Real Life - When my preps have saved my butt... How about you folks?

[Boyd]

This is from another board http://www.survivalandpreparednessf...eps-have-saved-my-butt...-How-about-you-folks

First time I can remember needing my preps was during the midwestern blackout when the power grid went offline for a week. Within a couple of days folks were scurrying around buying up all the bottled water, gasoline etc. We were fine short term with a small generator to run the electric well pump, but we did have a hand pump as a backup. We also ate from our wetpack storage, dried goods etc and cooked out on the grill as much as we could outside. Plenty of hardwood to keep the grill going, or could have broken into the charcoal a bit

Second time was these past two years. Michigan's Economy has been in a depression long before 2007-2008 downswing the rest of the country felt. I kept getting jobs at places that ended up folding up and closing down their doors. from Christmas 2008 through the present I do what I can when I can. Not many are hiring in Michigan. My long term food storage has really helped out. With a house full of kids, none of us have starved, and we've learned how to stretch a meal, groceries n supplies so the money we do have on hand can go towards bills n such.

I'd love to hear from other folks! I remember reading a blog from a Teen who helped his family survive Katrina without being overly hungry Anybody else want to share?

Here is where I'd love to hear from real life situations. This is what I posted from another board.. And there doesn't have to be a zombie apocalypse or a totalitarian government takeover.. economic meltdown.. This is just hard times... it's also why I prep. To be prepared for anything.

 

[big brown horse]

I'm glad I'm a saver of money and not a spender. Saving for a really big "rainy day" saved my buns these last few years when there was no money coming in at all. (I did cry as I went through my savings though.)

Money is finally coming in and it is going right back to beefing up my savings accounts again.

As soon as I get my savings beefed back up, I will feel extra prepared for the next economic meltdown, I really learned a lot from this one. Thankfully I'm now set up on some land, I have a nice big garden, a herd and a flock of edible, reproducing free range animals, a big pond (9 months out of the year), rain barrels, a forest full of fuel and 4 legged transportation.

Went through Hurricanes in the past, Ike being my last...we survived in downtown Houston for 11 days w/o power or potable water. During the first week no grocery stores were open, no ice available, no news....AND IT WAS HOT!!! We stuck together with our neighbors and worked things out, as neighbors should. (Moved up here 3 weeks later.)

 

[ohiofarmgirl]

hey Boyd!

i'm gonna thru out when we were out of electric for 5 days.. not a big drama but we had everything covered. you should have heard the folks from town screamin' like mashed cats... wow!

our amish neighbors just chuckled quietly to themselves.....

 

[Boyd]

hey Boyd!

i'm gonna thru out when we were out of electric for 5 days.. not a big drama but we had everything covered. you should have heard the folks from town screamin' like mashed cats... wow!

our amish neighbors just chuckled quietly to themselves.....

Even my immediate neighbors were in pretty good shape but were surprised to see the Kerosene lanterns I had as a backup

 

[big brown horse]

Funny, kerosene lanterns were just part of my growing up. I thought everyone had one.

 

[freemotion]

I've always been interested in how things were done a couple of centuries ago, and even in my farmer grandparent's day. A few years ago, when we bought our house with some land, I looked longingly at small tractors, Gators, and such. Could never scrounge up the money, though. Glad I didn't. I suddenly caught the fever to do things the old way and started gearing my purchases in that direction (a really, really good scythe, for example, and a growing collection of hand tools.)

And boy, am I glad I did. Our income continues to decline as clients dwindle as they continue to lose their jobs. Upturn? What upturn? In the past two months I lost another $500 per month in clients, who left me in tears, not knowing how they were going to manage.

I was ready. I use my time to save money, when I am not making money. As long as we can pay the mortgage and one car payment and the basic necessities, we will be fine.

Grinding grain reduces the cost of those goods by moving the decimal point over to the left, for example. I have twenty gallons of seawater to be made into salt this winter. I pick up acorns to feed the pigs and scrounge garbage for them....so far I am spending about $0.45 per day on food for them. Only because I find it hard to wrap my brain around the idea the I really probably don't need to grain them at all right now!

The list goes on. We eat really well on almost nothing, and have plenty of treats, too.

I love craigslist. So many bargains! People just don't know what they are selling or its immense value right now...free canning jars, my cheap grain grinder, etc. Even got a pressure canner for free. Sold it (I already had two) to help finance the pig housing.

Meeting these challenges is stressful, yes, but I also look at it as a puzzle to be solved creatively.

 

[pioneergirl]

Our preps and forethought have got us through some tough times. Extra plantings of tomatoes and cucumbers were sold to buy feed, and when DH didn't get a check for a month, we were able to spend less than $50 on groceries for the month. Bare minimums (sugar, salt, some seasonings, TP)...I made meals from what I'd canned previously, plus what we were getting from the garden. We already had half a hog and some beef in the freezer so that was good, too.

We haven't been in a lengthy grid down situation.....yet. At this point in our lives, our preps are getting us through 2 weeks (or more) of moving to a new place and a new job. Saving us from going to the grocery story and spending $$$ we're trying to save.

 

[tortoise]

I am so worried about winter storms here! Electric heat and electric well pump. Yikes! Scared to death. Fiance doesn't think it's a big deal. I suggested a hand well pump as back up and he's like "I'll just go buy a generator." Right.... when they've all been sold out...



I mean - what CAN I do?! He clearly isn't concerned about it! No pantry to speak of. We're frugal, but painfully unprepared. I would be a "city folk screaming" in a winter storm.

 

[mamagoose]

Yeah when Ike came through the city we lost power for 11 days but it was weird b/c the folks right across the street never lost it. We lost power but we use gas for cooking and heating water it was no big change. Really the only traumatic thing was that we had gone to the grocery earlier in the day so we had a fully stocked fridge and no electric! I ended up giving away a lot of it , I gave some of the milk to the neighbors so the $4.00 a gal. I spent on it at the time wouldn't go to waste. Put the rest of it in a cooler and kept it on ice.

My daughter couldn't understand why she had to go to bed as soon as it was dark, lol!

I was really glad of how quiet the house was, no whirring of machines, and kinda sad when the power did come back on .

 

[SKR8PN]

We had a nasty bad ice storm here about 6 years ago. We were without power and phone for 6 days. I have ALWAYS had some kind of a generator, and that storm was no exception. BUT....it was a portable and would only power a small portion of the house. Fridge, freezer, sump pumps and a few(darn few!) lights. No heat. I also had to shut it down every 6 hours to refuel it(PITA!) and we had to keep it hid because the Zombies were out STEALING generators right off of peoples houses as they were using them!
That is what put me over the edge and decided to install a whole house generator and run it on propane. Now if we lose power from the grid, within a minute we are back up and running, well water and all! Just this summer I bought and installed a second 500 gallon propane tank and tied it into the system. I figure now, if push came to shove....... I could keep the freezers and the water supply up for at least 3 months, by running the generator ONLY when it was absolutely necessary.
During that ice storm, the only thing we had to go to town for, was gasoline to run that old generator. We can now stay here and and be very comfortable, have plenty to eat, and guard what needs to be guarded.