But to more pressing matters... Week #8 of the 52 week suggestion to preparedness... welcome if you just came to this site. Food storage and the extra item each week are pretty straight forward, we all need to get wheat and beans for the long haul. The 72hour kit information is where it gets interesting... What do you want to eat for three days while away from home under a most likely stressful episode?? I have been sampling freeze-dried meals and have not been overly impressed. Mostly bland and taste-less and if you or the family members are picky eaters and like your food choices to be separated on the plate well then good luck because most of what's out there is of the casserole variety... all mixed together, and you need a stove to boil water to reconstitute most of it to make it eatable... extra water over and above drinking plus pots, stove and fuel. Maybe MRE's would work for this three day adventure, eat cold or warm with some options for sides and snacks, short shelf life, up to 130 months, ten years, if stored at 60 degrees or below, not frozen though. Take them on camping trips and outings to test them to find family favorites and keep them rotated, assuming you get out and camp more then once every ten years!
Well for the March newsletter... water water water, the best bet here might be a swimming pool with a cover and filter all the water you take out for consumption... no diapers or peeing in the pool though! The sheer volume of storing water is staggering to think of, then along with draining for rotation... each family will need a water master. Store as much as you can in large containers, also some smaller containers, five gallon or less, for grab and go emergencies, and filter all drinking and cooking water through a good three stage backpackers filter, this way you do not have to deal with rotation issues, remember we are storing treated city water to start with. Keep your stored water in a cool dry place, off the concrete floor, tightly sealed till use, and out of direct sun light. Stored this way its storage life is indefinite, and store someplace where it will not freeze.
The food storage issue just keeps nagging at me ... this idea of an "active pantry" keeps coming back to mind... a good active three month supply of food always rotating based on our daily family menus, along of course with the long term "raw" from scratch food storage items. If you are on the computer reading this go to http://preparedldsfamily.blogspot.com this is a very well done and thought-out site. Take some time to explore, at the green menu bar at the top click "start here" read then go to "food storage week-by-week" a great resource. If you are way behind on the years supply, as we are this three month idea is a great start/goal to work towards and expand upon. This food storage is a process that takes time... it can be done in one shot but if your like me and my budget it's not happening!!
Besides i don't like getting my food storage all from the same place and hope it lasts till i have to use it and then hit the "menu fatigue" wall early into it. Variety and options are the name of this endeavor and it takes careful planning not throwing a-lot of money at it to feel good and going into any kind of debt that can't be paid off in one month.
Please post comments to help us help you and we will keep offering ideas, insights and suggestions... i try to work on the k.i.s.s. principal as often as possible cause no one needs to reinvent what's already out there. Cheers.
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