What is Prepping?
I am sure you are hearing a lot about it right now. Prepping can involve as little or as much as your want. Basically prepping involves laying in “stores” to get you through “things.” What type of things you ask? Well it can be what ever you decide. Some prep for The End of The World As We Know It (TEOTWAWKI) or for when the Sh** Hits the Fan (SHTF). Depending on where you live you can prep for weather or natural events like hurricanes, tornados, wild fires, or earthquakes.
How do I Start Prepping?
You make the conscience decision to take the steps necessary to have your family be prepared. Next you decide how much time you ultimately want to have supplies for: one week, one month, three months, six months, one year, five years. It is your family and home so you make the decisions. Having a pantry is a form of prepping. Deciding to take the pantry from a one month supply of food to a three month supply of food is prepping. Small steps over time is the best way.
You also will need to think about alternative forms of cooking and storage of food. When Hurricane Isabelle went through our area 7 years ago we had neighborhoods without power for a weeks. That means no freezer and no electric stoves. So you need to think about that also.
I made those decisions, what is next?
Think about food, clothing, water, medical supplies, unique needs like allergies, will you have guns and ammunition in the house? Next you will need make a plan to reach your goal. Then you will need to make your budget. A budget is a must. You can buy a large amounts of storage food for large amounts of money, but why do that? Take your time and build the pantry your family will use.
Starting your plan
The most important thing to have is food and water so I would start there. The most important thing is to store what you eat and eat what you store! Make a list of all the meals your family eats. Write out the ingredients. Take inventory of what you have to make those meals. Now if you wanted to be able to have enough food in your house for a month, how much would you have to purchase to reach that goal. Plan to shop grocery sales for the next three months. Only purchase and plan meals that are on deep sales so you have the money to build the pantry over the course of a few months.
I would also suggest reading some books on how to become self sufficient. I am currently reading The Backyard Homestead by Carleen Madigan. It tell how to produce all the food you need on a quarter acre of land. Very interesting reading. There are other books out there. Square Foot Gardening, Encyclopedia of Country Living, and The Self Sufficient Life. That should give you some place to start your research.
Join an online group of like minded people. They will help you and encourage you along the way. One new group I belong to and can recommend is PrepWise. This board is relatively new, but there is some great knowledge there. Some sites are very hard core, conspiracy theories, but they have some great prepping info so take what you can and leave the rest.
Also start a notebook. If you find information online, PRINT IT OUT! If the power goes out and you don’t have the paper then you do not have the information.
My notebook currently has these sections:
Recipes
First Aid Information (how to)
Medical Information for each family member
Bank account information
Emergency contact information for out of area family
A pouch with some cash in lower denominations (if the power is down, no banks, no ATMs)
Prepping has been near and dear to my heart, I want to have others start thinking about how having supplies and knowledge in the house can be a blessing to the family. I invite you join my world and have hedge against the world.
Managing Mayhem and Multiples 