Happy New Year!

Remember the whole reason I started this blog about a year ago? I had three goals to complete by the end of 2010 (and to do so couponing).

Yesterday was the last day of 2010. I put the flour my mom had brought me (from a sale in Vegas) into buckets. It had been sitting in the garage for too long.(Notice my buddy heater keeping me warm while I work? I'm such a wimp when it comes to cold.)

I took a quick inventory of what we had. (The inventory/food storage calculator that I use can be found on the right-hand side bar.)

In reviewing my goals:

1. I was pleased to see I had met my goal of a three month supply (although I've found storing meat to be trying).

2. I was happy to know that even though we aren't swimming in money, we have been setting a little aside each month as a financial reserve. I have an AMAZING story to share with you about an experience we had with money savings a few months back. Another post, another time.

3. I was downright giddy to see that in addition to our 3-month supply, I had been able to continue building past that and was near a year supply of provisions for my family.

Almost everything I needed for my year supply I was able to get on sale and with coupons far below the retail price. BUT there were some things I wasn't able to. I headed to Costco to tie up some loose ends...and yes, I paid full price.

I spent $150.00 (thank you Christmas bonus from my transcription job!) and got a cart full of rather random items to top off the rest of my supply. These are the things I've found harder to get (in bulk) with coupons:

Large garbage bags

Paper plates

Napkins

Bottled water

Pickles

Canned chicken

Salt

Vanilla

Milk

Butter

Parmesan cheese

Apple Sauce

Popcorn

Tortillas

Hamburger buns

and the orange chicken was for our family New Year's Eve partay!

I have also been buying rice, pretzels, and tortilla chips every once in awhile at Costco.

Other than that I have been able to get everything else my family uses by coupon shopping at grocery stores and drugstores. It has taken me an entire year to build up a good stockpile but now I feel like I just have to maintain it.

I have learned a lot through this process. I promise to share in future posts.

Happy New Year!

Rung #3, Natural Disasters

It's March already? These months are just flying by. This month I am focusing on preparing my family for natural disasters. For example, earthquakes and wildfires could be potential threats in this area.

So far in my preparations (see my Food Storage Plan, page 2), I haven't geared up to leave my house. BUT it is often common for evacuations to occur alongside natural disasters.

This video got me thinking about how my family would respond to an evacuation. We have a lot of work to do. I'm not even sure we can get the whole family in the van and seat belted in ten minutes!

The Red Cross has a great Earthquake Checklist that I'm planning on going through and seeing what else we need to address for our family.

I also liked this Family Emergency Plan put out by ready.gov. We need to have a family plan set up.

These are a few of the things I'll be working on for the month of March. Feel free to join in or share any thoughts/experiences!

Rung #2, Power Outage

A couple of weeks ago our power was out for about two hours. (Yes, I had paid the bill...) It was a great opportunity for me to see where we are lacking in preparedness for a power outage!When the power goes off, one of the first things we do is call the power company. The number for Northern NV outages and emergencies is 775-834-4100. They are able to tell the estimated time the power will come back on. (They were only about 15 minutes off last time.)

I like knowing how long we'll be "roughing it" and if we'll need to worry about our food or not. (Or one time we were the first to call and they didn't even know the power was out in our area!) We have a top shelf in a kitchen cupboard where we keep flashlights, lanterns, and the old-school phone just for when the power goes out. I keep my extra batteries in the fridge, which I didn't want to open when the power was off, so I've moved some of those to the power shelf.

Our fireplace works even when the power is out (which I don't quite get because we turn it on with a switch on the wall...) so we used that to keep warm downstairs.

The Red Cross has a great one-page checklist for preparing for a power outage HERE. I just printed it (be sure to print this BEFORE the power goes out) and went through the list.

After reading through the list with my husband, I'm going to be on the lookout for coolers (CVS clearanced them last year at the end of the summer), going to be making up a family phone list, going to start pricing generators (any advice?), going to be checking into carbon monoxide alarms, and going to keep this Power Outage Checklist in our preparedness binder so I'll have some how-to the next time the power is out! One tip that Pam gave me from our power outage a few weeks ago...Keep a house key on your key ring. That way if you're not home and the power goes out, you can still get in without the electric garage door! Any other tips to share?

