I Have a Confession to Make...

I don't recall when I last cleaned the inside of my fridge.

There. I said it.

I am going to guess, however, that the last time I cleaned it out was when I was hugely uncomfortably pregnant with E. Yeah, you know...that well-known cleaning frenzy that women go through in the last week or so of pregnancy called the "nesting" phase? It really makes absolutely no sense that when you are hefting around what feels like a lead-filled beach ball on your abdomen, have cankles that only an elephant could be proud of, and a blood volume to rival that of a well-fed vampire (which results in feeling like you are roasting over open coals even in the middle of January) that a cleaning spree would even enter your mind. But, that my friends, is the insanity of hormones.

But, I digress.

So...in reality it is likely that I have not actually cleaned out my fridge in about 19 months. I'll even admit that the main reason I decided it needed to get done this week is because we are about to leave on a week's vacation to visit family in Virginia and I realized it had probably been THAT long. We went on vacation last year around this time and I honestly don't recall if I cleaned it before we left or not. Being that we were still very much sleep deprived with an 8-month old in the house at that point, I highly doubt it even crossed my mind or that I had the time to deal with it.

Ok, let's say it together now...ewwwww.

BUT! Now it is sparkling clean and looking somewhat empty. Yay, Jeanne!

And I must add that I did not actually find ANYTHING particuarly green, black and moldy in there. And certainly nothing that had an expiration date that would indicate I was infringing on any fridge-tenant squatter's rights. I mean, I do clear it of leftovers, old salad dressings with only half a lonely serving left on the bottom, and soft, shriveled up carrots that fall to the bottom of the drawer when the bag of opened baby carrots gets picked up by the opposite end... So, I suppose things could have been worse. But, there was certainly a fair bit of dehydrated-looking crud in the tray on the door where we keep the perma-gallons of milk. And there were vegetable-matter leavings - including tons of red pepper seeds (one of R's favorite vegetables to eat raw) - scattered across the bottom of the crisper drawer.

And, here are the results of my efforts. Pretty...no?



And as for the freezer...well, that's a project to tackle another day. I must not wear myself out, you know. I'll leave those cleaning frenzies to people who are either OCD or hugely pregnant and thank my lucky stars that I am neither.