Tuesday, June 28, 2011

Keep it clean!

Have you thought about sanitation? If the whole world goes sideways city/county sewers may not be available to handle waste.  How will your family handle waste?  How will you dispose of it? What kinds of WASTE are you prepared for? When it hits the fan, know where to put it :)

Waste Management
Sanitation
Disinfection


Here's a primer:

Part One



Part Two



Part Three



Monday, June 27, 2011

Different points of view are important.

If you have access to National Geographic Channel, at 10 pm tonight and then repeated at  1:00am  there is a show called Doomsday Preppers (Channel 253 and 1253 on Timewarner) You will see 4 very different points of view. Different points of view are healthy and important.  You may not agree with everyone but it will give you a chance to look at your own prep with perhaps a fresher view.

Op Sec folks. Op Sec.
This will  also be available online for viewing.

I'm not a Doomsday-er
I'm a Prepper.

~ What are you watching?


Friday, June 24, 2011

Preppers from all over the SouthEast met in Clyde NC Last weekend

Many of you expressed a great desire to know the details of the conference.  I have excellent news for you!  Here are the links to the "public".  Obviously not every minute of the conference will be available ~ but here is something to sink your teeth into:

Forstchen Part 1
Forstchen Part 2

Forstchen Part 3:

Forstchen Q&A #1


Forstchen Q&A #2


Forstchen, 14Days after


Water Part 1


 
Water Part 2

Food Prep 101 Part 1


Food Prep 101 Part 2

Food Prep 101 Part 3



Food Prep 101 Part 4


ENJOY!



Thursday, June 23, 2011

Food Storage made simple

Many of you are familiar with our mantra of "do the math" to figure out how much to store for your family.  YOU are your family's expert.  After a long conversation with likeminded folks ~ I discovered Wendy DeWitt's You Tube conference.  It's broken down into 9 parts but its only an hour total.  Wendy has given her permission for us to provide you with links to the conference AND her handouts.  If you can make supper for the family, you can follow her through this EASY explanation of food storage.

Please note, Wendy doesn't sell any products, she makes no money from her talks.  She has a passion for sharing the purpose behind food storage.  If you'd like the "book" she is refering to its available in Microsoft Word format please send an email to: 
PreppersWife AT gmail DOT com  Your subject line should read: Requesting Wendy Book
Part 1 of 9


Part 2 of 9




Part 3 of 9

Part 4 of 9

Part 5 of 9

Part 6 of 9


Part 7 of 9

Part 8 of 9

Part 9 of 9


This is ONE point of view.  But quite practical.






Tuesday, June 21, 2011

EMP/CME

One Second After by William R. Forstchen  If you haven't read it it's a good primer for why a family needs to prep. Once you've read it, here's some additional information that may peak your interest in regards to electromagnetic pulses  While I was aware of emps and the effects they could have the story painted by Forstchen left me wanting to know more.  Below you will find some eye opening information.

Overview of EMP/CME by National Geographic: http://channel.nationalgeographic.com/series/explorer/4821/Overview

The full 41min video from June 2010:http://video.nationalgeographic.com/video/player/national-geographic-channel/shows/explorer-1/ngc-electronic-armageddon-1.html

Recent news article:North Korea Tests Super-EMP Nuke  Homeland Security NTARC News | 6/16/2011
Gary Samore, a top Obama administration national security official, warned of new sanctions if North Korea conducted a third round of nuclear tests on Monday, as reports surfaced that North Korea has miniaturized its nuclear warheads so they can be delivered by ballistic missile.
North Korea’s last round of tests, conducted in May 2009, appear to have included a “super-EMP” weapon, capable of emitting enough gamma rays to disable the electric power grid across most of the lower 48 states, says Dr. Peter Vincent Pry, a former CIA nuclear weapons analyst and president of EMPact America, a citizens lobbying group.

Recent News on Solar Flares:http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2011/06/110608-solar-flare-sun-science-space/

Dave Mosher  for National Geographic News  Published June 8, 2011
A mushroom of cooled plasma popped like a pimple and rained onto the surface of the sun yesterday—shooting perhaps the largest amount of solar material into space ever seen, scientists say.



Friday, June 17, 2011

News from Greece about the latest Greek financial crisis may affect your trip
News about the troubled Greek economy
is impacting the Euro and the EU itself


Are you already a Prepper?
There is a conference in Clyde NC

Carolina Readiness Supply is holding an all day preparedness seminar on Saturday, June 18th at the Haywood Community College Auditorium in Clyde, NC., starting at 8 am until 5 pm. They have a great lineup of speakers that will give you many tips on preparedness. Admission fee is $5, to help defray the costs, and will include 2 tickets for door prizes. Lunch will be available for $5. Venders will be set up in the lobby with items for sale.