January Report

Well, I've been working on my food storage goals for one month now. It's time to report on my progress.

I have 3 goals in my food storage plan:

1: Build a 3-month supply.
2: Build a financial reserve.
3: Build a 12-month supply.

In my budget (I use the term budget VERY loosely) all household items are grouped together into the grocery budget. This includes food, diapers and wipes (I have 2 in this category), paper products, cleaning products, bathroom toiletries, medications...basically all of the things I have to buy at the grocery store to keep the household running.

Also included in my grocery budget are my food storage purchases. This month I've been able to stock up on things like cereal, toilet paper, laundry detergent, bar soap, and a few other things through the deals I've found couponing. I also went to the cannery before the prices went up.

Okay, here it goes. My January report:

• I spent $562.69 on groceries (Ouch! That seems like a lot.)
  
  
• I increased my 3-month supply by roughly 25%. (Good.)
  
  
• I increased my savings for a financial reserve by 33.25%. (Not much to start with...)
  
  
• I am 76.5% of the way to my 3-month supply goal. (Getting closer...)
  
  
• I am 25.4% of the way to my financial reserve goal. (Yikes!)
  
  
• I am 50.9% of the way to my 12-month supply goal. (Even though I don't have a complete 3-month supply, there are some things I have a year supply of...like soap.)

So, I may have jumped out of the gates a little fast. I spent a lot this month but I don't think this will be typical. There were some good sales and the whole idea is to buy it when it's low. (I can't imagine what I would have spent if I had paid full price!) It will be interesting to see how this compares to the months to come.

I think the thing I am most excited about after working out all the numbers for January is that this is doable. Sure, I've become the meanie rationing mommy, but it's nice to see my goals slowly coming together.

Water Barrels...CHECK!

Okay, so we've got the water barrels...now what?! I was cracking up when I got this email from Jen:

"Natalie, We got the water barrels. Thank you over and over! I really appreciate it so much.

One question: are you going to fill yours up with hose water? Do I add bleach to it? Or are these just for washing dishes/body kind of water? As you can tell, I am quite inexperienced with this whole thing. Jen"

This was funny to me because I was thinking the same thing. I was looking at those huge barrels thinking, "Hmm, what am I supposed to do with these?"

Now we all know I'm not claiming to be an expert. We're learning alongside and helping each other along, remember? BUT here's what I've found from people that are experienced and what I'm planning to do.

According to the Red Cross/FEMA information available online, it is a good idea to wash out any containers to store water in with 1 tsp. of bleach to 1 qt. of water solution. Swish the solution around so that it touches all parts of the container and rinse with clean water.

Even though our containers have been washed out, it might not be a bad idea to rinse them out again. I think I will...just in case.

Our tap water is treated with chlorine, so we can just fill it on up without having to add anything else to the water. If your water is not chlorine treated, you do need to add bleach (1 tsp. bleach to 8 gallons).

I think I will get a new (and clean) hose, so that I'm not filling my barrel up with nastiness from the hose that sits outside all the time. We can all share the clean hose. Let me know if you want to borrow it!

My personal plan is to use bottled water for my drinking storage and use the barrels of water for cooking/washing water. The inventory link (thank you, Prepared LDS Family) on my blog breaks down how much of each kind of water (washing, cooking & drinking) you should store based on how many people are in your family.

We also need some attachment things (can't think of what they're called, syphons?) to pump water out of the barrels. I'll look into where to order those and where the best price is. Anyone know of a good source for this?

I'm excited to be getting my water storage in order!

Food Storage Plan - Step Three

It’s a new year and it’s time for me to buckle down on my goal of a year’s supply in a year.

I’ve already completed step one (my inventory) and I was able to check off step two (knowing what I still need) once the inventory was complete.

I’m left with step three (preparing a timeline). Click HERE to see the food storage ladder and the breakdown for the year, month by month. (View page 2 and remember to start at the bottom.)

The idea is to start at the bottom of the ladder and climb up, beginning with the events that are most likely to occur first. I found this food storage ladder idea at Filling Your Ark and have used it to organize my plan of attack!

