[Condor51]

Could you or your child sew a button on a coat or mend a sock if clothing became scarce? Could you prepare a meal with flour, milk, eggs and canned meat and/or vegetables.

Uh yeah. Because I was taught to sew when I was about six. And not by my mother but an Uncle who was in WWII and they had to sew on their own unit patches and rank (see Movie Battleground as example) And I could cook something with those ingredients. That my mom did teach me. The same for washing clothes with a 'scrub board'.

If civilization collapses we'll go back to a Tribal Culture. Starting with our neighbors who we can 'trust'. That'll be the first 'Tribes'. Every outsider will be viewed with distrust (Justice won't be pretty either).

[concerned about politics]

Could you or your child sew a button on a coat or mend a sock if clothing became scarce? Could you prepare a meal with flour, milk, eggs and canned meat and/or vegetables.

Heck, I can make a button, spin my own fiber, and knit my own socks with four small twigs, and then wash them in my own fat/wood ash soap.
Flour? What if there's no wheat? Make your bread from any edible wild seed. Use wild apples (or any fruit) to make vinegar (very easy), add a teaspoon of wood ash, and you've got fluffy pan cakes.
Hello. What if there are no grocery stores? There's wild, edible food all over the place. It may not be as yummy at first, but in an emergency, those pancakes will taste pretty good with elderberry syrup.

If there were a national emergency that sent us back into a stone age, what I know alone will keep me and my family alive. If I die, so does my knowledge, and everybody around me freezes, dies of plague, or starves to death.

[GailA]

The "It's not my fault" generation, would have a very rough time. They don't know how to sew, cook, clean, or fix a leaky faucet. They think that wearing a piece of clothing for more than a few months is so passe, let alone having to wear them for years.

Our grand parents who went through the Great Depression knew how to do these things.

Time to start thinking about stocking up on items like TP which is something you can't make for yourself...no Sears & Roebuck catalogs any more.

Survival Gardens in place of the old Victory Gardens would be a must.

My mom and her sisters wore undergarments made of flour sacks, and clothes/shoes were passed down to the next in line until they wore out to the point they couldn't be repaired any more.