etc. So here you have it, my GARDEN! My area is half that first row – and I’m so proud of it.

My mom was SO helpful in getting me past my anxiety of planting a garden. I’m kind of the type that doesn’t like doing things that I don’t fully understand (ummm that is how this blog started in the first place actually hahah) so this is big for me. I felt like I was walking blindly into this whole thing, but with her help I feel much better now.

Here’s what we did a few weeks ago:

We planted the plants that you can plant in the cold weather outside
We planted herbs and spices in indoor planters
We planted a bunch of varieties of tomatoes in indoor planters – fully planning on buying tomato plants in a few weeks in case they don’t work

So I’m very proud to report that my tomato seeds are doing awesome… while my spices and herbs seeds WERE doing awesome….until they got knocked over and smashed by a 3 year old. Ah well – this is going to be my test year anyways

I got started a little later than I had intended on my garden this year (ok that seems to happen every year, maybe I should just plan on it, lol). But then we got a few of our crazy late spring blizzards and I was glad I hadn’t put too much into the ground yet. I’ve got a good start on stuff in the ground and stuff growing inside. It’s so fun to watch everything growing! My camera is being troublesome but I will try to get some pictures uploaded later today. Here is a quick summary of my progress so far.

What’s Outside

So far I have peas and onions that are coming up quite nicely. Like I said, I planted them late but I’m hopeful I will still get SOMETHING out of them. My potatoes aren’t showing any signs of life yet, but I have faith that they will product!

What’s Inside

I have a whole tray of seedlings going. Pumpkins, zucchini, and cucumbers are growing like crazy. Watermelon (first time trying it!) and some herbs are doing well. Tons of tomatoes and peppers are coming along but not as quickly as I would like. Oh well, they won’t go into the ground for a while anyway.

To Do This Week

I need to transplant a lot of my indoor seedlings into bigger pots. That’s always a fun (and messy) job. I’m also going to plant a lot more straight outside. Carrots, beans, corn, etc. I know it may be a bit late for spinach and lettuce but I’m going to throw some of them in the garden just for fun and hope for the best. I also need to finish cleaning out the weeds from the rest of my garden beds and I’m hoping to get some brick borders to section off my larger garden area along the fence.

What are YOU doing in your garden this week??

Filed Under: Gardening, Jodi's Progress, Julie's Progress

Jodi and Julie May 9, 2011 9 Comments

Spring Gardening Chores

It’s springtime, yay! This blog is not a “gardening blog” but gardening does have a lot to do with self-reliance and it can be an inexpensive way to stockpile your own fruits and veggies that you can preserve. I asked on our Facebook page what people want to see on the blog about gardening this year and got a wide variety of responses.

I’m not a gardening guru by any means, so I will be sharing what I’m doing in my garden (and hopefully Julie will share hers as she gets started this year too!). I will try to direct you to good resources along the way so you can see what I’m doing but also have the help you need for whatever your personal gardening goals and concerns are. And now, on to my gardening update for this week.

What am I doing in my garden this week?

Preparing My Garden Beds

This is not what they look like at the start of spring. Not sharing THAT photo lol. I left a few tomato pants in last winter that I need to rip out. I’m going to make another trip to the dump and get some more beautiful compost. If you want to learn how to build your own boxes like mine, click here for my hubby’s tutorial.

Planting Outside

I could have planted a little earlier than this, but we all know how hard it is to get organized and actually get started on stuff. I have been using the “Planting by Color” eBook that my cousin Emily created and let me tell you, it makes my gardening life SOOO easy. I just flip through my gardening binder and get to the week it is right now. I look at the list of what I’m able to plant each week (either outside, inside, or transplants) and I’ve already got all of my seed packets tucked into sheet protectors in the right week. I have missed some of the weeks by starting this late but it is so easy to see what I can still plant, because it’s listed on each week. LOVE. So this week I am going to get some peas and onions into the ground, and potatoes are coming up soon!

