We had "THE DISCUSSION"...

[brenda67]

Hi Brenda!

I stock a whole foods pantry as I mainly cook from scratch with the following: ( I find it cheaper and with allergies to certain preservatives etc I need to now)


50 pounds of bread flour ( I use this to make all my breads and pizzas , quick breads)

50 pounds of whole wheat flour ( for my bake goods ) I use Montana Wheat as they are better then organic in my opinion ( they do much more testing , organic standards and are non GMO which is important to me) I have now moved away from stocking so much of this as I now stock all my :

Soft wheat berries ( for grinding my own flour for baked goods)

Red Wheat berries ( for grinding my own ww flour)

4 packages yeast ( I keep most in freezer)

4 bottles of olive oil, coconut oil and palm oil. I also stock pomice olive oil for soap making

I stock a 5 gallon bucket of baking honey ( which is about 60 gallons)

I also stock a 5 gallon bucket of raw honey ( I use honey in place of lots of sugar now)

3 bottles of molasses

Case of natural peanut butter

Taco shells etc

We only use real maple syrup so I have tons of that stocked.

Gallons of red wine , white and apple vinegar.

50 pounds of Oats ( I make four different kinds of granola, oatmeal cookie mixes, no bake cookies , instant oat packets and etc with it all)

I stock about 10 pounds of brown sugar, 50 pounds of organic sugar, 50 pounds white sugar ,chocolate chips, dried apples, raisins, Sesame seeds, flax seed, wheat germ, 7 grain , oat bran, dried cranberries etc

Non GMO popcorn



I stock black beans, red beans, kidney beans , navy beans all organic. I stock about 20 pounds organic harmony soup mix, and bean soup mixes.

Tons of different pastas and rices ( I stock brown and red as well as white) Keep in mind brown will go rancid quicker so I don't stock as much of that.

25 pounds real salt and celtic sea salt

I have a whole spice cabinet but I use tons of garlic, sea salt , rosemary, basil , oregano. So I stock up much more on those.

I have cases of diced, crushed etc tomatoes , tomato paste, hot sauce and veggies as well as dried veggies, and fruit.

I have canned 40jars of jam, 40 of salsa, 50 quarts of applesauce, 10 quarts of grape juice as well as plenty of bottles of juice. I make all my own sauce but do have a couple of cases of commercial handy if needed. I don't even want to say how many cases of beans etc I got as I got them almost free ...LOL

12 bags of coffee beans , 8 boxes of tea and plenty of different kinds of tea. Tea drink mix canisters

25 pounds of butter( freezer) 30 pounds of cheese and tons of veggies and frozen fruit in freezer. I have tons of pounds of chicken , beef, fish etc

As for the others 4 boxes matches, 30 of dishwasher soap ( with my coupons), about a 2 year supply of laundry soap and tons of borax, washing soda to make my own. Tons of bleach, light bulbs , solar panels, batteries, toilet paper, paper towels etc.

I know there is tons more. Hope that was a help. Sorry if too long and boring....lol

I have some great places I buy in bulk online, Amish store , restaurant supply as well as Sams and grocery which helps .

OMG..I could never get bored reading your post's..Thank you so much for answering my questions..Can I move in? LOL.. I can't wait to do the same when I move into our house...I'm a stockpiling fool! Do you know how long white flour last before going bad? I do freeze my 5lbs bags for couple of days then I takeout of the freezer and put it in the cupboard...any tips are truely appreciated...

[HappyMama]

OMG..I could never get bored reading your post's..Thank you so much for answering my questions..Can I move in? LOL.. I can't wait to do the same when I move into our house...I'm a stockpiling fool! Do you know how long white flour last before going bad? I do freeze my 5lbs bags for couple of days then I takeout of the freezer and put it in the cupboard...any tips are truely appreciated...

I know you will have so much fun stocking once you get your house. Let me know if you want some cheap sources. Sure you would be welcome but have kids...lol if you can put up with that...lol

White flour will last forever and freezing is great before storing as will get rid any bugs if there happens to be any. I store all my things like that after freezing if I have room in white buckets with a bay leaf. Just make sure all your buckets if you start to use are food grade plastic. If you want more vitamins with the most nutrition and store for long use look into a wheat grinder and wheat berries. They will last forever and you will get the vitamins from your flour as most disappear within hours of grinding. I have a big walk in pantry and store most in plastic buckets, and totes as well as glass jars in my baking Hoosier in my kitchen. HTH

[dcompton]

I'm not doing much different. I'm continuing to work on the stockpile and I'm trying to replace a chunk of money that had to come out of my emergency fund this summer/fall and then continue to build it.

