Stockpiling beyond an extra can of something...

[Grainlady]

Wow! this is serious business! I'm not sure exactly where to start.
Making homemade bread seems like a good first step. The second step, up to buying whole rain & milling it seems much more costly.

I did glean from reading this thread that it would be better to start with white wheat. After figuring out where to purchase, I then have to figure out how & what to grind it with & where to get that...all within my budget.

Can I bake the bread in a solar oven? I don't like to use the oven inside during the summer, but would still like making bread.

I bake bread in my solar ovens. One of them works better for small loaves and the other works better for things like dinner rolls or burger buns.

Where to start...? It's better to have a plan than to just jump in. You'll avoid what could be some costly mistakes.

Grains/beans/seeds and a good quality mill is one place to explore and see if it fits your needs. I mill not only flour, but also cornmeal and make my own flakes and cereals for cooking (Cream of Wheat/Rice, or multi-grain cereal type mixtures). I never purchase "cereal" - I make my own for pennies.

The reason for storing grains is because they have such a long shelf-life - at least 30 years for wheat - and still maintain the nutrition. Commercial bleached and unbleached flour has a shelf-life of 6-12 months.

I'd suggest either a Nutrimill (does flour and fine-grind of cornmeal), or a Wonder Mill (flour only).

I purchase all my grains within my food budget, as I do all our food. Hard White Winter Wheat is just under $20/50-pounds now. I have some still in storage I paid $10/50-pounds and some I got free - which is VERY cost effective .

King Arthur Flour uses the same wheat variety for their White Whole Wheat Flour and charge $4.50 for a 5# bag = 90-cents/pound. I can mill it myself for 40-cents/pound. Milling it myself assures me the freshest flour and the highest amount of nutrients. Can't get that when you purchase commercial flour. The nutrients and valuable germ oil has already degraded - that begins about 3 hours after the flour is milled.

Cooking from scratch and storing those ingredients with which to do cooking from scratch is a good place to start. Make your own convenience foods.

I started with 3-months of food in storage (primarily pantry foods for daily use) and then over the years I built it so we have 1-3-years (depending on the food item) of the "Seven Survival Foods" in storage (grain, legumes, seeds for sprouting, fat, sweetener, salt, and powdered milk).

3-layers of Food Storage:

1. 72-hour emergency food (ready-to-eat foods from all the food groups that doesn't require heating or refrigeration).

2. 3-months (or more) pantry foods - foods you use for everyday food preparation.

3. Long-term Emergency Foods - These eventually rotate into pantry foods. This includes dehydrated and freeze-dried foods from all the food groups, and a large assortment of powdered foods (eggs, butter, peanut butter, sweet cream, sour cream - foods that generally come in #10 cans). These are foods you can depend on in an emergency (natural disasters, unexpected lay-off, trucker strikes, health issues, etc...)

[grammydoodle]

Honeyville has a 10% off your entire order coupon code that is good through Jan 19 at 6:00pm pst. The code is FOODNET.

[MakeADollarHollar]

Thank you GL for all your insight!! I have enjoyed reading your posts and need to go back through them with paper and pencil in hand and make a few notes.

I started stockpiling almost three years ago and learned to "coupon" the way the Big Girls do. I built a respectable pantry of convenience foods, canned goods and HBA that is still going strong (rotation, rotation, rotation!) but as the economy continued to crumble I started researching more long term solutions. Last year our focus changed. We purchased an Excalibur Dehydrator, FoodSaver Vac Sealer, Pressure Canner, Solar Oven, Grain Mill and Katadyn Water Purifier. We now purchase bulk whole grains, commercially prepared Freeze Dried eggs, fruits, vegetables and powdered milk for the long haul. In addition, we also purchase beans, rice, sugar, etc. locally in bulk. I now Dehydrate and am a Home Canner. This year's focus is Heirloom Seeds and getting our raised bed gardens up and running as well as making my own mixes so we aren't dependant on any store-bought flavorings. Chickens are also in the plan but not until we get our gardens up and running for the recurring vegetable source.

I can add a few tidbits...

