If you’ve been following us for awhile, you know at the beginning of the year we had some New Years Resolutions. Well now is the time we TELL ALL about how we did. We’re excited about how this year went, and can’t wait to share our goals for 2010 in a few weeks!
- I want to save up enough money to buy a wheat grinder so I don’t have to borrow Julie’s any more
- I want to plan my summer garden specifically with canning in mind
- I want to create a recipe binder full of meals that use my long term food storage items and cook from it frequently
Yay! This one was easy for me! When I wrote my resolutions last year my husband was out of a job so a wheat grinder purchase seemed far off. However, he was able to become employed in January and we got a little bit of money for Christmas and we decided that a wheat grinder would be a good investment since we used our food storage so much when he was out of work. The electric mills are on sale this month, so if you have extra Christmas money this year, now is a great time to get your own!
This one SHOULD have been an A+ as I started with a great plan and the best of intentions, but I had some setbacks along the way. You can read about my failures on my “lessons learned from gardening” post. However, I WAS still able to can some delicious applesauce and strawberry jam this year. Yay!
While I haven’t completed my recipe binder yet, I HAVE accumulated a TON of recipes and I use my food storage almost every day. I am still constantly pulling my laptop into the kitchen to follow recipes so I definitely still have room for improvement here. Next year it will be complete … I SWEAR!
- I want to cook more with dry beans and quit being so afraid of the soaking concept
- I want to plan dinners ahead of time to use more of my long term foods
- I want to find a way to help people who hate excel do an effective 3 month food supply plan even though the current excel file ROCKS! But I know, I know you don’t all love excel
I have to admit, I put this goal as a way to FORCE me to get into beans. I was SO scared of them. I can’t believe how much I have learned this year about them. I learned to use them to make hummus, cream of chicken soup, and to replace my canned beans.
I have done pretty well on this goal, but have to be honest there is room for improvement. I use my long term food storage ALL the time in my meals now, but I admit, I don’t meal plan that much. I have a bunch of recipes I love and use often, but I think I’m giving up on the dream of being a meal planner – it’s just not my style.
I was able to make a pdf for people to make their 3 month plan, and I think it’s worked out well… What I’d really love to do now is make a cooler simpler online way, but I’m not that tech savvy so… sorry about that!
Stay tuned as we unveil next years goals in the next couple of weeks. We’re gonna have some fun ones, and Julie is giving herself another one to FORCE her into something she’s scared of.
-Jodi Weiss Schroeder
http://foodstoragemadeeasy.net