Starting Seeds Inside

Every year I sort of fail at this, but it’s always fun. If you are just getting started gardening, don’t even worry about starting seeds at all. It’s super easy to just go and buy starter plants when the weather is warm enough to plant them. But my obsessive nature does not want to wait that long to get my garden going, so I always start some seeds inside. I got my seeds pretty early, but if you haven’t bought some yet, Burpee is having a sale (Get $5 Off orders over $30 at Burpee.com when you use code START5A now through 3/21). Some of the things I will be starting are my tomatoes and peppers. YUM! According to my planting schedule it’s probably a little late to start broccoli and kale inside but I might try it anyway just for fun. For a cheap way to start seeds inside check out my tutorial on Making Your Own Plant Pots Out of Newspaper.

Planning My Garden
This SOOOO should have been done already. Why does life have to be so busy? When I get my garden plan done I will post it on facebook so everyone can see it. Crossing my fingers that it will get done this week. It’s not too hard, just a matter of thinking it all through.

Helping Julie Make a Plan

Julie is committed to trying to garden this year (she has strange yard space so it will be experimental). You may remember I got her some gardening goods from our Christmas Recap post. We are going to be going through our cousin Emily’s other eBook “Gardening For Beginners” which I gave Julie for Christmas, and making a whole plan for her to go from nothing to thriving garden this year. I’m excited for her to catch the gardening bug. It’s almost as fun as food storage

Filed Under: Gardening, Jodi's Progress Tagged: food storage, food storage garden, Gardening, gardening faq, self reliance, spring gardening chores, square foot gardening

Jodi and Julie March 17, 2011 6 Comments

2010 New Years Resolutions Recap

In January of this year, we both posted some of our Food Storage goals and
Resolutions for 2010. It’s hard to believe a whole year has passed and it’s time to report on our goals.

Our joint goal this year was to help Grandma Lori get started with her Food Storage in the Extreme Food Storage Makeover. We’re pleased to report that we have had many successes in that realm and will continue to share things we learn with her. For a list of all the things we did with Grandma Lori, make sure to visit the Extreme Food Storage Makeover Page.

I want to start sprouting regularly and really use it in more in my regular cooking. I must confess, it still totally scares me. I plan to MASTER sprouting once and for all!

RESULT: I haven’t “mastered” sprouting, but I have sprouted a bunch of different things on various occasions. It surprised me how easy it really was – and now I can’t believe I was so intimidated by it. I have put my sprouts in stir fry’s, smoothies, soups, sandwiches, and sometimes I just eat them plain. I’m so glad that I have this skill to fall back on if I need a way to get fresh food in my diet should I have to live off my food storage for an extended amount of time.

I have never been one for following recipes – HOWEVER since I have started using my food storage, I’ll go ahead and admit, I need and use recipes. My current management system of those recipes is pretty pathetic, so I’m gonna beat Jodi on this one and figure out a way to put them all in the same place (and not bring my laptop into the kitchen as I cook anymore!)

RESULT: This is where I confess that I’ve failed. I have had good intentions all year of getting this done, but alas things have gotten in the way. I have brought all my recipes up to my office though with good intentions of compiling them. This however only irritates me when I’m cooking and have to come upstairs to get a recipe. Maybe having to come upstairs more and more will finally force me into getting this done.

I want to learn more about cooking without power. This is a topic I have never ventured into really because …. of fear …. but I’m gonna figure that one out this year too (well at least partially).

RESULT: I feel so much more confident with this topic now. I got a Volcano Grill and used it during the 7 Day Challenge. Just opening it out of the box and practicing on it has given me so much more confidence. I need to store more fuel now, and continue to learn about other methods, but I’m glad I did something about this fear!

My sweet mom (Grandma Lori) donated her food dehydrator to me when we first started to learn about food storage. However, I haven’t been ambitious enough to use it yet. We have had some great tips and resources sent in by readers and I am determined to put some of it into action.

RESULT: Grandma Lori and I traded the dehydrator back and forth a few times this year depending on who was feeling ambitious enough to try it. The final discovery was that it was no longer functioning properly so I’ve been saving up to get an Excalibur Dehydrator. It finally arrived LAST WEEK and I am planning to dry some apples tomorrow. Yay!

When first getting started in food storage, all of the disaster/emergency prep stuff really overwhelmed me. Now that I have food more under control, I feel ready to step up and start to become better prepared for specific types of natural disasters. Our Seven Day Challenge really made me think and my goal is to get more prepared this year.

