I struggle to find a happy medium in my preparations mostly because I'm not sure what me "scenario" is.
There is the short term emergency which is what I tell everyone I'm preparing for when it comes up. "Why do you have 10 bags of spaghetti noodles?" "Blizzard."
Then there is the longer term emergency which I think is what most "preppers" are prepping for. But even in there I find wildly different views.
For example, in a true long term immediate emergency ala "One Second After" (Which, if anyone ever wants to discuss that book with me I would LOVE to.) having lots of food storage would be helpful. For awhile. Canned soups and fruit will only go so long and then you have real issues once that begins to run out. Assuming you get to keep it all to begin with. (I'm going to be optimistic and assume that no one will take my food. Probably because we have guns. And ammo.)
Which is where/why I begin to lose focus. Should I buy lots and lots of canned goods or should I focus more on the ingredients themselves. For example instead of buying split pea soup should I work on having the split peas, carrots, spices, etc. instead? Will that take up more space? Will my family even EAT split pea soup?
There is no harm in learning to cook from scratch, I get that. Which is probably why I tend to buy more of the raw ingredients than the prepackaged stuff BUT since I can't cook everything from scratch yet (it takes time) where should I focus?
You can see I get a little ADD/OCD about this.
So for the rest of the first quarter of this year I'm going to focus on medical supplies.
I have three children. There will never be a day where I will wonder about the kinds of band-aids I have. My only question will be "Do I have enough?"
Anyone have any suggestions about what your medical supply closet has? Aside from band-aids?
About Me
- Lace
- Married mother to 3 children, 2 dogs and a cat. Work outside the home 8-5 in a professional career.
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4 comments:
Yes, I read the book. Just had hubs read the book. It is hard to know where to focus my prepping energies. I am going to be canning my own food more and more. I am trying to stockpile a little bit here and there. I haven't even started on the medicine cabinets yet! I struggle with not being overwhelmed, but I am determined to do better and better!
Try making split pea soup (or whatever it is you want to make) and see if your family likes it first. The thing with having the basic ingredients is it is much more versatile and you can use the ingredients to make other things.
Personally, I have tins and jars and things, because they are easy and quick, but we don't use them much. We cook from scratch 99% of the time and have the basic ingredients and also have a garden growing.
Maybe do a bit of all, that works for us, but it will still take time regardless which way you choose.
I also enjoyed that book, been a while since I read it so may be time to reread.
Our first aid stuff has lots of basics but no needle and thread.
Imodium
Betadine
Triangle Bandage
Gauze
Paper tape
Non stick bandages
Wound closure bandage/Butterfly bandage (for stuff that needs stitches)
Hydrating ice block thingies
Cold and flu tablets
Burn kit
Tweezers
Extra strong pain killers (as well as paracetamol and iboprofen)
Anticeptic/Anaesthetic/Anti-inflammatory cream
Tea Tree Oil
Lavendar Oil
Paw Paw Cream
Heavy weight Crepe bandage
Witchhazel
Hydrogen peroxide
Face masks
Hope that helps :)
As for what to prepare for, think of it like this: I went into the grocery store the other day and a 250 foot roll of aluminum foil was almost $7! For foil! Seriously?!?! Holy cow! My husband says it's because it's a "metal", and all precious metals are getting more expensive.
- as is everything else -
You should be stocking up a little bit at a time on whatever it is your family enjoys having and always have one more than you need, because prices are going up. I've been stocking up for years, just in case I can't afford to go to the grocery store every week. It's not an emergency or some End of the World, the-zombie-hoards-come-and-take-my-food scenario I'm worried about. It's something more akin to the Great Depression, where regular people didn't have enough food to feed their kids.
And, I'd have ingredients - they take up less space, cost significantly less, and are a lot more versatile. For instance, if you buy a case of peanut butter flavored granola bars, you have a case of peanut butter flavored granola bars, but if you have oatmeal, butter, sugar and syrup ... some dried fruit, nuts, chocolate chips, butterscotch chips, peanut butter chips, coconut, etc, you have dozens of combinations of granola bars, in less space, and at a smaller cost than that case of granola bars. And they're healthier, and if you get tired of granola bars, you can have hot oatmeal instead ... or you can make baked oatmeal or you can make oatmeal cookies or you can use the oatmeal in bread .... See? Ingredients. It gives you so many more choices.
Fascinating thoughts here -- and ones I can completely relate to! After a motivated start to prepping, I feel like I hit a wall and was unsure where to go from here. We have ample supplies for a power outage or other similar inconvenience, we could make it through a short amount of time if there's a lapse in paychecks, and we could deal with a stay-home-and-avoid-the-flu situation ... but where do I need to go from here? Your post (and the helpful responses!) have helped me start to regroup.
I'm planning to read the book within the next couple of weeks ... I'll let you know :-)
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