Okay- it doesn't seem that long since I blogged about losing my internet connection. Now I don't know why I was complaining.
We lost power completely for 3 days. A storm rolled through here Saturday morning around 3:15am (our weather dog was kind enough to tell us it was coming- with her shaking and all around panic). We lost power around 4:30am and didn't get it restored until 5:10pm Monday Night.
My poor kids didn't know what to do with themselves. Plus our whole routine was off so that was hard for them too. Of course they wanted to watch tv and computer but that wasn't as disturbing as not having night lights, or music to listen to at bedtime. Jenna went to bed one night with a flashlight and pushed the play button to her music that she listens to at night. It didn't work obviously and I told her that her radio didn't have any power either. She was a little panicked and said "Now how am I going to fall asleep?" so Nate lent her his IPOD to listen to High School Musical. She kind of enjoyed that and requested it the next night too.
Note to self- Batteries are important and especially the big batteries (C and D). I realized that I didn't have batteries for the radios and flashlights.
A new item that needs to go on my preparedness need to get list is a generator. A tip from a family friend was that you get a smaller generator and just rotate it between the different appliances (such as the refrigerator and freezer to keep them both cold) every 5 or 6 hours.
I was even thinking that would have been a great idea so that I could have temporarily plugged in my stove to cook too. Having a gas stove would have been a plus since I would have been able to cook but no mine is electric but that isn't going to change anytime soon (I like my smooth top surface).
Also on my list is having food that I can prepare without power. We had all of the water we wanted but it was hard to put the food storage that I currently have into meals without needing a stove. Another item to preparedness list- camp stove.
Yes, I could have BBQed or used the camp fire but -as Spencer was constantly commenting- we need "fire utensils" to be able to cook more than just hot dogs and marshmallows. So another item should probably be pots or pans that can be used on the grill or fire pit.
After being so happy about getting power last night we had another huge storm roll through. I was a little nervous that we were going to lose power last night but thank goodness we are not one of the households without power this morning from that storm. I hope that it affected new areas- just for the sanity of those that had to be without for so long.
Luckily we didn't lose too much food and today is garbage day so the stuff I did lose gets picked up today- phew! We had just stocked up our big freezer for some future BBQs and I think that the large amount of frozen food worked well to keep things cold. Although I had a lot of frozen berries and I think they may have thawed a bit and now I may only have berry mush but I can live with that- we'll just have a lot of smoothies and things.
What was interesting is that Nate and I were just starting to stock up on preparedness items. We have been focused on the food aspect but now I am going to work more diligently on the non food items so that we are stocked up for the future.
Anyone have any other ideas of what essential items need to be on a preparedness list do to your own experiences?
7 comments:
For outdoor cooking, look at cast iron. There and some nice cooking "crates" with several types of cooking pans. Definitely a dutch oven. One comment on generators, they have to have fuel and that will need to be stored. You will need to consider where you want to store it and how long it can be stored. Gasoline doesn't store well in cold weather. It jellies. Then you have sterno. Check out the sleeping bags. If you are without heat, a good sleeping bag will be a huge help. Also, double bags that can be zipped together can be comforting to small people that want to cuddle up next to mom or dad. Keep in mind issues of carbon monoxide. You may want to be sure you have a battery opperated CO2 detector. Generators need to be where they won't threated your well being. Same is true for heat sources and cooking sources. Camp stoves are great, but charcoal cooking needs to be done outside. You might want to consider a kerosene stove. That allows you to have warmth somewhere in a smaller room that is easier to keep warm. We used to store large amounts of propane. That would allow us to cook or heat and was relatively safe.
For food-without-power, try K-rations from a military surplus store. It's not the best eating, but it tastes ok, and all you need to cook it is the included heat pouch and some water. (Not sure what the chemical process is, but it works in five minutes or less.) I totally agree with Mom's comment on cast iron. The smaller skillets aren't that expensive (I've seen them for $5-10) and they're durable as anything. As for batteries, you can try solar/crank-powered radios (some newer ones will charge your cell phone, too) and the no-battery LED flashlights--the ones you shake to create an electric charge--in your emergency suppies. Mom has more practical experience with the flashlights than I do, I think, but you wouldn't have to worry about batteries or bulbs going dead without you knowing. Also, I heard somewhere that you want a full freezer and an almost-empty fridge for minimum food spoilage. For those first few minutes after the lights go out, it helps to know exactly where a light source is, too. We have a lighter and a candle in each of three different locations that we can go to right away, giving us time (and light) to hunt down anything else we might need.
LED flashlights are wonderful. Even with batteries they last a huge long time. Everyone should have at least one.
Wow, what an experience! I have often thought that some of these sorts of items would make great Christmas gifts.
Whenever there are big storms I always worry that will happen.
I would love some of these items if they were given to us as gifts!
One of the emergency items that we do have- I can't remember where we got it -but it is an emergency flashlight that you leave plugged into the wall and if the power goes out it automatically turns on. That was very convenient and since you can turn it off to save the charge it worked the second night too!
We used to have one of those plug-in flashlights but it became annoying after a while because it would not really hold a charge.
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