We all know the addage Store What You Eat and Eat What You Store. But if you're moving in to more long term foods like dehydrated or freeze dried, you need to learn how to use them NOW. Experiment with your storage as often as you can. Find out first hand how things re-hydrate, how they cook and how they taste. My first mistake was assuming re-hydrated celery and onions would be great in a Tuna Sandwich. I couldn't have been more wrong. They were totally unpallatable for me and had to be dug out of the Tuna, as best as possible, to finish the sandwich. Even after that I was still so grossed out that it was a totally disgusting lunch. But cooked in a stew or soup, they are delicious. This holds true for several other things but I am vigilant about testing our products and finding the best way to use them.

Powdered Milk...this was an adventure for us. DH was raised LDS (Mormom) from Salt Lake City. Morning Moo's is one of the highest regarded powdered milks amongst the LDS so it was my first choice to try. I did not realize at the time it was a "Milk Substitute" product...Whey...as GL had mentioned. While I enjoyed the taste going down, it was awful coming back up. It kept "repeating" for hours and hours (as in burping). I tried it again the following day only to suffer the same symptoms. After hours of total discomfort and two days of trying, DH and I finally read the label. We decided that I must have an aversion to "Whey". The remainder of the sample bag we purchased was ditched. A few powdered milk's later we discovered Grandma's Country Cream. If your family drinks Fat Free milk I can promise you, they will never know the difference. This stuff is absolutely fabulous! No funky after-taste, no goop at the bottom of the jug. Just pure milk. Google Grandma's Country Cream and you can find the link (I'm still new and not sure if I can post links yet.)

Grain Mill...based on our budget we opted for the Family Living Grain Mill but also bought the KitchenAid attachment. As long as my KitchenAid still has life in it and we have power, that was the way to go for us. The bonus is, if we ever do lose power we can still grind by hand (but be forewarned...it's a work out!) It grinds our Hard White Wheat and Soft White Wheat to a beautiful fine flour on the first pass. The only thing we have to run back through on a second pass is our Dent Corn when we make cornmeal.

Invest in a Pressure Canner and The Ball Blue Book of Canning and learn to Can your own meats. It's as simple as adding raw meat, water or broth and salt if you so choose to a Mason Jar and canning according to directions and your altitude. You can feed your family healthy proteins all year long as opposed to Spam, Corned Beef, Dinty Moore or whatever else may be on your shelf. And the added bonus is, if you don't feel like cooking on any given night, you already have a home cooked heat and eat meal. I sometimes take a jar of meat (any meat that was on sale that I decided to put in a jar), along with the juices and dump in a hot skillet. Push the meat to the side, stir in some flour (fresh ground of course), some salt and pepper and make a gravy. Serve with quickie mashed potatoes and a salad or veggie and we call it dinner. Totally healthy and guilt free.

Date your stockpile even if you exercise proper rotation (even though I practice this religiously I still find that sometimes I put things with longer expiration dates in the wrong place...dating saves me from using goods too soon.) Blue Painter's Tape and a Sharpie are my best friends and have a permanent home in my kitchen drawer. When I get home from shopping I set everything on the dining room table according to product. Some cans or jars are not conducive to a Sharpie. It just wipes off. That's one place where my Blue Painters Tape comes in handy. I pull a piece off and apply. Write the expiration date and store to the back of the pantry. Sounds like a PITA but it's not. It literally takes minutes as all like-ingredients are together and you can easily find the expiration dates as they can be located in various locations on different products. In addition, the Blue Tape comes in super handy when trying out new recipes. I stick them to the cabinets and can pull them off when finished without leaving any sticky residue behind.

Many thanks to GrainLady for her extremely useful posts and I'll check back often. Hope what little I've shared is useful to someone.

[Grainlady]

MakeADollarHollar -

Thanks for your great insight and tips. Keep them coming! It's interesting how the "crumbling economy" is what made us decide to get serious about our long-term storage as well. Something beyond the well-fitted pantry. I wish I had the LDS background since I use it as a guideline, but I have purchased many of the food storage books and there is a lot of good information on-line.

Thanks for suggesting Grandma's Country Cream, which I ordered this morning. I want to give it a try with kefir grains and making kefir, as well as a taste test. Yet one more powdered milk product to add to the long list I've tried over the years (LOL). Looking forward to giving it a try.

FYI - The early whey-based milk products (i.e. Meadow Fresh (developed by Roy Borg), Rockland Whey, etc.) were lactose-free and contained no milk. Morning Moo's is a mixture of whey and milk - the milk improves the taste, I believe. Morning Moo's was a "1st cousin" to the original Meadow Fresh. We started using Meadow Fresh in 1981 for our lactose intolerant son (then 4-years old), as advised by his doctor at the time. And as they say, the rest is history.

