Loving It!

I wrote this on my other blog, but it fit too perfectly here, so if you read me elsewhere, you may have already seen this. I love it THAT much!

image: http://foodstoragemadeeasy.net

I ran across "Food Storage Made Easy" a long time ago. They would send me emails frequently telling me which step I should do next, and I, being the rebellious soul that I was (and am--but I'm working on it), would just delete them--nothing done.

 For about a week now, though, I've been working with their 3 month supply worksheet. You can find it here--go to the link they have set up to find the spreadsheet. It's AMAZING!

 You figure out and type in the names of the recipes you'd make each day for a month (breakfast, lunch, dinner, and snacks) across the top. Down the left-hand column, you type in the ingredients you would use to make the recipes you've put in and how much of each thing you'd need under each recipe.

 I have also set up hyperlinks to the recipes I will use, so all I have to do is click on the name of the recipe, and it takes me right to it. Lovely!

image: preparednotscared.blogspot.com

When all is said and done, they figure out how much of each item I need for one month and for three. I can put in the price and size of an item, and it will tell me how much I will be paying for a three-month supply of that item. No guess work left to the process.

 Oh, I can also type in how much of something I have on hand, and it will tell me how many I still need to buy. Voila! Inventory not a stressor anymore. Love it!

If you're working on getting your food storage set up, this is definitely the best way I've seen to get it going. Check it out.

Should I, or Should I Not?

I went to see my sister-in-law yesterday to check out the Shelf Reliance program. It was fascinating! My sister-in-law used the products to make us chicken noodle soup and chicken salad sandwiches. They were both SO good.

Looking at the products, I was so impressed--cheese, eggs, two kinds of milk--one for cooking, one for drinking, and even dehydrated yogurt. Really?! I have to admit I'm not very well-versed in dehydrated food, but this was amazing to me. It opens a whole new reality to food storage!

I went ahead and signed up. These are many of the things I know our family will lack in food storage. She told me that anything you can buy at the dry pack is better to get there because it's so much cheaper, so I'll keep buying my milk through them as well as rice, onions, flour, sugar, etc. I like the fact that when I buy these items from the dry pack, they'll last for 30 years. That's one of the big sales points for me with Shelf Reliance too. Their items don't last as long, but after they've been open, most will last a year to 18 months. I mean, if I'm going to buy food for storage, I want it to be able to last for awhile.

I went ahead and signed up for the program. By late afternoon, I received an email telling me that I was in their computer system, so I went and checked it out. Wow! I was so impressed with the site. The one thing I wasn't impressed with, though, was the prices. YIKES!

I have to keep reminding myself that in a time of being without, without these items, we really would be without, so is it worth is to me? Yes. When I think of how much easier it will be to cook with sour cream and cheese and be able to keep my family happy in the long run, yes.

I used to watch "The Biggest Loser" on Netflix. I only really watched when I was folding laundry or doing dishes, but one day I went to turn it on and found that it was no longer stream-able--you now have to order the discs. BUMMER! But, last night, while folding laundry, I found that "Extreme Couponing" is now an option. Watch out!

I used to extreme coupon--to a degree. I did the stock up items but bought normal food for my family too. I was always amazed at how much I saved. Well, I think I'm going to start heading that way again. I was astounded at how much these people save weekly and how small their grocery budgets are. They take a lot of time on coupling, but maybe, at this point, it's worth it. I know it will get me to the point of feeling secure about what I have stored for my family if I do.

Spiritual Storage

"We each have moments of spiritual power, moments of inspiration and revelation. We must sink them deep into the chambers of our souls. As we do, we prepare our spiritual home storage for moments of personal difficulty." 

--Neil L. Andersen, "You Know Enough", Ensign, Nov 2008, 13–14

Money

So, one thing I think I neglected to mention on my last post was the fact that there were two companies I'd try to reach Monday morning. One was the pharmacy that I mentioned in the post. The other was our credit union. Both were having computer issues. I guess that's why the slight feeling of panic took over.

Those are both fairly critical places of business, and to not be able to get what you need from either one?....Yikes!

So, this takes me to the cash reserve.

My daughter is planning on serving a mission. A rather large sum of money is needed for this endeavor. It currently all sits in our credit union. It was the first thing I thought of when the computer system was down. This wasn't one of those we're updating our system kind of things. This was no ability to log in kind of a thing.

