amightyfortress

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Everything posted by amightyfortress

  1. Practice makes perfect. It's good to start trying to garden while the good times are still here (if your plants don't make it, you can still get food at a grocery store). Just keep trying and ask other gardeners lots of questions... eventually you'll have a green thumb.Herbs are fairly easy--chives, rosemary, oregano, etc. It will give you an easy start. If you don't have alot of space, you could just put the dirt in buckets, milk jugs with the tops cut off, even a child's plastic swimming pool. Poke holes in the bottom of the container(s), add some gravel, then some soil... plant the herbs.
  2. Ohhhh, my kitten hates-loathes-despises crates. He'll scream, bite the metal door, shove his paw all the way up to his shoulder and then get it stuck. You'd think he was being slowly dismembered with a dull butter knife the way he carried on. That's why I got the harness and leash and trained him to go for walks. Now he's great about going places.
  3. Kitten update: My kitten is now trained to walk on a leash and also loves to go for rides in the car. I take my kitten to the beach, for icecream, to the pet store to check out the birds-fish-mice-other cats, and to visit family. This will come in handy should I ever have to evacuate. The kitty will not freak out since it's use to going new places and meeting new people. If I did evacuate, I would not go to a shelter, I would go camping. So now I'm getting my kitty use to bonfires so that won't scare him.
  4. Those are boxes that originally held 12 cans of soda. I want to get ahold of one of the boxes that comes with 24 cans of soda and see how those work. You don't even have to cut the boxes or anything. They come perforated like that and are meant to self-dispense. Hint: It's easier to load the box if you stand it on end...load it, then lay it down like in the picture--you can get more cans in it that way.
  5. I'm not in an earthquake zone (I'm in Wisconsin). However, I have been thinking of putting each bottle into a clean tubesock (for cushioning) and then putting the bottles into some sort of rubbermaid tub to "corral" them. Afterall, there could always be an explosion in the neighborhood or airplane crash (I live near an airport) or something else that could cause the house to shake a bit and the bottles to tumble.
  6. Get soda drinkers you know to save those cardboard boxes the canned soda comes in. I just experimented and those boxes are GREAT for storing your canned goods in. Look at my pictures to see an example of how I used old Fresca, Dr. Pepper, and Rootbeer boxes to store beets, corned beef hash, and canned soup. Can't wait to get more boxes (and some plain white labels for the front bottom of each box). I just did this a couple minutes ago. Does anyone else have any cheap ways they came up with to store canned goods and keep them rotated?
  7. That is so true. Food inflation is going up so fast. The 20 pound bags of rice I bought for $7.99 are now over $16. Corned beef hash I paid .99 cents a can for is now $1.29. 39 cent vegetables are now 55-65 cents each. There isn't an item on my shelves that hasn't gone up tremendously in price--including the BIG boxes of powdered milk that make 20 quarts that I purchased for $5.99 and are now selling for $14.99 (sure glad I bought three years worth).I'm not planning to quit eating--I'll need the stuff anyway--so I keep plenty on hand. All that savings is tax-free "profit". I keep a little over a 3 year food supply (working on upping that to a 7 year supply). At my house, I'm still enjoying 2006 .39 cent a can tuna :)
  8. A bit off topic, but just wondering... can I invite missionaries to my home for a meal if I'm not LDS? I know finances are a bit tight for them and they have to get by alot on the kindness of others. I've learned so much from the LDS websites and although I haven't converted, I'd like to pay it back and think it would be fun to make a nice meal for some of the missionaries from time to time and hear about what they are working on.
  9. In a long-term situation, you may not be able to have the usual fresh salad every night. You may have to make some modifications/substitutions. However, you could grow sprouts and then you're getting some fresh food in your diet. Depending on the time of year, you'll be able to garden (if you have the space) and could also consider building a root cellar. Lettuce and spinach will not hold up in a root cellar long-term, but you can make a winter salad instead with cabbage, sliced beets, onion, apples, etc. or other items which store well in a root cellar. Depending on where you live, a cold frame for growing spinach might also work. The other option is switch from fresh salad to vegetable soup during the times of year when fresh salad might not be an option. Your indoor growing option will help supplement your desire for fresh items also.
  10. I have the Back-to-Basics handcranked (non-electric) grinder and I love it. It's inexpensive and works well. I have it attached to my kitchen table next to the window and I just gaze out the window and daydream while grinding grain. It's nice mindless work.