Another reason for the popularity of the whey-based milk products over homogenized milk from the store was the XO (Xanthine Oxidase) factor. It was believed the XO caused cardiovascular disease when cows milk was homogenized and consumed, but that wasn't a factor in the whey-based products.

These products were lower in calcium than cows milk in order to to keep it in proper proportions with other minerals in order to be used by the body. Whey is higher in minerals than milk.

Whey has the highest BV (Biological Value), which means it's protein digestion rate is the most readily absorbed by the body. The BV of whey protein is 100-159 (on a scale of 100). Eggs are 100, milk-91, beef-80, chicken-79, beans-49.

Whey is also a good, natural, colon cleanser. Not sure what antigen in Morning Moo's caused so much digestive distress. That's very unusual.
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I have a Family Grain Mill as well, but it's mostly used as a back-up - should we be without electricity (although I have the motor for it as well). I already had a flaker mill, or else I would have purchased the flaker attachment for it as well. I usually suggest a Family Grain Mill if an impact mill (Nutrimill or Wonder Mill) is out of the budget, but it also has other attachments that would make it a good choice.

Your other suggestions for Excalibur Dehydrator, FoodSaver Vac Sealer, Pressure Canner, Solar Oven, Grain Mill and Katadyn Water Purifier are spot on... I have an American Harvest dehydrator, I've used a FoodSaver since 1986 - what a wealth of food it's protected over the years, two solar ovens (a Sun Oven and a Tulsi Hybrid Solar Oven with an electrical back-up), and for water purification I have an electric and non-electric distiller as well as a Berkey.

If you don't have a non-electric blender (Vortex Dynamo Blender), that may be one to put on your wish list. I make several recipes using whole grains from Sue Gregg's cookbooks for Blender Batter Baking Recipes (pancakes/waffles/cornbread, etc. - www.suegregg.com

I see you are new around here, so welcome, and please contribute your wealth of information and experiences. Our precarious times seem to need home food storage more now than ever!

[MakeADollarHollar]

Thank you GrainLady for the warm welcome!!

I hope you enjoy Grandma's milk as much as we do. I've recommended it before and so far the reviews have been positive. Even with shipping it is still less than what we pay for milk locally (I think we figured around $2.29 a gallon if I remember correctly.) At present our milk is up to $3.19 gallon.

Awesome tip on the blender!! Even after hours and hours of research and learning how go the Long-Term way nowhere have I read about a blender! While most things can be hand whipped the luxury of a non-electric blender will surely expand our variety if we lose power!! You are a fabulous wealth of information!

[jas]

Thanks again Grainlady for all your wonderfull information. I just placed and order at Blue Chip. I had been buying my wheat from Honeyville farms, but this price is way better and with the free shipping to boot. I was tell my dh about the little fyi you posted about not as much wheat was grown this year so we are seriously thinking about placing another order. The one I just placed was for 250 lbs mostly hard white, one hard red , and I think a small soft white. We are converting one of our spare rooms for food storage. We live in florida so no basements and the garage is out of the question for the heat factor.

I too have the excalibur, and the Wondermill. I will be looking into some of the other things mentioned too.

I have book marked all the links provided and can't wait to check them all out.

[MakeADollarHollar]

[QUOTE=jas;1309250]We are converting one of our spare rooms for food storage. We live in florida so no basements and the garage is out of the question for the heat factor.
QUOTE]

I couldn't resist. This would have been my next tip. As a fellow Floridian I can totally relate to the no basement and heat aspect not to mention, on a personal note, the overall lack of storage space. Even if you aren't limited by storage space, this is our experience:

I bought this house years before meeting DH. Being the Foodie I was, one of the things I did was remodel the laundry room to include a HUGE pantry. It alone has been a life saver but if you decide to go the Long-Term route plan with the END in mind. What I mean is, whatever space you can make available go ahead and do it now and save yourself some trouble. Once you are bitten by the Long-Term bug you just can't help yourself.

I re-organized half a dozen times then had DH do a small remodel project here, another remodel there, and still another remodel. We finally just caved and completely remodelled a spare room to hold all our Long-Term storage. I keep teasing DH that our house is going to Tip Over or that section will just sink in to the ground.