Schedule: Subject to change.

7:30 – 8:30 Registration and Meet and Greet

8:30 – 8:40 Prayer, Pledge of Allegiance

8:40 – 9:00 Welcome and Gomer Parable – Larry Porter

9:00 – 10:00 William Forstchen author of One Second After

10:00 – 10:15 Break

10:15 – 10:45 How do I begin? Ryan Croft

10:45 – 11.15 Communications – John Swain

11:15 – 11:45 Water – Engineer775

11:45 – 12:00 Questions & Answer

12:00 – 1:30 Lunch & Breakout Sessions

FireStarting – 3 ways to start a fire without matches

Medications & Tinctures

Bug Out Bags

1:30 – 1:50 Food Storage – MadMick15

1:50 – 2:20 Sanitation – Southernprepper1

2:20 – 2:50 Retreat Design – Engineer775

2:50 – 3:00 Break

3:00 – 3:40 Disaster Security – southernprepper1

3:45 – 4:15 Weapons – Ryan Croft

4:15 – 4:30 Neighborhood Security – Dr. Dan Eichenbaum

4:30 – 4:45 Questions & Answers

We will give an honest review of the conference tomorrow evening!





 

Wednesday, June 15, 2011

Once Upon a time...

Once upon a time we walked through life asleep, 
unaware of all the ills in the world. 
Unaware of how food really made its way to our table.  
Subtle things happened around us in our universe and we slowly began waking up to reality. 

The environment became popular to pay attention to, it became trendy to be green, suddenly you weren't weird if you had a full pantry and home schooled your kids.

Regular people began to become conscious of what really going on in the world.

Our food supply, how things get to the table, what's in it once its there...
Unemployment sky rocketing
less money
rising gas prices
rising food costs
.
Be Prepared. Really prepared.

For what?

If it rained to day could you stay dry? Warm? Fed?
If it rained for a week could you stay dry? Warm? Fed?
And if it then flooded and washed out your only bridge to town? 

Now its not just you.
Its you, your significant other, your children and your parents.

It's raining.
It's been raining for a while...
Have you noticed?
Those with blinders look out and say The Prepper's Wife is nuts...
the sun is shining bright...
Is it? Really?
Nope its raining and its been raining....

And now I must ask are you prepared for the flood?
Were we prepared for 9/11?
Was New Orleans prepared for Katrina?
Was Japan prepared for a 8.2 Earthquake and subsequent tsunamis and aftershocks?

So I ask again...
It's raining...

Will you stay dry?
with an umbrella?
boots?
rain coat?
hood?

Do you have a boat?
It's going to flood.
Are you practically prepared...

Some folks will stay dry, others will get wet, unfortunately some will drown.

By the way, if you think we're talking about just the weather...then this really isn't the blog for you.

The sun will shine again.
We will band together and create a better community
one where we teach each other how to prepared.
How to have full pantries,
Seeds
and more
and yes to have an umbrella for a rainy day...boats for the floods

We will live happily ever after..
Will you?



Tuesday, June 14, 2011

The key is being organized.

It doesn't matter how much stuff you have, if you don't know where it is!

We all have places we put stuff, laundry detergent in the laundry room, Toilet paper in the hall closet and under the bathroom sink...Where do you put 50 bottles of detergent? 100 rolls of TP? There are several ways to organize your family's inventory. Diversified ~ this is a fancy way of saying "all over the house" wherever you can find space. Centralized ~ this is a fancy way of saying "in one room/part of the house" Keep like items together it will keep you sane.  When you are first getting started diversified storage is a good way to go because you don't have too much stuff yet. Once you start making bulk purchases (I'll teach you how to do this without breaking your budget) you're going to need to get serious about your organization.  Not everyone is blessed with a basement or an extra room and you're thinking ~ well, where am I going to put our family's pantry items and emergency gear?  let's look at that together for a moment. EEK out space where you can!

First declutter
throw it all away if its in the attic when was the last time you used it anyway? Seasonal storage OK, Aunt Martha's crib that doesn't even pass current safety standards - clutter (unless you can figure out how to reuse it right now chunk it) Paper products case packed CORRECTLY can be stored in the attic or basement.  Perishable Food items should be stored in a temperature controlled environment.  Garages are great for your actual gear, but an awful place for anything sensitive to temp changes.

Be sensible! Bar soap is small I can fit a 5 yr supply in a single diaper box in the top of the hall closet - keeping 5 bars in each bathroom that has a tub/shower (that's a 4 month supply for us) I keep enough paper products available for 3 months as much as possible in each bathroom with a potty the rest in the hall closet What I hear all the time is: "we don't have a walk in pantry or a basement to store stuff"
SO WHAT?