I'm really not a financial genius--at all. It's all kind of a deer-in-the-headlights kind of scenario, to be honest, but my husband's great at it. The one thing that's helped us more than anything has been the envelope system. It's helped us get our finances in order, and it's ensured that we have a cash reserve on hand.


Last night, my husband finally took the old tent to the dry cleaner to fix it. Ugh! I think I can now get back to organizing the garage for storage, so I'm off to get dressed and then out to the garage for 15.

Oh, This is Why I'm Doing This

TOTAL eye-opener today.

Because I have two boys struggling with asthma lately, I came to the realization that I would have to get a new inhaler for the school to have on hand for #5. I contacted our pharmacy first thing, and they told me to come on in, and they'd take care of me. I went in, pulled a number, and sat and waited. I was the only one there, yet I continued to wait.

 After about ten minutes (I may be exaggerating just a bit--time flies when you have two little ones in tow :oP), a pharmacist emerged and asked me if I was there for something urgent. I told him the nature of my visit and said it wasn't "urgent urgent, just urgent." I could run the inhaler we currently own up to the school and administer it myself if necessary.

He shared with me that their computer system was down, and they didn't know when it would be back up. He said it could be up to half an hour or 45 minutes, but he really had no clue. Whatever the problem was, it was system-wide.

 I thanked him, got up and walked out. Oh, btw, my car was making some interesting noises too, so that totally shot my entire morning--the morning when I was going to get my life in such great order.....Oh, wait, that's every morning, but as you can see, it never happens.

 Needless to say, I didn't get the inhaler, but what I did get was a big ol' dose of reality. Wow! We are SO reliant on computers. What would we do without them.

My next stop was the gas station. As I'm sitting there, I'm thinking, "Man, oh man. I hope their computers are working. Don't those pumps work on some kind of computer system?

I tend to have a bit of an active imagination, so my thoughts just flew from there....No wonder we, as members of the Church, have been asked to have a year supply of food, clothing, and fuel. All it takes is the wrong power to step in and revoke ours, and we're sitting ducks.

 I called the pharmacy again later and asked if things were back up and running. The woman on the phone, rather embarrassedly, told me "No." I asked if there was a back up system that they used for times like this. Again, and more embarrassedly, the answer was "No."

 How prepared are we? I'm guessing not very, so my next and most obvious question: "How prepared am I?"

Shopping Tonight

On the weekend of General Conference, we rotate the food in our 72-hour kits. I've got my shopping list ready and am venturing out here in a few minutes to go get the goods. Here's what I'm buying and how much for each kit:

3 packages of oatmeal
3 fruit snacks - can I find some without red dye 40?
2 cocoa
1 apple cider
3 jerky packages (1 oz)
3 packages of crackers
3 granola bars
3 Cup O'Noodles
3 packages of cookies
1 pack of gum
6-8 pcs. of hard candy
3 packages of nuts


These go in a Ziploc bag along with a little printed menu. Here's what the menu lists:


Breakfast
Oatmeal
Fruit snacks
Cocoa or cider

Lunch
Jerky - 1 oz.
Crackers
Granola bar

Dinner
Cup O'Noodles
Cookies

Snack
Gum
Candy
Nuts


I'm not a huge fan of Cup O'Noodles because of all of the preservatives, but I figure it's only for three days, right?

The kids'll eat the goodies out of the past kits during Conference tomorrow and Sunday.

Already Done

I'm working on a three-month menu. It's funny, as I'm working on this preparedness thing, I can now see how random I was being about it and have been from the beginning of my marriage--kind of half-hearted (going through the motions) and random.

The plan now is to create a menu. I've heard that you should just create a 9-day menu and rotate that, but that was suggested by a man. Did I just say that? Well, it's true. My husband wasn't the one who suggested this, but I'm pretty sure he would do things completely differently than I do, and that's really okay. If he wants to eat spaghetti every nine days, he can go for it. As for me, my plan is to have spaghetti every month and a half or every three months.

At this point, I've created a 45-day menu, but I may expand it. Oh, and I only have dinners on it at this point. I will continue to fill this in. I've laid it out on a regular Word document and turned the page to a landscape layout. I've set tabs for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and snacks.

After I'm done with the menu, I'll create a master shopping list. Each month, I'll use my preparedness budget to buy extra items on that list. If things go on sale, I'll buy in bulk and store it away to be rotated later on.