If you are even considering Long-Term Storage, plan ahead...way ahead. It's a bulky process and can overtake your house if you are working with limited space. We have less than 1200 square feet but we make it work in a way that doesn't affect our normal life and casual observers would never know what we are up to.

[Shelli_wnj]

So here's a question (along with my usual lengthy explaination! I am a total newbie to this type of storage. In the past I did couponing which worked out well in that area, but here it is next to impossible. But that was a different type of stockpiling.

So my question is where do I start? I am looking for an extremely concrete answer. I think that one of the reasons I have never tried is because I am a "do x and when completed do y, then start z" type of person. I have about 20 gallons of water in storage because when we loose power we also loose water. The water isn't "clean" - it's stored in cleaned out milk cartons and juice bottles, but it would be sufficient for cooking, flushing, washing, and in a pinch we could put it through a brita or boil it and drink it. We also have a coal stove with a flat top surface for the same reason. We loose power a lot in the winter and needed it for heat and cooking.
My problem is what's next? I am continuing to acrue water (every empty gallon container goes towards this I have flour in storage, but usually just enough for a month. Right now it's less than that because I haven't been able to get to the bulk store recently.
OK, more concretely, I don't have a lot of money. I have almost nothing to invest. My grocery budget is around $50 a week. How do I get started in stockpiling and "getting ready" as it were and feed my family on a weekly basis. PLEASE remember they are used to store-bought. I have a 4 year old who turns his nose up at almost anything homemade (and the doctor recently told me to just give him the prepared foods so he can "bulk up". So it's not like I can store up cheap beans and expect to use them.
I just want a "store water, then flour, then...." type answer. Right now we have been working on the water because I have enough food in the freezer and pantry to "make it work" for about a month, but not that much water if we were to loose power. I don't know why I am so scared to live without power for an extended period of time, but it seems to be what everyone is working towards.

Now this has become a novel... My FIL is working towards a future where grocery prices are unattainable - foodshopping for the rich. Problem is he (nor my mil) has any experience farming or canning, or anything else of that nature. He went out and purchased hundreds of dollars worth of seeds but lives in an apartment building and wouldn't know how to grow them let alone have the space to do so.
I dont have chickens (nor would I know what to do with them!) I don't have a foodgrain mill, up until this year I wouldn;t have known you could grind your own flour anyway!!!
Can you help a very fumbling newbie out here?
If you read through this far, thanks!!!

[thefrug]

So here's a question (along with my usual lengthy explaination! I am a total newbie to this type of storage. In the past I did couponing which worked out well in that area, but here it is next to impossible. But that was a different type of stockpiling.

So my question is where do I start? I am looking for an extremely concrete answer. I think that one of the reasons I have never tried is because I am a "do x and when completed do y, then start z" type of person. I have about 20 gallons of water in storage because when we loose power we also loose water. The water isn't "clean" - it's stored in cleaned out milk cartons and juice bottles, but it would be sufficient for cooking, flushing, washing, and in a pinch we could put it through a brita or boil it and drink it. We also have a coal stove with a flat top surface for the same reason. We loose power a lot in the winter and needed it for heat and cooking.
My problem is what's next? I am continuing to acrue water (every empty gallon container goes towards this I have flour in storage, but usually just enough for a month. Right now it's less than that because I haven't been able to get to the bulk store recently.
OK, more concretely, I don't have a lot of money. I have almost nothing to invest. My grocery budget is around $50 a week. How do I get started in stockpiling and "getting ready" as it were and feed my family on a weekly basis. PLEASE remember they are used to store-bought. I have a 4 year old who turns his nose up at almost anything homemade (and the doctor recently told me to just give him the prepared foods so he can "bulk up". So it's not like I can store up cheap beans and expect to use them.
I just want a "store water, then flour, then...." type answer. Right now we have been working on the water because I have enough food in the freezer and pantry to "make it work" for about a month, but not that much water if we were to loose power. I don't know why I am so scared to live without power for an extended period of time, but it seems to be what everyone is working towards.

Now this has become a novel... My FIL is working towards a future where grocery prices are unattainable - foodshopping for the rich. Problem is he (nor my mil) has any experience farming or canning, or anything else of that nature. He went out and purchased hundreds of dollars worth of seeds but lives in an apartment building and wouldn't know how to grow them let alone have the space to do so.
I dont have chickens (nor would I know what to do with them!) I don't have a foodgrain mill, up until this year I wouldn;t have known you could grind your own flour anyway!!!
Can you help a very fumbling newbie out here?
If you read through this far, thanks!!!