  11. You can live on "the Mormon 4" ("live" is a term used very loosely in this instance, because it is so basic a person's tastebuds would perish from the monotony...hahaha) but technically you can live on it. If it was suspected someone was only sniffing around for the "free food", they'd quickly decide to continue on their way.
  12. "The Mormon 4" are wheat, powdered milk, salt, honey (or sugar).
  13. If I find an outstanding price on something I really don't eat I sometimes buy it anyway because you may end up with some guests showing up on your doorstep and can give them those items (or donate them to a food pantry when they get closer to expiration.) For instance, I'm not a big fan of macaroni and cheese, but almost everyone (especially children) like that stuff and it's cheap. So I have several cases of it on hand. I got a great price (4 for $1) so each case of 24 boxes was only $6. Having 72 boxes of mac-n-cheese for only an $18 investment seemed like a good trade-off.
  14. Stockpile rice. I've never heard of anyone being allergic to rice. White rice lasts decades if stored properly. (Brown rice will go rancid in six months to a year). So you can have brown rice for the short term... and some white rice for the long term.
  15. Give outsiders only "the Mormon 4" and they won't keep coming back for more :)
  16. Oops, I already posted and just noticed Elgama's similar post re: 12 boxes for rotating food storage.
  17. Easy rotating: Get 12 of those Rubbermaid storage containers. Label them January, February, March, etc. Then put stuff in each container. When the January container is empty, it gets moved to the end for refilling for next year. Or, have 12 shelves, label them for each month of the year. Same thing.
  18. Are the store shelves in your area empty? Are people all around you starving to death? If not, then it's not hoarding. Hoarding is when you rush out and buy up stuff and leave others to do without. If there's plenty of food still on the shelves for others to eat, then it's not hoarding.
  19. Store 360 days worth of food (a fews days short of a year). Then when someone asks you about LDS storing a one year supply of food you can truthfully answer that the church says you should have a one year supply of food, but you don't follow that teaching.
  20. I just got a kitten 12 days ago and I've already got him a three-month supply of dried food, canned food, litter, and hairball treatment :) I'll up it to a one-year supply after Christmas.
  21. Getting all your food storage as quickly as possible is very comforting... and you're right, after you KNOW you have your one year supply, then you can add fun things to it. I believe it's critical to have the faith and then follow-thru to put the one year supply together.
  22. Kyra: I like the idea of buying a year's food storage all at once and having instant peace-of-mind. Don't forget the water! Lots of it! You'll sleep well at night with those two items out of the way. Then move on to other items like paper goods, first aid, etc. and once those are done, you can go back to the food storage and start adding more variety to it like canned goods, juices, etc. I always kept six months of food on hand, but when I decided to expand it to a one year supply, I bought a one year supply of "the Mormon 4" wheat/honey/powdered milk/salt. So at that point, I had 1-1/2 years of food stored (and a couple months of water). I then turned to first aid, toilet paper, shoes, coats, blankets, clothes, camping gear, etc., and more water and a water filter... then I returned to the food storage and I now have three years food storage and about six months water. On items like razors, cotton balls, toothbrushes, etc., I have a 20 year supply. My final goal is 7 years food and a full year of water (and of course the other items, too) But if you can get that one year supply in quickly, you will immediately feel a weight lifted from you. I think that is an excellent use for the bonus money.
  23. I hope you don't have kids. Think of how it would feel to wake up one morning and one of them is missing and all the kidnapper had to do was turn a doorknob--didn't even have to bust glass or make a noise or anything. Or waking up and someone is standing over the bed. No way, not anything I'd care to experience. I'm not going to take a chance when all I need to do is lock a door. It's simple and easy.
  24. I would NEVER leave my home unlocked at any time--not even briefly. When I cut the lawn, I lock the door. If I park in front of the house to unload provisions, I relock the door when I go to park the car behind the house. I don't ever want to walk into my home and be confronted by someone hiding inside. If someone wants to enter my home, they're gonna have to work at it to get in.
  25. I can cook, clean, sew, garden, crochet, make lace, needlework, candymaking, soapmaking, make natural cleaners and perfumes/lotions/etc, bellydance (hey if bad times come, people will need a good laugh to take their minds off their troubles), shoot a shotgun, rifle, pistol, bows/arrows, good with a knife... and I'm advanced level at maintaining/rotating/using my food storage. I do cardmaking, too. Hmmm, and quilting. Trying to think of what else. Oh, I know how to ride motorcycles and can drive a stick-shift :)