Go in your kitchen - open every cabinet and be HARSH!
How many glass pie plates do you really use at once? Get rid of the rest.
PYREX?
CHIP and DIP platters?
Plastics - no lids or stained?
Here's one - those lunch box coolers - really are you EVER going to use all 13 of them at once?
DONATE or sell, get rid of it!
Now look where you store your pots and pans...
Get real I want you to throw away all nonstick pots and pans that have the Teflon peeling - you really shouldn't be cooking in those!

Mugs -- Come on folks really? How many people will ever be at your house drinking coffee at once?
Keep the matching ones, and let everyone in the family keep their absolute favorite travel mug, and stoneware mug. Now donate/sale the other 20. YES THE STARBUCKS MUGS TOO!

Under the sink - There should be a kid/pet safe bucket (unless you don't have any of either)
In that bucket - cleaning supplies DO NOT HAVE DUPLICATE ITEMS OPEN! If you have more cleaning supplies than will fit in a 5 gallon bucket you need to either chunk some
or diversify storage (ex: put bathroom cleaners in the bathroom) hmmm more 'found space"

Do you see - just in your kitchen all the found space? Now put everything you use on the shelves you can reach. - in most kitchens you have just reclaimed all the
 deep corners under the cabinets, the top shelf in all cabinets and above the fridge, under the sink you even made space ALL PLACES TO STORE  Practically prepared stuff. Declutter: Under your bed ~ Tip top shelves in closets ~ Junk drawers just think of all the reclaimed space!

There is one other thing about stockpiling.
Keep the true extent of your family's stockpiled assets to yourself. Why? Ice storms, hurricanes, tornadoes, But if - just if - the world goes sideways -
your family's safety is the single most important thing in the world. Those that didn't prepare "just in case" will prey on those of us who did. Our family will not be victims. Don't make yourself a target!  OpSec ~ Operations Security keep your family plan, a family plan.

There is a book called "Just in Case" you can get it on Amazon all stockpilers need to read it.
Please check out the "Books" tab ~ many good reads are listed.

When someone comments "oh I know who's door to knock on if it all hits the fan" I look quite seriously at them and say - charity begins at home we have a large family - we won't answer the door for non family members. And we wouldn't. Our stock pile will actually hold extras for bartering.. seeds, TP, soaps, etc but we have children, and we have to draw a line in the sand ~ to have enough to keep them safe.

Why do you want to stockpile?
We all have different reasons...
When you know your why -
You'll figure out the where...
I'm here to help with the how...




Monday, June 13, 2011

First Things First

There is a lot to think about these days. 

Being a Prepper's Wife, is a role I have grown into over the last 12 years.
The goal of this blog is to assist others with the practical preparations for family without spending as much money.
The American Dream has turned into a nightmare for so many...Whatever your reason for wanting to "prep" or "stock up"on this site we will discuss the how to do it, and do it for less.

I will be making the following assumptions:
~ You either are already a prepper, or you want to begin to prep your family
~ You're willing to do some research (you need some inside information from your family to make this work)
~ You're willing to learn.

Take a moment and think about the following things:
1. WHY do you feel you need/want to be practically prepared?
2. Does your significant other know YOUR why? 
3. Do you have a family goal on what you want to do? (its OK to say no we'll work on this)
4. How many people are you preparing for?  You may be thinking this is an easy answer by counting noses of who lives under your roof but it isn't that simple.  If the power goes out today ~ never to come back on ~ who would end up at your house? How many folks?
5. Are you prepared to get prepared?

Step 1 - 72 Hour Supply
Step 2 - 30 days of supplys
Step 3 - 6 months- 1 year
Step 4 ~ Anything beyond a year some jump to 3 yrs on some items 5 yrs on others

We have 5 children at home, 2 out in the world on their own with relationships, families. My parents live a couple of blocks away ~ When we discuss stockpiles and family inventory  I want you to understand planning meals and household supplies for 10 people isn't easy or cheap. For that reason, when something goes on sale, we buy  it.  When it's free we buy ALOT of it.  Free? How do we get supplies for free or near free?  With coupons!  How crazy is that?  You wouldn't believe how much it saves.  Just by watching sales and matching up coupons I have been able to get things to stock for barter, plus meet our family goals for how much we want to keep on hand at all times but we'll get to that in a moment. First things first...

What do I need to prep for? Oh Darlin' if you're seriously asking that I need to remind you of everything that's going on in the world?  All the natural disasters, slow economic collapse, man made disasters?