RESULT: Our group book discussion on the book One Second After really helped me with this goal. While the book covers only an EMP (Electromagnetic Pulse) Attack, it really makes you think about how other emergencies could have similar situations to go through. One of the days of our Seven Day Challenge this year also had us write down a list of disasters that are likely to occur in our area. This was helpful too, and we’ve already had a “severe storm watch” this winter!

I love our three month supply worksheet. I have long wished I had something that specific for my long term food storage. I want to be able to plan meals for my year supply and know I have the right ingredients to make the meals I will be cooking. This is a huge goal for me this year which will take a lot of work but I know it will be worth it!

RESULT: What is it with both Julie and I failing on our recipe projects this year? You’d think we have been busy or something? I managed to come up with recipes for breakfast and then didn’t get any further. I would still love to put all of my food storage recipes in their own binder and have all of them included in my spreadsheet. (SOME DAY!)

What are some of your Food Storage Resolutions for Next Year? It’s always good to set a few goals, and celebrate the successes. We will be sharing our 2011 Resolutions soon!

Filed Under: Jodi's Progress, Julie's Progress, Just For Fun Tagged: Emergency Preparedness, food storage, food storage made easy, food storage resolutions

Jodi and Julie December 6, 2010 2 Comments

What’s Coming Up Next?

As we read through all of the blog comments, emails, facebook discussions, etc. we came across several main themes over and over again that people are struggling with. And many of them are things that are issues we are working on ourselves. We are going to be spending the next few weeks covering each of these topics more in depth and hopefully they will be a help to you too.

1. Water storage / purification / conservation: Most people are prepared for a water shortage lasting even up to 2 weeks. However, it’s a lot different to have drinking water for 2 weeks versus LIVING water for two weeks. It’s also a big concern as to what to do if there is an even longer water shortage. There were a lot of great tips about how to stretch out your water supply that we can’t wait to share.

2. Powerless cooking: This is a huge one for us. We will be sharing details on what each of us used for cooking during the challenge, however we also need to research more options for cooking INSIDE.

3. EMP or Electromagnetic Pulse Attack: While some people don’t feel this is a legitimate threat, others consider it to be very possible. It is very hard to find credible information online about what ACTUALLY will happen during EMPs of differing levels of severity. We are going to be gathering more information and also want to do a group read and discussion of the book One Second After so we can look at possible scenarios in an interesting manner. Grab a copy from the library or order one today and we will have more details about the group read coming up soon.

4. Financial reserve: We all know we should have a little money tucked away in our disaster kits, but it was a bit interesting to note how many people actually struggled with this task. We’ll be sharing some tips and a little more detail on exactly what is recommend for this.

5. Alternate heating and cooling for your home: By always doing the challenge in September we miss out on really getting to emphasize the importance of having solutions for heating and cooling your home. It’s an overwhelming concept that is definitely “beyond the babysteps” but we think it is very important to start thinking about, learning about, and discussing.

6. Shelf stable recipes: While we still strongly believe that food storage is highly likely to be used in an economic crisis where you would still have access to electricity, we also now are ready to start thinking about what to do in an extended emergency where power is NOT available (EMP, fuel shortage, etc.). We are going to be exploring the world of “shelf-stable only” cooking and we will need your help! More to come.

If any of these things sounds like concepts you are wanting to work more on, follow along with us over the next few weeks/months as we will definitely be busy researching and sharing on the blog.

p.s. Just for fun, take our little poll! (FIX BEFORE GO LIVE)

Filed Under: 7 Day Challenge, Jodi's Progress, Julie's Progress Tagged: Emergency Preparedness, food storage, national preparedness month, Seven Day Challenge

Jodi and Julie September 27, 2010 15 Comments

The #1 Most Common Email We Receive

My computer crashed and I lost everything … I know you told us to back up our computers but I didn’t … Could you please resend my Food Storage Made Easy Binder file?

And that is the part where we say “I told you so!!!”. In our BabyStep Checklist program the VERY first thing we tell people to do is to have some sort of backup plan for their computer. This doesn’t seem like a typical recommendation from a food storage/preparedness site, but it is the MOST common “disaster” that people have and it is absolutely devastating when it happens. To lose all of your work and school files, not to mention family pictures and videos … it has happened to me and it is awful.

Well today I had a serious computer emergency myself. I was working on my laptop at a little table in front of my couch and had a nice full glass of ice water sitting beside me. My five year old son wanted a turn to hold my 2 month old baby, so he came and sat down beside me on the couch and tried to situate himself to comfortably take the babe. Well, in the process of doing that … he kicked the entire glass of water right onto my computer keyboard.

