September is National Preparedness Month, when FEMA and Ready.gov promote planning ahead for emergencies. Many times when we think of an emergency, we think BIG. Hurricanes, earthquakes, tornado, a disastrous ice storm, etc. No doubt, these are big emergencies, but do we take the time to plan for other smaller things? Or even better, take …
There are certain things I remember about my Grandpa Dick. He always wore a grey button shirt with a pocket and a pocketed t-shirt underneath. He wore black working boots, slip-on cowboy style, that went to the middle of his calf. Grandpa Dick was a blue collar worker, in charge of the grain co-op in …
Just before Christmas one of the community Facebook groups that I’m a part of had a post from a family asking for assistance to help replenish their bare cupboards. There were several posts from people indicating that certain churches in the area had pantry assistance programs. One post really stuck out to me: “Churches are no …
It’s fall in Wyoming and I have apples on the brain! Each fall we like to stock up on apples. I often order these by the case from Azure Standard or pick locally from friends. I love to dehydrate apples to have for snacking and baking through the winter but we also enjoy eating them …
With the news of Russia having drills for a mock nuclear attack or other large scale catastrophe some are suggesting we are entering a new cold war. Still others say we’re already in a 2nd Cold War (source). Cold War is term is used to describe the relationship between America and the Soviet Union 1945 to …
Amazingly versatile and so handy. Tomato powder is probably one of my favorite pantry items. This little gem is incredibly useful. Dried, tomato powder may be used in every way that tomato paste is used and more! Simply add water to make a paste or add it directly to items to give a tomato flavor. …
As I’m writing this post it’s late-June and I have a pot of soup on the stove for supper. Two days ago it was quite warm and more salad weather than soup weather but last night a storm came through and has left a cold dreary day behind. Once again perfect for soup weather. When …
We’re definitely coming up on salad season. Salad greens are one of the things we tend to grow well in our garden and find easily at the natural grocery store and, later, the farmers market. Plus once it’s too hot to cook a main dish salad is a welcome meal. When we first switched to …
It’s easy to get distracted when there is a large task to be completed. Preparedness is one of those tasks for me. Mainly because it’s a task that in many ways has no end. We first realized that we were woefully unprepared for things like natural disasters several years ago when a major storm hit …
This post was originally shared on my short-lived homesteading blog. Things have changed for us since I originally wrote this post. Did you know that it is believed that cheese making may have started when dairying started? Milk was put in animal bags (usually made out of a ruminants stomach) for storage and transportation. The natural …
For the past several months I’ve been involved, behind the scenes, in an amazing project. My friend Wardee from GNOWFGLINS put together the Ultimate Survival Bundle. My behind the scenes involvement allowed me a sneak peek at all of the amazing resources Wardee was compiling for the bundle. To say I was in awe at …
You may know that I have a slight obsession with beans. Beans are a wonderfully frugal whole food, they have an excellent nutritional profile, and are extremely versatile. There are hundreds of varieties of beans/legumes available which really helps keep things interesting. Beans also make an excellent addition to your food storage. For ease of …
“Then the phone call came. One cold February afternoon, Jeff called to tell me his company did a 20% pay cut across the board. Two months later, it was a 20% reduction in hours on top of that pay cut. Just one month later, I got another afternoon phone call. They had laid almost …
We recently made a decision to bump up our food storage from keeping three months on hand to twelve months. Something that we started even when having three months of storage was a Heat and Eat Bin. In my Introduction to Food Storage: Why? post I told you about our real life experience of being without …
I like making lists. I make a ‘to do’ list almost every morning of the things I need to accomplish that day. I make a menu plan nearly every week. When we have a trip or vacation coming up my planning time usually starts several months in advance (yes, I’m already planning for next summer’s …