Food Storage Plan Update

I'm working on my food storage plan. So far, I've finished my inventory. Have you?

It's been nice to know exactly what I have. It came in handy when the sugar was on sale to know how much more I wanted...because I knew how much I had.

I'm now going to work on slowly gathering what I need. First on my list is WATER.
It's said that humans can go three weeks without food but only three days without water...so water it is.

After reading water storage information from:

• USU Cooperative Extension (Water Storage & Emergency Use)
• USU Cooperative Extension (Water Storage)
• Water Information (HERE)
• Fema and the American Red Cross (Food and Water in an Emergency)

I've decided to store 2 gallons of water per person, per day for two weeks.

The breakdown:
6 people at 2 gallons a day= 12 gallons of water/day
12 gallons/day x 14 (two-week supply)= 168 gallons

Whew! That seems like a lot. Since I've done my inventory, I know that I already have about 90 gallons of water. I have some water bottles for drinking that I've picked up when I find a sale. (I usually like to pay $2.00 or less for a 24-pack.)I also have some 7-gallon containers that we used for storage when it was just the two of us. We kept these babies stacked in the bathroom of our little condo. (Ah, the good 'ol days.) We bought these at Wal-Mart.

I actually had to use them once when the water was shut off for repairs to the building. I liked that they were portable and had a spigot on the side for easy use. I just put one at each sink and used it as I would the faucet. I'm going to buy the 55-gallon water barrels for the rest of my water storage. We have room in the garage for them and I think this will work for our family. What has worked well for you? Any suggestions for me?

Step One Initiated

Well, I did it! I spent the morning hunched over in the storage space underneath the stairs (a.k.a. the "food storage closet") and got an inventory of everything in there.Here's what I did. I downloaded this 3-month food storage calculator onto my computer, put in my family's numbers, and printed a copy. This calculator comes from a FABULOUS site called Prepared LDS Family.

I tried my hardest to ignore the "NEED" column (that's step two and I didn't want to get ahead of myself!) and just wrote down my numbers in the "HAVE" column. I found things today I didn't even know I had. I'm glad I used a pencil because I did a lot of erasing.

Next I need to inventory my pantry and the food under the beds. Yes, under the beds. Along with the inventory, I'm keeping a list of where things are (potato pearls under Nathan's bed, etc.) so I'll know where to find it.

(Thanks, Prepared LDS Family!)

Food Storage Plan...Where to start?

It is comical that I have a blog about food storage. Why? Because I am not prepared with my food storage.

Even though I can come up with a page (or more) of excuses (money, time, energy...) as to why my food storage is not in place, here's the bottom line - I'm going to do it.

I am going to start at the beginning and go step by baby step. The best part is - You're more than welcome to join me in my food storage journey.

Whenever I get thinking about food storage I get overwhelmed. Where do I start? What do I do? How do I do it? And then I do nothing because it's too much and life goes on. I'm stopping that vicious cycle.

This pamphlet outlines the basic idea of family home storage and is a good starting point. My goals are to (1) start with a three-month supply of my family's needs, (2) continue building a financial reserve, and (3) finally have a year's supply by this time next year. Yes, by the end of 2010.

Where to start? HERE with a talk that was given before I was even born. I had to chuckle at the "wheat for Christmas" line. (Thanks, Mom and Dad, even though I think Willie was wishing for a TV...)

1. The first thing for me to do is take inventory. I'm not even exactly sure what I have so that's a logical starting place. I think I'll just count it all and put it on a spreadsheet. Is there a better way?

2. The second thing I'll do is figure out what I still need. This will be easier to do once I know what I have.

3. The third thing I'll do is prepare a timeline. I've already set the goal of one year to a year's supply but I'd like to lay out a month-by-month plan of attack.

Additional thoughts: I'm going to step up my gardening efforts this year. I'm going to continue couponing to get items at a great price to store away. I'm going to sell my husband's truck set up and stick to a budget.

Whew! I am not going to get hung up on wanting it all now. Line upon line here. I'm focusing on step one. Once I've got my inventory, I'll return and report. Feel free to join in the fun!