Defrosting the Outside Freezer

This week we did a lot of baking for the kids' teachers.  Unfortunately all the shredded zucchini was frozen under layers of ice in the outside freezer.  On the bright side, it was just the motivation I needed to go ahead and defrost the outside freezer and make everything fit in the inside freezer.

Now, the inside freezer was already pretty full.

And there was quite a bit outside.  But I have supreme confidence in my packing abilities and I figured if I failed I'd just let the 'zucchini paste' go down the disposal.

First I removed all the milk jugs and ice packs I keep out in the freezer to help with energy efficiency.

Then I started moving stuff inside.  After about 4 hours, a few things were still frozen and stuck in place.  That's about 8 pounds of ground ham on the top shelf, a big pork roast on the next shelf, and the shredded zucchini on the third shelf down.  To my great delight I found 12 cups of frozen blackberries under all that top shelf frost!  Hooray!

The empty, unplugged freezer.  Yahoo!

 And the jam-packed inside freezer.  I had to cut the huge pork roast in half and the girls ice cream for snack, but I did manage to fit everything in including the "zucchini paste."

I am going to stay pretty focused on meal planning from the freezer.  We are hoping to have a neighborhood ice cream party in a few weeks and I also have 1/4 cow coming sometime.  And it's extremely hard (and a little time-wasting) to move food and repack a freezer this tightly packed every time I need something.

Katie