Needless to say I FREAKED OUT. I hurriedly put the baby down and tried to salvage the computer. I burst into tears because my MacBook is my other baby and it is only about a year old and it was FULL of WATER. My 2 month old was screaming because I scared him by putting him down so fast. And my five year old started crying because I was so upset and he was worried about the baby. Plus my three year old girl kept saying “What’s wrong, why is everyone crying?” It was quite a scene.

I thought the computer was completely ruined, as it kept doing crazy freak-out things whenever I tried to use the keyboard. But it appears to work ok if I use an external keyboard and mouse plugged into it. So I’m writing this blog post on my poor flooded MacBook and crossing my fingers that it will still function tomorrow.

The funny part about this is that I was not at ALL worried about my data. The very first thing to cross my mind was “Thank goodness I finally transfered my Mozy account to this computer (after procrastinating for almost a year).” I only had to be sad about replacing a $2400 computer, but all my non-replaceable files are safely stored in my Mozy account and were accessible to me all day while MY computer was drying out.

Use coupon code OCTOBER for an additional 10% off your subscription!

So don’t let yourself be one of the people who emails us and says “I know you told me to get a Mozy account, and I should have, but I kept putting it off … and now my computer is fried … can you please resend my checklists?” (Have we mentioned that we have to do those manually and it is HARD to keep up with!) Those emails are the saddest because it is so cheap and easy to get an account and the amount of pain it can save is immeasurable.

Can you tell I’m a BIG Mozy fan? (Julie is too, you can read her story here).

Filed Under: Computer Backup, Jodi's Progress Tagged: Emergency Preparedness, mozy, mozy backup, mozy home, mozy review, mozyhome, online backup services, online backup storage

Jodi August 18, 2010 12 Comments

Jodi’s Three Month Supply Problem

Basement junk making it difficult to reach long term food storage buckets
Bags of groceries dumped on the floor BESIDE the shelves
Canning supplies scattered in multiple places
Shelves for 3 month supply are hard to access, hard to see, and hard to reach

My big excuse is that I had a baby 7 weeks ago. So for probably a good 5-6 months I avoided going down to the storage area like a plague. My sweet hubby would refill my containers upstairs with my long term foods. And my sweet 5 year old son would run down and grab cans of veggies or soup when I needed them for a recipe.

The problem could no longer be ignored when I sent my son down to grab a can of tomato soup for a recipe. He told me there wasn’t any. I didn’t believe him, because I should have at LEAST 10 cans down there. The soup is normally on the left shelf (see above) so I had to navigate around that junk to look for the soup. To my dismay there WASN’T any TOMATO SOUP. UGH! This is not supposed to happen to me.

A complete reorganization of my storage space
Elimination of space hogging (and leak-prone) water jugs
Discarding of multiple foods items that were long past expiration
Re-inventory of my three month supply spreadsheet

Once I had reorganized and catalogued my foods I realized how much I had depleted my storage over the past months. My “three month supply” was more like a partial 2 week supply plus a billion stewed tomatoes and mandarin oranges.

Print out my list of “Need to Buy” items
Use Deals to Meals (LOVE THEM!) over the next few weeks to catch the items when they are on sale
Put foods straight onto shelves as I purchase them
Fill up my new water storage boxes
Buy or build more Can Racks as needed to improve rotation
Buy better shelves some day (these are second hand and kind of odd-sized)
Keep stocking up on my long term food storage now that I’m using it so much!

We quite often get asked to see an example of a filled out sheet, but I’ve always been a little embarrassed to share what we eat. I’ve finally overcome my fear and I’m willing to share. Hope it is helpful for you!

Jodi’s Three Month Supply Spreadsheet

Filed Under: Jodi's Progress, Organization, Three Month Supply Tagged: food storage, food storage spreadsheet, three month food supply, three month supply

Jodi August 8, 2010 52 Comments

The "Food Storage" Diet

My baby will be 7 weeks old tomorrow. Wow does time fly. As any mom knows, losing the baby weight can be quite a torturous process. I knew I didn’t want to go on some sort of crazy fad diet to lose the weight, so I decided to go with just eating healthy and exercising. That means lots of fruits and vegetables, whole grains, and lean meat (i.e. chicken). Basically no processed foods, very little fat, and no refined sugar … if you know my love of treats this basically equals NO FUN! But he was worth it! And the best part is I am using TONS of food storage while I’m at it.