As for the 403b (like a 401k), I am making no changes in the incredible shrinking investments that are already there, but I've changed the future investment allocations to reduce my exposure to the stock market for a while. But for Oct-Dec, I'm only putting in the mandatory. We do not pay into social security where I work, but have the 403b instead. The facility pays into it what they would pay into SS, and we have a mandatory 8% contribution. I am taking the additional voluntary contribution I have been putting in it, and I will be throwing that into savings. This is probably not a very smart move, because I lose the tax break, but right now, though my job seems secure, I really want a larger long term emergency fund. I will sleep better. I have health issues that balance out the job security. I've sailed through two years of post-cancer check ups with A+'s, but that could change any time and result in lots of time off work. I have a good bit of sick leave built up again, but not as much as I had when I wiped it out the first time around. So I want that cushion in savings. I'll re-evaluate the tax vs. availability question at the beginning of the year, or maybe the beginning of December, depending on how much I can really get into savings by then.

I lead a pretty dull life, and I am well stocked up for my hobbies and amusements. The move, with all the expenses a move always entails, is officially OVER, so my monthly expenses should be pretty minimal for a while. I put my tax rebate and some additional onto Kroger gift cards back in the summer to get the 10% bonus they added. I bought them with a credit card that gave me another 5% cash back on them, and when I buy house brands I get a 10% senior discount, so with careful shopping, I'm saving quite a bit on groceries. This has let me really stockpile effectively. I have quite a bit left on them, so groceries are still covered for a while, except for the loss leaders I may pick up at different stores.

I've been reading the other post about what 10 non-food items are most important to stockpile -- and taking notes! My stockpile is heavily weighted to food rather than HBA and other stuff. I need to work on that. And just as you can never have too much TP, you can never have too many beans... so the food stockpile will continue to grow too.

So for now, the focus, as for most of you, is stockpiling and saving, saving, saving.

[freebs]

I know you will have so much fun stocking once you get your house. Let me know if you want some cheap sources. Sure you would be welcome but have kids...lol if you can put up with that...lol

White flour will last forever and freezing is great before storing as will get rid any bugs if there happens to be any. I store all my things like that after freezing if I have room in white buckets with a bay leaf. Just make sure all your buckets if you start to use are food grade plastic. If you want more vitamins with the most nutrition and store for long use look into a wheat grinder and wheat berries. They will last forever and you will get the vitamins from your flour as most disappear within hours of grinding. I have a big walk in pantry and store most in plastic buckets, and totes as well as glass jars in my baking Hoosier in my kitchen. HTH

Would love to know some of your online cheap sources....lol. I know i dont have as many dry goods as i should would love to find a good cheap source for those kinds of things.

[tomishco]

Our DS has an early a.m. appt. in Madison, WI at Childrens Hospital this month. Instead of staying in a hotel as planned, we are just going to get up early and drive there. Our big treat will be McD's for breakfast in the car on the way. It's not a big deal, but we were kind of looking forward to the hotel, but building our EF back up is more important and the kids understand that.

[jurisbo]

We seem to travel a lot for 4-6 weeks at a time, so I'm actually using the rest of this year to eat up some of our stockpile. I've been finding random things that are well past their dates, so I want to get some stuff sorted out and used up before we pack up the house for a while again.

I guess you could say I'm stockpiling grocery money, but it never actually seems to work out that way. My son has a lot of food allergies that pushed our monthly five-person grocery budget from $300/mo to $700/mo (at the same time regular food prices went up). I'm hoping that we'll be able to keep things under $400 or less while we use up some of the older stockpiled food.

--Shawn

[MysticEagle]

We haven't made many changes. Hubby's job is stable as far as I know and I don't work bc of health issues. Hubby thinks I should look into disability but I'm not sure since I've never worked for any period of time if that will work.

The biggest thing we did was change the 401k contributions back down to the 6% employer match. We were putting in 22% so I will use the extra check money to rebuild the cash fund that was a little depleted.

I have always stockpiled food and hbas. Every 2-3 months I'll do a big SaveALot and Costco trip. In between is just picking up a few sale items and milk/bread.