Please share with me/attach a pic of how you organize your breast milk stash. I have such an oversupply (pumping 6oz from each breast 2x/day) while nursing 7-8 times/day that I had to buy a chest freezer to keep it all in, and now I can't figure out the best way to organize it without have to keep the lid open and sort through all the dates to find the oldest ones. What works for you? Tupperware bins, bags, something else?
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I filled freezer bags with the milk bags and labeled by week. The deep freezer wasn't very organized but I always found the oldest milk first.
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@autumnlove: Did you label them by the week they went in the freezer or the week they expire?
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@oahujeni: I labelled by the date range the milk was pumped...our deep freezer was only opened once a week so my LC said milk could be stored for up to a year.
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I h ad jumbo ziploc bags that were labelled and dated. I also used large haagen daaz icecream boxes to help sort things out
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@autumnlove: holy sh*t you have a lot of milk!!!
I did the same thing as you but keep it in my regular freezer. I have just two measly freezer bags full of milk bags. -
@autumnlove: Oh ok I like this! I need to go get some freezer bags. Right now I just have all the flattened frozen milk bags in piles but they keep falling all over the place in the freezer and the dates are a mess. And I didn't realize they could be stored for a year in the deep freezer, that is so great to know!!
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@Mrsbells: So you are telling me I need to go out and buy/eat several containers of haagen daz? I'll talk to you ladies later, I'm off to the grocery store to stock up on ice cream!!
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You can use a gift bag to stack all the milk. You can even cut a slit on the bottom so you can pull out the oldest milk from the bottom. I would post a pic but I have a baby attached to my boob.
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@mrskc: This is what I do.
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@mrskc @weagle: smart!!
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@oahujeni: I don't take credit for the idea. I saw it online somewhere. Probably on HB.
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long skinny kind of tall tupperware without the lid! fits bags perfectly and i can store them standing up by date! will post pic when i get home.
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I kind of just throw them in there, but I use the MilkMaid app to keep track of what's in there, how old it is, and when it expires.
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@autumnlove: Wow! You have a LOT of milk!
Subscribing to this thread to see more pics!
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@shopaholic: @mediagirl: That picture is from Sept! I only have 2 bags left!
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@mrskc: I use gift bags too!
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I also stored in a larger ziploc bag in the freezer.
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I put mine in a gift bag with a slit at the bottom so the oldest is always used first. It keeps everything organized and saves space too.
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i didn't know about the milk maid app! def downloading that. here is a pic of how i store.
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@oahujeni: Ok, this is after much trial and error! Go to Target in their dollar/3 dollar section at the front of the store. For $3, they have file holders that will fit the milk bags perfectly. No milk avalanches, and super cheap!!
Don't overfill your milk bags, 6oz per bag works well for us portion and storage wise at 12 months. Lay the bags flat to freeze, then you can put them in the bin by date. It will hold a month's worth of 6 oz portions easily. I've made the mistake of over-filling much of my early stash
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@oahujeni: I'm lucky and my grandparents own a gift store.. so my aunt found a box that was a perfect fit and holds 10 6 oz. bags. Before this discovery I was using a muscle milk boxes (from costco) to store my milk because they fit almost perfectly. I've also heard that coke boxes work well.
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@lemondrop: wow that is super organized and I'm a total file system girl. I have a trip to target in my plans for today and will see if can find those
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@LaineysMom & lemondrop: so do your los eat 6oz at a time because I've only been freezing 4oz portions?
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It may be hard to see, but I have The First Years organizer and 2 gift bags. I am going to run out of room soon though!
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@oahujeni: now that he is older, he is drinking less and less at a time, but he has never been a big drinker.
Just think of the worst case scenario- you may need to defrost more than 1 bag for a feeding. You just go through more bags, not really a big deal! I wish I had frozen smaller portions, rather than bigger. Smaller portions are much easier to store and defrost.
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Thanks for your ideas, everyone! I found ice cube bins at target today for $3.99 and they hold the bags perfectly!
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@oahujeni: Yay! Good find! I freeze 6oz. portions b/c I'm cheap and don't want to shell out more for more bags.. I have 20+ 2.5oz. Medela bottles with frozen milk in them for smaller portions, and 150 1 oz. "milksicles".. My bags are organized, but the rest of my stash is a mess.
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