In my one and only week in relief society in the last 3-1/2 years, they emphasized that even having a 2-week supply of food and water in your house is very helpful and attainable for any circumstance...small spaces, small budget, etc.
We have had several times the last few years that we have had to use what we had on hand--like the President's Day snowstorm in 2003 that closed down life for a week. Or especially when the remnants of hurricane Isabel (also in 2003) came through and our area didn't have power or phone for a week.
We were very grateful for our :
Extra batteries
Cases of bottled water (since water treatment plants were also without power)
Grill with extra propane
Non-perishable, easy to prepare food
Candles
Flashlights
These items tend to be the first to disappear off the shelves during the emergency situation, not to mention the fact that many emergencies don't give lots of warning, so it just makes sense to keep them in the house and you won't have to be one of the crazy ones looking all over town for batteries during a huge snowstorm.
Friday, October 3, 2008
Tuesday, July 22, 2008
Fruit Punch Anyone?
About two months or so, my very awesome wife ordered some food from the cannery. She ordered very useful things like flour, wheat, sugar, spaghetti and fruit punch. Well, I went to pick up the order at the cannery the other day. They were out of the sugar, we will not be eating sugar in an emergency situation (actually we will probably just buy a big bag from the grocery store).
Well at the cannery, I also realized that the fruit drink mix that we bought was actually about 50 pounds worth. So we have plenty of fruit drink mix. Also if I ever forget English, I will still know what I am drinking. If anyone of you need fruit drink, you can have some of ours.
Then the problem was we would not have enough water for the mix. But today we received somewhere between 1000 and 4000 gallons of water by FedEx (we received ten of these things, although only two are pictured).
Thanks for idea for the water bottle thingies. I think that they will come in handy in an emergency. I also ordered MREs from Emergency Essentials (there are various meals besides this one) and I will post on how they taste in a later post.
Well at the cannery, I also realized that the fruit drink mix that we bought was actually about 50 pounds worth. So we have plenty of fruit drink mix. Also if I ever forget English, I will still know what I am drinking. If anyone of you need fruit drink, you can have some of ours.
Then the problem was we would not have enough water for the mix. But today we received somewhere between 1000 and 4000 gallons of water by FedEx (we received ten of these things, although only two are pictured).
Thanks for idea for the water bottle thingies. I think that they will come in handy in an emergency. I also ordered MREs from Emergency Essentials (there are various meals besides this one) and I will post on how they taste in a later post.
Thursday, July 17, 2008
I've Got Water on My Mind
Slowly, but surely, we have been working to get our food storage built up. It is going . . . . slowly . . . . but . . . . surely (did I already say that?). The main concern we have had recently is water. We are very limited in the space we have to store water. Water takes up TONS of space and weighs . . . well, TONS. Side note: I just started giggling when I noticed what the word "tons" is backwards. Back to the topic -- plus, I get a little freaked out about the idea of water sitting in our basement for an extended period of time. I realize there are ways to treat water, but I just assume that any water left sitting for a long time will turn green and grow mosquitoes. For those of you with plenty of storage, you can go back to whatever you were doing in your gigantic house with a 3-car garage. For the rest of you, I have found something that, we think, will work for us. And might could work for you. (that last sentence was for those of you in Oklahoma).
We found a special on these water bottles that are supposed remove up to 99.9% of pollutants and contaminates found in most water sources (i.e. rivers, streams and lakes) and comes with some free water chlorine tablets. The site claims that between the filter and the tablets you have a portable "mini-municipal bottled water plant". The site also claims that each bottle filters up to 100 gallons of water, so one small, lightweight bottle takes the place of one of those huge, heavyweight water barrels (that may, or may not, turn green and grow mosquitoes). On another site, a reviewer claimed that the bottles worked fine up to 400 gallons. We live exactly 0.62 miles from a large creek and 1.25 miles from the Potomac River. Each of these bodies of water contain exactly 9.7 gazillion gallons of water that has the potential to be drinking water (if only we had a mini-municipal water plant). Here is a link to the website where you can get one water bottle for $16.95. However, if you buy 10+ you can get them for $10 each, which includes shipping and tax. We bought 10, which means that for $100 we now have at least 1,000 gallons of drinking water and at the most 4,000 gallons. That is a lot of barrels (or old 2-liter Diet Mountain Dew bottles) worth. If some of you want these, but do not want 10+ you could always coordinate to buy them together.
The big downside to these is that we have to lug the water at lease 0.62 miles to get to our house. Our hope is that in the event we have to use these water bottles, the plumbing will still be working in our house (it just may not be safe to drink). If not, we will get to perfect the art of balancing a big water jug on our heads like in third-world countries . . . and who has not dreamt of that?