Check here for some hints and lots of info.

http://www.americanpreppersnetwork.n...ease-t508.html


that can get you started

[redmaples]

thank you for the great response to my questions a few posts back. I'm trying to get a step by step plan in place as it seems many of us who are following this thread are doing.

Because it is January, I am now working on baking. Trying to incorporate different flours into different recipes in small ways. I don't buy any mixes. It's time for me to graduate up from buying 5 # bags of flours & lg containers of oats as I've got enough good recipes to make now. I did just make a record purchase of 4 5# bags of reg & bread flour. The 20 # at once was a big step for me.
They were bogo right before christmas so didn't break my budget.

I only spend $ if it is practical. I am a bit leery of making the next steps which require me to make big purchases ($100 is a big purchase to me). So, I appreciate the advice & references as to specifics types of grains & even what companies have the deals. I am thinking about searching for a grain mill on craigslist. I am going to work out a figure to answer this question: how much will it cost to get started in bread making from the grain?

The kitchen Aid was mentioned. Does it have a grain milling attachment? I was given a champion juicer & have a vague recollection that that might also be outfitted to do some grinding,

I was thinking of investing in a few good dairy goats, but am reconsidering a different direction for that $ I have saved. I considered having a dairy goat a form of milk storage!

It seems that to chart the course with this you have to know where you're at. As Grainlady said...cooking from scratch is a good starting point.

My starting point was taking an inventory of recipes/ things I know how to make & collecting up a few other recipes.
the advice on making your own mixes is an excellent place to start. The jiffy mix is my favorite & I really like the site that GL posted a while back with all the recipes to use it with!

I don't make my own cereals yet, but did stop buying boxed cereal. We have egg sandwiches, oats or pancakes as our breakfast mainstays.

Oats & corn are the 2 grains I am using most right now. I'm better with oats so far....getting then in oatmeal dinner rolls & pancakes. Granola is good too! Oats seem like the easiest & most versatile of the grains right now for me to use.
With cornmeal I am only making cornbread. I aspire though to learn tortillas & polenta. When that step is met, I can buy cornmeal in a larger container.

Where I am at with the bread baking is dinner rolls & cornbread a few times a week. We have not been eating as much store bought loaf bread. I have scone recipes & sour dough recipes. I hope to get making some loaf bread for sandwiches.

I'm glad to hear that the solar ovens will bake breads. It would have been a sorry year for baking last summer & fall though as we had so little good sunny days. I'm wondering how it would be to count on just the solar oven. It is my rule here not to bake in the summer. We tend to go toward much lighter foods in our diet anyway.


Other things we already do:
Garden & can
Freezer full of venison
Freezer full of frozen veggies
Bean Keepers (save dried beans for planting next year)
Feed chickens from the garden (they hade kale & pumpkin seeds today in zone 5)
Make soups & stews
Share eggs with other people who garden
Starting to purchase 5 gal food storage buckets

We are not quite to the beginning of the middle stage of food storage. Probably have enough for a few months for 6-8 people if we ate sparingly. I've got some work to do.

Thank you for all the help here!

[redmaples]

I don't have a lot of money. I have almost nothing to invest. My grocery budget is around $50 a week. How do I get started in stockpiling and "getting ready" as it were and feed my family on a weekly basis. PLEASE remember they are used to store-bought. I have a 4 year old who turns his nose up at almost anything homemade (and the doctor recently told me to just give him the prepared foods so he can "bulk up". So it's not like I can store up cheap beans and expect to use them.
Can you help a very fumbling newbie out here?
If you read through this far, thanks!!!

You will find lots of help here. I am still fumbling along trying to get as good at food storage as some of the ladies here are!
Does your 4 yr old like peanut butter? If you can figure out what he does like you might be able to design your menus & grocery list around that. You can figure out also what to make from scratch.
My kids, when that young, liked fresh apples cut up w/ raisins & maybe a piece of cheese or pbj on bread or crackers.
If you are buying things like spaghetti o's in a can or
lunchables...those are things you can mimic & make cheaper.
Most kids like pancakes & you can top them sparingly with syrup & add some fruit or a fruit sauce on top. I let the little kids (but they were probably older than 4) help make the pancakes into shapes on the griddle by spooning the batter into a big circle w/ little circle on top for ears. They could use raisins or craisins for the eyes. Kids usually like to eat their own food creations.