While this “diet” is very healthy, it can also be a bit of a pain to prepare the foods. But I’m going to show you a few tricks I’ve learned to make it easier to follow, and super easy to stick with even on busy days when you aren’t at home to cook the food. And the bonus part is, it uses lots of food storage, yay!

Whole Grains

I have started keeping a bucket of wheat, rice, and oatmeal upstairs because I’m going through them so quickly. I make two loaves of whole wheat bread (click here for my favorite recipe) every few days and my family has started snarfing it up. I should be grateful that they love the healthy food but then I have to keep making it more often. At least it’s really cheap since I grind my own wheat! I’ve also started cooking up big batches of brown rice in my pressure cooker and storing it in 1 cup baggies in the fridge. This has been an awesome way to always have a healthy side dish on hand.

Fruits and Veggies

I have been using my favorite service Deals to Meals to find the best deals on produce and stock up. If the foods look like they may go bad soon I just stick them in the freezer. Usually I can make the freezer foods last until stuff goes on sale again. Sweet! (To see how easy it is to use deals to meals for product, check out this post)

Chicken

I am choosing to avoid red meat and cheesy/pasta dishes for now, but I still make some of our normal family favorites for dinner. So I have started cooking up large batches of chicken in the pressure cooker and keeping it in 4 ounce baggies in the fridge. It’s so easy for me to pull out a baggie and stick it on a salad for a healthy dinner, while my family can still enjoy a good spaghetti dinner. I like to consider frozen meat as part of my three month supply so preparing this in bulk is great for that.

Pressure Cooking

Here is my confession, until a few weeks ago I was AFRAID to use my pressure cooker. Seriously! But I could never make my brown rice turn out very yummy so I decided to give it a whirl. Well I am officially in love. The rice turns out perfect and chewy and delicious every time. And the chicken … oh the chicken. Tender, moist, and cooks in such a short time. After eating plain chicken on a george foreman for a few weeks the pressure cooker chicken in marinades are divine.

How to Use a Pressure Cooker for Rice and Chicken

The Finished Product

I accidentally had to eat some of the chicken after working so hard to prepare it all

Garlic Lemon Chicken Recipe

2 lbs thawed chicken
1/3 cup olive oil
2/3 cup lemon juice
6 cloves garlic
2 tsp. thyme

Mix all the marinade ingredients up and pour in a gallon ziplock bag along with the chicken. Marinate for 15-20 minutes and then cook in the pressure cooker according to your cooker’s directions.

Our Favorite Pressure Cooker

Cuisinart CPC-600 1000-Watt 6-Quart Electric Pressure Cooker, Brushed Stainless and Matte Black
Reduce time spent in the kitchen preparing meals with the help of this 6-quart electric pressure cooker–it cuts cooking times up to 70-percent when compared to traditional stovetop cooking methods. The unit traps steam inside, which builds up pressure to create hotter temperatures, and its tight seal locks in heat, moisture, and flavor, as well as vitamins and minerals for exceptionally healthy, great-tasting meals like soup, chili, and other one-dish entrees. For safety, the cooker must be fully locked for pressure to build, and it will remain locked until the pressure inside drops to zero. It is so easy to use and we LOVE it! [Learn More]

Filed Under: Grains, Healthy Food Storage, Jodi's Progress, Recipes, Recommended Products Tagged: food storage, Healthy Food Storage, wheat grinder, wondermill

Jodi August 5, 2010 27 Comments

Meal Planning Made Easy

Exactly one month ago I gave birth to my third baby. Crazy I have three kids now! I knew with having a busy husband who wasn’t able to get any time off work, and two “big” kids at home who like Mommy’s cooking, that I needed to do some planning ahead in the meal department. I made tons of freezer meals and shared the process in depth with our Facebook Friends. I wanted to show you guys how EASY it is to plan ahead either for a big event, for a three month supply shop, or just for regular monthly meal plans using the Deals to Meals service.