We found a special on these water bottles that are supposed remove up to 99.9% of pollutants and contaminates found in most water sources (i.e. rivers, streams and lakes) and comes with some free water chlorine tablets. The site claims that between the filter and the tablets you have a portable "mini-municipal bottled water plant". The site also claims that each bottle filters up to 100 gallons of water, so one small, lightweight bottle takes the place of one of those huge, heavyweight water barrels (that may, or may not, turn green and grow mosquitoes). On another site, a reviewer claimed that the bottles worked fine up to 400 gallons. We live exactly 0.62 miles from a large creek and 1.25 miles from the Potomac River. Each of these bodies of water contain exactly 9.7 gazillion gallons of water that has the potential to be drinking water (if only we had a mini-municipal water plant). Here is a link to the website where you can get one water bottle for $16.95. However, if you buy 10+ you can get them for $10 each, which includes shipping and tax. We bought 10, which means that for $100 we now have at least 1,000 gallons of drinking water and at the most 4,000 gallons. That is a lot of barrels (or old 2-liter Diet Mountain Dew bottles) worth. If some of you want these, but do not want 10+ you could always coordinate to buy them together.
The big downside to these is that we have to lug the water at lease 0.62 miles to get to our house. Our hope is that in the event we have to use these water bottles, the plumbing will still be working in our house (it just may not be safe to drink). If not, we will get to perfect the art of balancing a big water jug on our heads like in third-world countries . . . and who has not dreamt of that?
Thursday, June 12, 2008
Follow Up to Thumb Drive and Bucket O' Food
Since no one has updated this recently, I thought that I would write a post to say that we received our Bucket O' Food in the mail a while ago and we feel a little more prepared now. Also I had a good idea for the scanned documents and credit cards and stuff. In many programs (including Adobe, Word, Excel, etc), you can password protect each document so that even if the flash drive fell into the wrong hands, they would have a hard time trying to access the information.
Wednesday, May 28, 2008
Thumb Drive
I have just been reading about some creative uses for thumb drives that I thought would be worth sharing.
1. For insurance purposes inventory your house and belongings with a digital camera including owner's manuals and receipts then download it onto a thumb drive.
2. Scan important documents like passports, credit cards front and back, driver's license, bank account info , etc.. Put all that on a thumb drive and put it in your 72-hour kit.
3. As the cost of thumb drives go down use them to back up your computer.
1. For insurance purposes inventory your house and belongings with a digital camera including owner's manuals and receipts then download it onto a thumb drive.
2. Scan important documents like passports, credit cards front and back, driver's license, bank account info , etc.. Put all that on a thumb drive and put it in your 72-hour kit.
3. As the cost of thumb drives go down use them to back up your computer.
Wednesday, May 21, 2008
Survival Kit for your Pocket
As I was going through boxes in the basement the other day, I found some preparedness papers that we colected in Minnesota. I thought this was an interesting one about a survival kit for your pocket.
Your container should be waterproof and small enough to fit in your pocket.
1. Emergency food, like boulion cubes or ration bar.
2. Matches waterproofed in wax or nail polish. Or just buy waterproof matches.
3. Fire starter made from tightly rolled paper soaked in paraffin.
4. Compass.
5. Whistle.
6. Small knife or one sided razor blade.
7. Nylon fishline, heavy.
8. Fishing lures that work in your area.
9. Wire, 5-10 ft. long, light and flexible for snares.
10. Adhesive tape, 1-inch wide in strips 12 inches long.
11. Pencil and paper for messages.
12. Aluminum Foil, heavy duty, two sheets 12 inches square to make drinking and cooking
utensils.
13. Tablets to purify water.
I have no idea how or why we received this. Maybe Dad got it when he was scoutmaster, and they were doing a lot of camping.
Your container should be waterproof and small enough to fit in your pocket.
1. Emergency food, like boulion cubes or ration bar.
2. Matches waterproofed in wax or nail polish. Or just buy waterproof matches.
3. Fire starter made from tightly rolled paper soaked in paraffin.
4. Compass.
5. Whistle.
6. Small knife or one sided razor blade.
7. Nylon fishline, heavy.
8. Fishing lures that work in your area.
9. Wire, 5-10 ft. long, light and flexible for snares.
10. Adhesive tape, 1-inch wide in strips 12 inches long.
11. Pencil and paper for messages.
12. Aluminum Foil, heavy duty, two sheets 12 inches square to make drinking and cooking
utensils.
13. Tablets to purify water.
I have no idea how or why we received this. Maybe Dad got it when he was scoutmaster, and they were doing a lot of camping.
Bucket O' Food
I have told most of the people who check this blog about this already, but we have been buying these buckets of emergency food from Costco. We originally found them for $50 on the shelf at Costco, but have not been able find them since. We checked on the company's website, but they were selling for over $100 -- so we gave up for awhile. Then we decided to check on Costco's website and found them for $79.00 ---- which is more then we originally paid, but seemed like a good deal after seeing the company's website plus it includes shipping in the price. We now have a total of 7 buckets.
The buckets have 275 servings each and have a 20 year shelf-life. In case you are interested, here is my take on the pros and cons of the bucket o' food. Let's start with the CONS: limited variety of food (only 8 different meals), unknown quality, and most meals require cooking (which may be difficult in an emergency situation - side note: I have read that freeze-dried food is the best for emergency situations because they generally require little or no cooking). PROS: very compact, long shelf life, pretty affordable, easy storage (hard plastic buckets that can be stacked in a garage without worrying about rodents), and you can wear the buckets on your head after you eat all of the food.
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