Here's a great place to start with your personal research:

Talking About Disaster: Guide for Standard Messages

Presented by the Coalition of Organizations for Disaster Education

Print complete guide ( takes you to the PDF version 214 pages)


How much does a family need?

There are many sites out there that want to sell you stuff.  There are lots of prepared kits that you can buy both in emergency supply and foods.  The problem with ready made kits, they're expensive and they lack customization for your most precious asset ~ your family. How much we use maybe way more, or way less than you.

"But the experts say ...."  If I had a dollar for how many times folks say that I'd have alot of extra cash!
 Best kept secret in the prepper's world: ~ YOU ARE THE EXPERT ~  for real.  you know your family better than anyone.
Little Johnny won't eat peas, Suzie is allergic to corn.  A family of 2 needs less than a family of 10.

Its all about the math.

Step 1 - Decide now: How many folks are you prepping for?

Step 2 - Decide now: How long of a supply of food, non food, health & beauty aids do you want ?
     EXAMPLE: we would like to have 5 yr supply of all non perishables, 3 years of canned food, 2-3 yrs of pet food

Step 3 - You need to know how much you use.
     Make a list of all the foods your family eats on a regular basis.
     Make a list of ingredients for recipes your family really enjoys.
     How many rolls of toilet paper does your family use in a week?
     Do you have pets? How much do they eat a week, a month?
     How many times a week do have spaghetti?

Here's an example for toilet paper:

Now if the world goes sideways - I need to provide for my 5 kids, me, my husband, my parents, and possibly one other (see here I rounded up so I'd get 10)

10peeps x 1 roll/week x 52 weeks in a year = 520 rolls/yr x 5yrs = 2600 single rolls divided by 2 (because i only buy double or mega rolls) is 1300 rolls to stockpile

so that equation is:
# of people x 1 roll/week x 52 wk/yr = # single rolls needed to stock for ONE YEAR ( remember to divide this by 2 if you buy double or mega rolls)
Amt you use per month X 12 months = how much per year used
Per year amt X yrs of stock desired = total to buy to stockpile

Now you have the basic equation to use for anything you want to stockpile!
I know I know - you say - "But PW  what about stuff I measure by the month?"

Easy Peasy:
How many bottles of shampoo? Well, That depends after all your mileage may vary...
But for our family we use 2 bottles shampoo and 3 bottles of conditioner per month I have a hard time (very hard time) not matching my shampoos and conditioners ....  # bottles/month x 12 months = # of bottles per year x # of years you want to stockpile = total to buy to stockpile

Spaghetti Meals for 5 years:
Meat 2 lbs x 52 weeks = 104 lbs of meat (ONE YEAR SUPPLY FOR SPAGHETTI)
1 lg jar x 52 weeks x 5 yrs = 250 large jars of sauce for a 5 yr supply
1lbs a week X 52 weeks X 5 yrs = 250 pounds of pasta for a 5 year supply

Are you following the math? I hope so.

Now plan out breakfasts, lunches, dinners for 2 weeks for the number of folks you want to prep for.
Then calculate how much of the ingredients you need for each recipe
Then check you math really good, and extrapolate those numbers out for 1 year, 3 years, 5 years

~~~~~~~
I have to say if you have a ton money and you are itching to spend it I'll be happy to create a customized plan, and to shop it for you send me an email and we'll discuss consulting.


Links for you to review

Presented by the Coalition of Organizations for Disaster Education:

Just-In-Time & Post-Disaster Preparedness
Evacuation, Sheltering and Post-Disaster Safety
If Evacuation is Necessary Because of a Storm
What to do When There is Flooding
“Wind Safe” Room
How to Shelter-in-Place (Chemical Incident)
Factors for Protection from Radioactive Fallout
Food and Water Safety During/Post Disaster
Emergency Sanitation
How to Recognize and Treat Heat Emergencies
Frostbite and Hypothermia

Pre-Disaster Preparedness
Family Disaster Plan
Disaster Supplies Kit
Emergency Supplies for Your Vehicle
First Aid Kit Contents
First Aid Kit for Pets
Stocking and Storing Food and Water
Smoke Alarms
Carbon Monoxide Alarms
Fire Extinguishers
Arc-Fault Circuit Interrupters (AFCIs)
Home Fire Sprinkler Systems
Portable Generators

Hazards
Chemical Emergencies
Droughts
Earthquakes
Fires, Residential
Fires, Wildland
Floods and Flash Floods
Hazardous Material Incidents
Heat Waves
Hurricanes and Tropical Storms
Landslides and Debris Flows
Nuclear Power Plant Incidents
Terrorism
Thunderstorms
Tornadoes
Tsunamis
Volcanoes
Winter Storms