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Jan02

I’m Ready For Spring Already!

by Big Mike on 01/02/2013 at 13:10
Posted In: PREPAREDNESS

It’s gotten cold, and we’ve had a couple of snow days. I’ve never been a big fan of winter, and that hasn’t changed as I’ve gotten older. I’d much rather sweat than shiver. I’d rather mow the lawn than shovel the driveway. I don’t mind a little bit of snow, if it goes away in a day or two, but that’s about it.

winter picture

Is it Springtime yet?

But, since it’s here – we deal with it. Noah & I have been out shoveling the snow, and chipping ice off the walks. We got the generator out & started it up & let it run for awhile a couple of days ago, just in case we need it.  I suppose if we have another big ice storm in Kansas City like we did in 2002, we’ll be OK for awhile.

Today Noah & I are going to work on making sure we have everything for cold weather in the emergency kits for the vehicles. It should have already been done, but we’ve been busy. With 4 children & all the driving we do, I think it’s important to prepare for prepare for roadside emergencies.

I’m also going to make sure that all of the gas cans are filled & have STA-BIL® in them to keep the gas from going bad. If you’ve never used it before, I recommend it. They make fuel stabilizer for gasoline (and diesel fuel) to keep it from deteriorating when being stored for over 30 days, as well as other products.

If you don’t have any fuel stored for your vehicles, you might consider it. If you paid attention to the news recently, there were shortages, rationing, and long lines at filling stations after Hurricane Sandy. It’s pretty easy to keep fuel stored in case of emergencies. Buy 4 or 5 five gallon gas cans & fill them with gas. Put the STA-BIL® in them to make sure the gas stays good. Number the cans 1-5, or whatever. In 30 days, put the fuel from can #1 in your vehicle & refill it with fresh fuel & stabilizer. Then put it in the back of the row of cans. 30 more days, do the same with can #2. And continue using the fuel in each can in order. Your fuel will stay rotated & fresh, and you’ll always have some on hand in case of emergency. Use your head – DON’T STORE GASOLINE IN YOUR HOUSE!!!

I was going to cook on the grill last night, but the propane tank ran out shortly after I fired the grill up. I have another tank, but didn’t feel like switching it out, so I cooked inside. I’ll pick up another tank tomorrow. If you have a grill, it’s a good idea to keep extra propane or charcoal in case you lose power for days & need to cook some food! You can even bake bread in your propane grill if you have to. Try it sometime when you don’t have to & see how you do.

I hope everyone had great holidays, & you all have a safe & happy 2013!!!

^MM

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Jul06

Take Responsibility For Your Own Security

by Big Mike on 07/06/2012 at 21:50
Posted In: PREPAREDNESS, SURVIVAL

Time for week two of the “Five Dollar Preps” series that I started last week. This time, I was at Harbor Freight Tools, so I decided to look around and see what kind of inexpensive things they had on the shelf that would be something to have in your preps.

I spent a grand total of $4.78, so I was under budget! Here’s what I picked up:

Five Dollar Preps Week Two Image Here are this weeks goodies!

  • A pair of scissors with a built in bottle opener.
  • A large magnifying glass
  • A 60′ roll of electrical tape
  • A 25′ roll of mechanics wire

I wasn’t looking for anything specific. I just walked around a little bit, and saw a few cheap items that could come in handy. I don’t know that the order in which you buy all of your preps is as important as whether or not you are actively working toward a preparedness plan for your family.

Some of the “experts” would probably tell you differently. If you buy their book, they’ll have some formula that tells you that you need to buy A, B, & C in the first 30 days, then X, Y, Z……yada, yada, yada. Bull! Unless you hire a consultant that spends the time to get to know you and your family, what your needs and wants are, and what your goals are – then that “expert’s” opinion doesn’t mean jack. There is no “one size fits all” preparedness plan that is perfect for everyone.

The best preparedness plan in the world won’t help anyone, if you don’t do something with it. The reason I’m doing this series is to show new preppers that you don’t have to destroy your budget to start getting some items together. Five bucks a week is nothing, but over time, all of those little things will add up, and you won’t miss the money you’ve spent on your prep kit. Hopefully it will help to motivate some folks to think about adding some larger things to their preps as we go.

I don’t care what you buy, or how much you spend. Just get up & do something! Become involved with your own safety & security for your family, in case something bad happens. Don’t just “buy stuff.” Learn some skills on how to take care of yourself & your family if there is a disaster in your life.  Don’t be part of the majority of people who assume that someone will come save them. Many people were not happy with the help they got in the recent past after disaster struck their lives.

I’m not going to make a list of the uses for the items I bought. If you have questions, please post them in the comment section. For all of you experienced preppers, feel free to post your ideas on how these items could be useful in a disaster/emergency situation.

Thanks for reading. Please register on the site for updates, and become involved in our community forums. MM^

 

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Jun29

The Tortoise and the Hare

by Big Mike on 06/29/2012 at 19:00
Posted In: PREPAREDNESS, SURVIVAL

We’re all familiar with the story of “The Tortoise and the Hare.” I think it’s a perfect illustration of how to look at our preparedness plans and goals. The tortoise didn’t look like he was getting much done at first, but slowly & methodically he was able to keep working his plan until he got to his goal. If we have a plan in place, and keep working that plan, we can achieve our goals as well.

Tortoise and the Hare

Whether you are brand new to preparedness, or if you’ve been at it awhile, you should ask yourself a few questions. First – what is your goal? What is it that you are trying to achieve? If your goal is to make a fully stocked “bug out bag” for each member of your family, and you’d like to have that done in a month, then make a plan on how you are going to get that done. If you have a much larger goal, like perhaps obtaining enough food storage to feed your family for 3 months, and you’d like to have it all done by the end of the year. Make a plan. Figure out how much extra food you will need to buy each week, or each month to get to your goal.