I've been out to the garage today. I found more buckets and lids. I also found a bad surprise....the tent that was used for some camping this summer. It was stuffed in a large plastic bin. I pulled it out piece by piece and found water in the bottom of the bin. Ugh! Well, we shall see if it's salvageable. I need to lay it out in the sunshine. It was sunny yesterday, but it's not warm any more. It was actually pretty windy yesterday. I'll lay it out on the back deck anyway, and see what we can do.

I have all of the clothing I found in the garage all gathered together to be gone through. I'll get through it and see if anything is worth saving away for the future.

Frog....Eaten...for Today

Progress made! I can't seem to stop once I start in the garage. I found both lids to the buckets along with putting another sleeping back up on the shelves. I found some pie filling I canned, so that's now in the pantry to be used. There was another water bottle too.

The huge buckets of rice are stacked and in one spot that's easily accessible. I brought one bucket in for easy use. It's now in the pantry.

We have all kinds of clothes out there in plastic bins. I'm sure they're from when kids cleaned their rooms, and they're just ready for D.I., but I'm going to go through them carefully and hopefully keep some for storage.

I also, very randomly, found a large juice container with a lid. My plan is to wash it out really carefully--bleach water and the whole nine yards--and fill it with water.

Oh, and I found a bunch of work gloves. They are now sitting with the 72 hour kits. I learned from Japan that no 72-hour kit should be without work gloves and a shovel.

We keep our 72-hour kits in wheeled garbage cans, but realistically, one can only holds three kits, so for now, I've put the extra kits and the first aid kit onto a counter top near the garage door. They'd be easy to grab if we ever had to.

Trying to Be Like Moroni

Alma 50 is all about preparation. This morning I sat down to read and the very first thing was....

"And now it came to pass that Moroni did not stop making preparations...." (Alma 50:1).

There you have it. I'm hopefully not preparing for the same things Moroni was, but the fact is, I'm preparing, and I have to do as Moroni did. I have to keep these things in my mind and just continue daily. There's the challenge--not stopping.

I'm figuring it can't be a big panic thing; it just needs to be consistent. Little baby steps done on a consistent basis.


As I continue to read, I'm learning that, not only were the Nephites preparing themselves for eventualities, but as they did so, they thrived. Here are people threatened by war from their enemies, but they're actually building new cities as they're preparing to defend what they already have. Amazing!

So, what I'm gathering from this is the idea that if we are obedient and are taking care of what we already have, we will be added upon. There will be more given to us as we prove that we are capable of caring for what God has already given us.

Here, catch this one too....In verse 23, it even goes so far as to say, "There never was a happier time." Wow! Really?! Here's a people preparing for war with a blood-thirsty people, and they're HAPPY?!

So, there's my motivation for the day. As far as having more stuff to take care of, mmm...no, I can do without that. I'm overwhelmed by the stuff I already have, but if obedience makes me happy, I'm ALL OVER IT!

So, today is FULL of activities. I don't know when I'm going to have time to do any preparation activities, so I guess the first thing I'm going to do (here at 5:41am) is to get out to my garage and continue to "dig trenches." I'm going to work on that darned garage for 15 minutes. That's something I can do while the family sleeps on.

At least, I'll still be working on being obedient and keeping preparedness consistently on my mind. It's a baby step, but still, it's a step.....a step toward prospering and being happy.

Total Sloth

I only did one thing for emergency preparedness, and that was...get this...trying out the new can opener I bought at Ikea yesterday. It didn't work all that well. I need more practice, I guess. We have an opener that I bought through Pampered Chef that I LOVE. This one's similar, but you have to really have it on the can in just the right way.

I shared a link with my college-aged daughter about her food storage, and for the emergency preparedness document, I looked up links to three-month food supply ideas. There are lots of GREAT sites out there. Like I said in my first post, I'm just another LDS woman with an emergency preparedness blog.

I'm heading to bed. I'll link you up to a BUNCH of site tomorrow.

The Significance of Armor

Reading in Alma 48-ish this morning. It spoke of the Nephites' preparations for war, and how they were always one step ahead.

One thing that struck me was how the Lamanites were continually trying to keep up. One way they did this was to finally figure out that armor would be a good idea. This thought of armor got me thinking about preparedness in other ways--not necessarily for war.