My first food storage thing was pasta. With so many varieties there are so many things you can make with it. Do most kids like spaghetti? I can tell there has been inflation over the last decade. When I started stockpiling pasta you could get it 4/ 1 # boxes for $1 !!! Times have changed haven' they! Sometimes now, with coupons & sales I can still get it for 50 cents a box!

Start out small. Figure out what you CAN make from scratch, collect up those ingredients as you see them on sale, more if you have coupons. Collect up coupons for the 'store bought' things you are going to keep using & get a few at a time when you can get the best prices.

Be encouraged, I know you are going to get a lot of good advice here!

[Grainlady]

There isn't a one-size-fits-all program because not everyone has the same goals, eats the same foods, has the same amount of money to spend, or has access to the same things. But I do know if you do what you've done, you'll get what you've got, so you may need to move out of your comfort zone a bit and try some things you've never tried before. Therefore, make small changes that don't cost a lot until you find things that work for you and your family.

I built my 3-stages of home food storage over time on $50/week food budget, so I know it can be done.

Stage 1 - a 72-hour emergency kit including food that doesn't require heating or refrigeration, and water. http://lds.about.com/od/preparedness...72hour_kit.htm

Stage 2 - Three-month supply of pantry foods (foods you use for daily meal preparation).

Stage 3 - Long-term emergency foods.

Once you have a 3-month supply of pantry food, then your primary purchases are to restock at the lowest prices possible. You plan menus out of your food in storage.

I started by designating $5 per week for storage. If tuna was on sale, I purchased as many I could with $5, or divided it between a couple of loss leaders like peanut butter and jelly, or stock up on flour when it's on sale.... Five dollars will purchase multiples of the most basic items you use, until you have all the food groups covered and all your ingredients for baking from scratch. VARIETY is the key. Several kinds of fruits, vegetables, meats and meat substitutes, etc....

It took about 18-months to complete our Long-term Emergency Foods, which is primarily whole foods in the form of grains/beans/seeds/dehydrated and freeze-dried meat/veg./fruit/cheese, powdered peanut butter, butter, cheese, milk and milk substitutes, etc. Some of those items I've used for years and I've always stored them. Once we had enough of these on hand (multiple #10 cans), we started moving them from the long-term storage to the pantry. I'll never go back to canned peas and corn now that I've used freeze-dried!!! Not to mention all the garden produce we dehydrate.

Twenty gallons of water isn't much for 4 people, so keep adding as much as you can. Hide the bottles behind your sofa if necessary - around the perimeter of your closets, if you don't have a basement for storage... If you suspect you have a potential power outage (ice storm or blizzard forecast) fill your bath tub/s to use for general household use and flushing the toilet. Your hot water tank is also a source for water. It will even stay warm for a day or two. If you have a top-loading washing machine, you can also fill it and use the water from it for general use, other than drinking water. Keep a bottle of bleach in storage and rotate it regularly. It's needed for purification when you store water or to purify potable water.

Check out this link for more information about water storage: http://www.nationalterroralert.com/safewater/

Plastic milk jugs are not a good choice because the plastic degrades and they can start leaking. The milk fat binds to the plastic (it's a molecular thing - fat and plastic are somehow similar) and you can never remove it no matter what you clean the jugs with. Eventually that water will smell like rancid fat. If you use plastic milk jugs, consider them temporary, not long-term, and try to replace them a.s.a.p.

Recycled juice bottles or 2-liter plastic soda bottles are good choices. My problem is if you purchase juice in ready-to-serve bottles rather than 100% juice concentrate where you add your own water, you are wasting money when you figure the unit price of juice. On a tight budget you can't waste money on anything, especially convenience foods. You might be able to get juice and soda bottles from people you know, as an option.

I'd suggest you budget money for empty 3-gallon water bottles (make sure they have screw-top lids). Purchase one each pay-check, or one a month or every other month, whatever will work for you. Save your change to fund the bottle purchases... You can fill them with tap water PLUS the appropriate amount of bleach per gallon (see the link above). ALL water in storage should have bleach added to it (in appropriate amounts) and be kept in the dark so algae doesn't start growing in it. I have fifteen 5-gallon jugs of water in storage on racks, plus 10 three-gallon jugs - all purchased one jug at a time over a period of time. I find 5-gallon jugs difficult to move and fill. Three gallons are easier to work with. If you store your water properly, you shouldn't need a purification system, but there are low-costing ways to treat potable water for drinking. Your first line of action is to add bleach in the appropriate amounts.

