[Kartographer]

For your comments and consideration.

[Kartographer]

Preppers’ PING!!

[JRandomFreeper]

I no longer give a rat's ass what anyone thinks. If they don't like it, they can pound sand.

That's my simple solution.

/johnny

[Diana in Wisconsin]

I don’t talk about my prepping with the non-believers I know...or rather the DOPES that THINK Mother Government will SAVE them should TSHTF. *Rolleyes*

Why make yourself a target? I’m MORE than willing to help those I love in a crisis situation.

The rest of ‘em? Notsomuch, LOL!

[TMSuchman]

when I do my shopping [on a monthly basis] i always get more than we need for the month. that way it does not draw any extra attn from anyone.

[Citizen Zed]

Some helpful pointers here... www.ready.gov/build-a-kit
But use cash or the government will get suspicious of your behavior.

[Dead Corpse]

It’s not “prepping for the end of the World”...

It’s “prepping so that when the crash comes, it ISN’T the End.”

[defconw]

Bumping for later!

[stevie_d_64]

The number one rule of preparedness, is to not talk about your preparedness...(i.e.: details)

Kinda like “Fight Club”...

:-)

[Scrambler Bob]

M4L, without looking active

[PA Engineer]

UGH! I just prepared my first long tome in about a year (with pictures). Poof. Gone.

I'll try again next year.

The post was about preparing to live versus living to prepare. To all the outsiders who visit, our place is one to escape to relax. There are not outward signs of longterm preps for the uninitiated. They just see it as somewhere to have a drink and relax. To the initiated, our place is also somewhere to visit to relax.

My post did an IRS hard drive. UGH.

Let's see if at least one picture loads. Freepers are welcome for cigars and drinks.



P.S. Bears and bird feeders do not mix.

[kaehurowing]

The three men are buried on the back 40?

[greeneyes]

Good article. I enjoyed reading it. We have always had a certain way of life. It’s now called prepping, so I have a hard time thinking of myself as a prepper.

I am just doing what we grew up doing and what most of our friends and grand parents did too.

Since we grew up camping we always had alternative ways of doing stuff when the electricity went off as it often does. We have always grown some food and preserved it. Always bought extra food when on sale and stored it. Ordered a quarter of beef and stored it in the freezer (that’s a year’s worth for our family of four).

The main change for us is just more of what we have always done. When the oil prices first spiked up from 2 bucks, and the market crashed in 2008.

I immediately began stocking up on all our usual and favortie things. Like peanut butter and tuna fish.

If the peanut butter had a use by that was at least 15 months in the future, then I bought enough to last 15 months, and so forth. We have 4 grocery stores, so I bought some from each store, and bought plenty of extra when it was on sale.

Same for all the staples that last forever it seems, like pinto beans, sugar, flour, salt, baking soda, honey, etc.
Once a quarter, I buy food in bulk, number 10 cans from the LDS on line store.

I particularly like their starter kit. It has 6 cans in a case. Beans, Rice, White Wheat, Red Wheat, Flour, Oatmeal. That’s about one months worth for 1 person. Add some home grown veggies, staples, and vitamin pills a few scraps of meat or seasoning, and you can make some tasty meals.

These cans will still be good for 20 or 30 years, and that’s longer than we expect to live. We are working toward having at least a year’s worth of our regular food, and a year or more of staples and number 10 cans.

One of the easiest ways to prepare is to just buy 2 or 3 extras of whatever is on your non perishable grocery list. I have always bought one to use, one for the pantry, and one in case of company. I still do, except now, I buy it more often.

If your garden hasn’t produced, check out the farmer’s market, and can, dehydrate, or freeze the stuff your self. Saves money, and prepares for emergencies too.

Many people do this kind of stuff all the time anyway around here, and most families hunt deer, quail, turkeys etc, so it’s all pretty much under the radar.

If you are a “doomsday” type, then you need to consider that even if you have a year or 5 years of stuff. At some point you will run out, or maybe there will be a storm that ruins your stuff.

If something happens to your food and water, do you have the knowledge and skills to do it yourself? Take sugar for example. What if there is no where to buy it? What will you do? Can you grow sugar beets? If so, do you know how to make sugar from beets at home? Have you ever done it?

What about bread and flour? How will you make your own if you don’t have a grocery to buy bread or flour? Well, you get the idea.

Skills and knowledge are very valuable things to have. Such a hobby is another under the radar thing you can do, and it can ensure that your food supply is not tainted with pesticides and chemicals which is the reason, I got started. Just sick of hearing about e coli in spinach for a tiny bag @ 3 bucks. Save money and be safer. Buy a pack of seeds have spinach all year.

[Ellendra]

My neighbors around my land know that I’m prepping . . . for the next time I lose my job and have to pay my expenses with what I grow. They know it has happened 3 times in the last 7 years, so this doesn’t seem outlandish to them. In their eyes, I’m just learning from my own past.

This will work much better after I get my house built and am actually living on that land, but one step at a time.

Meanwhile, I’m investing in a few gadgets that will hopefully make my canning and preserving easier. I got a Back 2 Basics tomato strainer, and later today will be ordering the accessories for grapes and berries and such. I got the strainer used, so I saved enough that after buying the extras I’ll have spent about the same as buying just the strainer new. I’ve also been saving up for a grain grinder. I have a couple of cheap ones, but they don’t get any finer than malt-o-meal. I want real flour! Tomorrow I plan on experimenting with making my own bug spray. I found instructions for distilling yarrow, and the person who wrote that said that it worked better on mosquitoes than any other spray she’d tried. Granted, my “distiller” is going to be a little more kludged than hers was, but the physics should be the same.

Oh, I also got a cherry stoner for $5 on shopgoodwill.com. Good place to find gadgets. I currently am bidding on a solar/hand-cranked radio/lantern/USB charger. I’m not able to put up much in the line of solar panels, but this should at least help keep small electronics charged.