Armor is intended for individuals. There are things we do for emergency preparedness to protect the greater good--food storage, emergency supplies--but what am I doing to protect the individuals in my family? Are my children prepared to take care of themselves if something were to happen while they were at school?

Each year, I send $10/child to the elementary school's PTO so that they can purchase some items to have on hand in the event of an emergency--granola bars, etc. Is this enough, and what about my older kids? I have never heard of any such thing at the middle or high schools.

We have our 72-hour kits here, which is great--I need to be prepared to rotate them this weekend (we do it Conference weekend), but what are the chances that my kids are going to be home when and if something disastrous were to happen? I would say pretty slim since so many hours are spent away from home.

So, maybe there needs to be some focus on preparing them as individuals so that, no matter where they are, they are ready to care for themselves. I just found this.

I haven't created my big plan yet, but this is definitely going to be one of those frogs I'm going to have to include. My list just keeps growing.

To keep my head straight, here's what I'm remembering from the past couple days:

• Clean out food buckets (still not done--I'm cringing about the amount of wasted water to do this. Ugh!)
• Find lids for food buckets
• Purchase canned fruit
• Purchase peanut butter
• Create the big emergency preparedness plan for the fam
• Buy items to rotate the 72 hour kits this weekend
• Buy items (including bag) for mini kids' survival kits

None of these things are all that hard. The trickiest is probably the 72 hour kit ingredients. My sister-in-law used to get the items at their Super Saturday activity. They'd make the food portion of 72 hour kits available to all of the sisters in their ward. I thought this was BRILLIANT! You'd pay $5 per person and voila! I didn't hear about anything like this this year, so I'm on my own. I'll have to get a kit out here soon, get the bag of food pulled out and create a shopping list.

Follow Up on Today

I didn't even go into the garage today. Sad, but true. Tomorrow's my day at the preschool, so it might not happen tomorrow either. Ugh! If I don't eat those frogs first thing in the morning, it just doesn't get done.

I just realized that if this is the first post you've read, you might really think I'm eating frogs in my garage. Yikes! I'm not, to figure out just what I'm talking about, go here.

I worked on birthday shopping for my son who will turn 17 on the 4th today, so that's where my focus was.

In regard to that, I have to share a little something. I know part of emergency preparedness is having a cash reserve on hand. The best way our family has found to do this is with an envelope system. I've written quite a bit about our exploration of this system, and I really love it.

I'm really kicking myself for letting emergency preparedness fall to the wayside in our budget. I did take that $20 and head to the grocery store. I went to the one that I know has the lowest prices for canned goods and ended up buying 5 larger cans of chicken and 12 cans of tuna.

The next things on my priority list will be canned fruit and peanut butter.

Oh, and while I was out birthday shopping, I picked up a can opener at Ikea. It was super cheap, and who knows if the thing even works, but I figure a can opener might be an invaluable object--much better than banging a can on a rock over and over again trying to get it open. I think it cost me a couple dollars.

I think, at this point, it's a matter of getting this kind of thing set in my mind on a daily basis and doing the little things that'll eventually add up to become bigger things.

Makeshift Preparedness Budget

I mentioned before that my emergency preparedness portion of the budget was sucked up by other things. This is a very insecure place to sit, in my opinion. I sat down last night and tried to figure out just what we could cut, so that we're not dealing with this issue in the future. My conclusions weren't ones I was comfortable with, so I'm still working on that.

In the meantime, I've decided that any money that comes into my hands this month will automatically go into an envelope for this purpose. When I moved my bed the other day to rearrange my room, I came across $20. YAY! Where did that come from? Who cares. Into the envelope it goes.

So, I've decided that our food storage is lacking in protein more than anything else. Today, I'm going to go stock up on canned chicken and tuna. I should do peanut butter too, but I think I'm going to wait until that goes on sale and until I have more than $20. Winco has pretty good prices on tuna and canned chicken, so that's the plan for today--to buy as much of those items as $20 allows.

Here are my frogs for the week:

• Go through the box of little stuff from my bedroom--this really has little to do with emergency preparedness. It's more for my state of mind. I know that if I can get things cleaned up, I will be more motivated to do more and get moving better in the right direction. 
• Keep working on the garage.

Yup. Only two. The garage is seriously going to take me awhile.