As far as your 4-year old goes, how about involving him in food preparation to increase interest in foods. Let him cut out small, kid-size homemade biscuits, dollop cookie dough, cut veggies and cheese with a plastic knife, make mini-muffins instead of big ones, etc. I've taught classes on the subject for years to frustrated parents, and I don't like the advise your doctor gave you at ALL! Everyone has food likes and dislikes. I've had a child with food allergies that required special foods. You need to be the guiding, teaching parent when it comes to food and nutrition, or one day you'll need a visit from "The Nanny". You can prepare foods they like AND continue to introduce new foods. Most people aren't still eating Spaghetti-O's when they are 40, and have moved on from most childhood foods. It's a process. Kids change every day, and so do their food interests.

Just remember, small children don't have a full set of teeth, so they may not like chewing on steak as much as they like a hot dog. Try lightly steamed veggies instead of raw. They like things that are kid-size and easy to handle. Also remember to serve a variety of foods in serving sizes appropriate for the child's age. Don't feed children non-stop or they never develop an appetite. Children constantly snacking and drinking high-calorie drinks tend to be picky eaters because they don't get hungry between meals and snacks.

Get creative, introduce a new food, or a homemade version of a favorite food at a picnic, rather than at a regular meal. Fix a sandwich with white bread on one side and wheat bread on the other to introduce whole grains. Cut it in a fun shape.... Have one day a week where you make a new recipe, and have them help pick out and prepare the recipe. Check out some of the recipe at Kids a Cookin - http://www.kidsacookin.ksu.edu/ They are kid and budget friendly.

Your FIL sounds like one of the Y2K kooks who didn't have a clue, nor a plan. I have a friend who built a concrete bunker and put in several tons of rice for Y2K. He did it out of greed, he was going to sell his rice and get rich, not live on it. Your FIL is reacting, not planning, which will generally cost in the long run. Good intentions followed by poor execution. Have him get a copy of The New Passport to Survival 12-steps to Self-Sufficient Living - by Rita Bingham. That's a good place to start, and would be a good book for you as well. Lots of great basic information that isn't related to panic, rather about preparation.

Keep reading and studying. Information is power.

[Shelli_wnj]

There isn't aone-size-fits-all program

I guess I know that, I just don't like hearing it... I am so concrete - but you're right.

I built my 3-stages of home food storage over time on $50/week food budget, so I know it can be done.

Thank you for the inspiration...



if you don't have a basement for storage... I thank God that we actually do have a basement for storage, so that is a non-issue for us.

My problem is if you purchase juice in ready-to-serve bottles rather than 100% juice concentrate where you add your own water, you are wasting money when you figure the unit price of juice. I personally wouldn't buy it either, but it's what WIC provides, and I am not complaining

As far as your 4-year old goes, how about involving him in food preparation to increase interest in foods. We have done most of that, and he LOVES to help, however when it comes time to eat it, he will say, "No thank you" or "I made it for my brother" or some other too cute yet frustrating comment.

and I don't like the advise your doctor gave you at ALL! me either!

Most people aren't still eating Spaghetti-O's when they are 40, and have moved on from most childhood foods. I notice you said most. My husband is one of the few who hasn't. He also won't eat a vegetable (unless you count potatoes). He dislikes beans, will not drink any other milk than whole, etc. He has moved on in the fact that he will eat homemade rather than convenience, but his choices are still very limited. This is why I get worried because my son doesn't actually ever see my husband eat, so it's not learned in that sense.

Get creative... In the interest of space I haven't recreated your entire post, but I LOVE LOVE LOVE your suggestions and am printing them out. Thank you.

Your FIL sounds like one of the Y2K kooks Yup. I don't have to say anymore here - you nailed it.

Keep reading and studying. Information is power.

Thank you. I love to learn, but have problems implimenting. I guess I will start with re-thinking our water storage and go from there. It's what's most important with the most realistic short term need.

[thefrug]

Ain't she (GL) smart???!!! LOL

[jas]

Ain't she (GL) smart???!!! LOL

She sure is!!