1. Go through your recipe books, favorite recipes websites, etc. and write down all the meals you are planning for (I looked for easy easy meals or meals that would be good frozen either as whole meals or in components to put a quick meal together. I also used several of the meals from the Deals To Meals weekly meal plan since those items were all on sale that week)
2. Make a grocery list of all the ingredients you will need to purchase.
3. Log in to Deals To Meals and add everything to your “cart” that is on sale that is also on your shopping list. (View Julie’s video tutorial to see how EASY it is to do!)
4. Print out your Deals To Meals shopping cart list and your entire shopping list.

1. Go to Wal-Mart or any other store that does “price-matching”. Grab all of the items from the Deals To Meals list and go to the checkout.
2. Show the cashier your printout from Deals to Meals and you should be able to get ALL of the low prices without even having the actual store ads. (Please note: Check your Walmart for their policie but so far it has worked for 5 different ones that Julie and I have tried).
3. For the rest of your “non-sale” items, you can either purchase them at Wal-Mart too, or go to your favorite discount grocery store. (I have found that Winco is generally cheaper than Wal-Mart so I do the rest of my shopping there).

Just to give you an example of how much money you can save … I was stocking up on freezer meals so I bought ten pounds of ground beef. I like to buy the 93% lean variety but it is normally $3.47 per pound at my Wal-Mart. Well I found on Deals To Meals that it was on sale at a store I NEVER go to for only $1.99 per pound. I saved $15.00 JUST on the hamburger alone! This service is worth every penny. And if you use their weekly meal plans you save even more because then virtually ALL of the items you are buying will be on sale. So cool.

When we first heard of Deals to Meals, they were only in Utah, but now they are in 12 states! We hope they become national, because they are awesome. Even if you don’t live in one of the 12 states, the meal plans can be used wherever you live – so go and check them out FOR A FREE TRIAL!

Side Note: We became affiliates for Deals to Meals because we love their service so much and are way excited about promoting it!

Filed Under: Budgeting, Jodi's Progress Tagged: deals to meals, freezer meals, meal planning, three month plan, three month supply

Jodi July 19, 2010 2 Comments

Our Blog Anniversary + a GIVEAWAY + a SALE

We hope you enjoyed our Blast From The Past Week as we celebrated our two year blog anniversary last week. We went through a lot of fun stories and things we’ve discovered over the last two years as we have been learning about food storage and sharing what we’ve learned on this blog. Here is a summary of the posts in case you missed any of the days.

A look at our “old” blog design and a summary of some of our blogging milestones over the past two years
[View Post]

See how Julie is CONSTANTLY re-organizing her food storage [View Post]
Jodi and Julie “argue” over how to plan a three month supply [View Post]
Julie discovers that food storage is NOT only for desserts! [View Post]
Jodi shares her adventures with canning, sprouting, and more. [View Post]
Julie shares the BEST food storage recipe ever. [View Post]
Jodi divulges two amazing cornmeal recipes. [View Post]

SURPRISE GIVEAWAY

We are so excited we have ALMOST hit another milestone in our blogging journey as we are approaching having 5000 “fans” on our facebook page. We are going to be announcing a FACEBOOK ONLY giveaway as soon as we hit the magic number of 5000 fans so if you aren’t already a fan make sure you go to our page and click the “like” button. You MUST be a fan in order to get the notification about the giveaway and find out how to enter (it will be easy we promise!)

UPDATE: We already hit 5000 fans so make sure to check out the Facebook Note for details!

Being a facebook fan gives you more of a day-to-day look into what we are doing to learn more about food storage and using it in our daily lives. We also announce special sales and events, ask and answer lots of questions, link to other great food storage information sources, and post our latest blog posts so you can read them right on facebook and never miss a post again. It’s been a great way to get to know our readers better and to learn from all of you as well. Hope to see you over there!

HERB CLASS SALE

Julie attended a “healthy food storage” class over the weekend (her class notes are coming later this week) and had to share this great offer with you (before it’s too late). One of the suggestions for people that are into more whole, natural types of foods and herbs was to make sure to store herbs for medicinal purposes. Dr. Christopher’s School Of Natural Healing was giving a special for conference attendees only, that they said we could pass on to our blog readers. They do a Family Herbalist course that is normally $500 but if you go to this link by TUESDAY (tomorrow), you can get the conference special of $100. If this is something you’re interested in learning more about, click here.