The goal has to come first. You need to know where you’re going before you head out. If you don’t, you might end up someplace that you don’t want to be. Your goals are your business. Your plan is your business. Once you have them in place, do a little bit each week, or each month toward that goal. If you consistently work your plan, you can achieve big things. I’m not an expert on goals. I’m not a personal development coach. If you need help in that area, there are a lot of books, & articles on the web that’ll help you more than I can.

What I can try to help you with are some ideas on small things you can do to work toward your preparedness goals.  Today I’m beginning a series of posts on  just getting five dollars worth of preps at a time. Every Friday, I’ll put up a new post on what I found for five bucks that you could get to help you work toward being more prepared. Maybe something for your bug-out bag, your car, your pantry – who knows? We’ll see what I can come up with. These will all be things to put back for preparedness, not for everyday use. You certainly wouldn’t need to buy the same things I buy. Hopefully it will give you some ideas, and inspire you to set some goals of your own, & work toward them.

For the first installment, I stopped the “Dollar Tree” store. If you’ve never been in one before, everything in the store is $1. I saw all kinds of things in there that would be good for inexpensive preps, but I limited this purchase to $5.

I got:

  • 2- 25 oz. aluminum water bottles – besides the obvious use of carrying water, you can use the bottles to heat water in, or check out this video on how to make a cool alcohol stove that’s a lot more heavy duty than the ones made from pop cans. STOVE …
  • A box of 15 – 1 gallon size zipper seal freezer bags – these can be used to carry water, to keep other items dry (phone, maps, etc), put them on your feet under your shoes to keep your feet dry…
  • A box of 8 – 113L drawstring-type garbage bags – an emergency poncho, keep your pack or  bed roll dry, keep firewood dry, hang up high in a tree to keep animals out of food/trash…
  • A box of heavy duty aluminum foil (27 sq. ft) – you can cook in it, I use it when camping for scrubbing my cast iron cookware, you can use it to make a container to hold water for drinking or cooking…

For more great ideas of how these items (& a lot more) can be useful to you, check out this post on the Survivalist Boards: HERE

Thanks for reading, and don’t forget to check out the new recipe I added yesterday for Marisa’s Ham and Potato Soup! Subscribe to the site to get all the latest updates via email, as well as being able to participate in the community forums & groups. ^MM

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Jun26

Make a Pop Can Stove

by Big Mike on 06/26/2012 at 12:00
Posted In: CAMPING, PREPAREDNESS, SURVIVAL

If you have never made, or used a pop can alcohol stove, you should check them out. These are very small, lightweight, efficient, & cheap. You can make one pretty easily with just a few tools, a couple of empty pop cans, and an hour or two. I’ve made a few different designs, and I really like these little stoves. I have a couple of these in my backpack, as well as several small bottles of fuel for them. (two is one, one is none) They take up very little room, and weigh almost nothing. I keep the fuel (Heet – in the yellow bottles, not the red ones) in empty, rinsed out 5 Hour Energy bottles.

Alcohol Stove

They are great for backpacking, camping, canoeing, as well as for disasters & emergencies when you need to cook, make coffee, etc. It might be a good idea for you to make several of these & keep at least one in all of your kits.

Do a search on Youtube for pop can stove, or alcohol stove. There are ton of how to videos. One of the best sites I’ve seen for alcohol stoves is Zen Stoves. This site has quite a few different designs, and goes over the advantages and disadvantages of each. There are directions on how to build the different models, and the even have templates for some of them that you can print off. They even cover the different types of fuel for the stoves, with warnings on what not to burn.

This would be a good family project, but not for smaller children. There are some sharp edges on the cans after you cut them, and putting the pieces together would be difficult for the younger kids.Try making one or two, and let me know how you like them! ^MM

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Jun19

Site Improvements & Some Camp Goodies!

by Big Mike on 06/19/2012 at 03:31
Posted In: General Announcements

I haven’t been adding much to the blog, because I’ve been studying, learning, & adding some new things to the site for you. The main thing that I’ve been working on is being able to provide a place for everyone to have the ability to share their knowledge, make friends, follow other’s contributions, ask questions, etc.

This site is no longer going to be just a blog for people to read what I write. Everyone will have the ability to share their knowledge with others. There will be different groups on the site for different areas of interest, forums for open discussions, you’ll be able to set up your own profile page & let people know about yourself and your family if you choose to.

I’ve also added some things to allow better navigation of the site from mobile devices. And you can now register and sign in using your Facebook credentials. As the site grows, & things get busier, I’ll be selecting some moderators to help with managing the different groups. So if you have a particular aspect of preparedness and survival that you are most interested in, please register and get involved in the community & let me know that you’re interested in being a moderator. There is a lot more that I’ll be working on, so register & get involved. Everyone has something to add to help other people!

On another note – I was at Harbor Freight Tools today with Noah. We were just looking around at all the tools & cool stuff. I ran across some Figure 9 Carabiners from Nite Ize. If you’ve never seen them before, this is what they look like:

Nite Ize Figure 9 Carabiners photoYou use the to tighten ropes & secure loads. I have heard that they are pretty handy around camp, as well as for use to secure loads on trailers, or in the back of your truck. I have seen them in use, and I have heard a lot of people talking about them, but I haven’t bought any until now. After I’ve had a chance to try them out for awhile, I’ll do a review on them. Maybe even a video. If you have any experience with them, please let us know what you think of them.

That’s all I have for tonight. Have a great week, & be safe out there! ^MM

 

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