Pearls&Grit

Welcome to Part Two of my tiny Emergency Preparedness Series. I have been focusing this week on how to organize my pile of supplies that I gathered up previously. If you’d like to start from the beginning, start here and then continue reading Part 1.

Now, lets get to it!

Here is a breakdown of how I organized my emergency supplies. I went and got heavier duty plastic totes. I wanted something that was water-resistant, sturdy, had a large capacity but remained transportable, while still being easily store-able. I wanted efficiency! The totes I found were the Sterilite brand and I happened to chance on a sale, so I got them for about $11.00. Yes!

The “Supplies” – Inside the first tote, wrapped up in Ziploc bags, I put batteries, flashlights, candles and matches, and a hand crack AM/FM radio that will also charge a phone or other electronic device via a USB cord.

Buy The Crank Charger Here from Amazon. This has proven to be a great buy!

I also put an entire box of large, heavy duty trash bags in this tote. With the recent flooding, it occurred to me that perhaps it would pay off if I took extra precautionary measures to keep things dry. Baby wipes went in, along with a spray can of Lysol and a bagged roll of paper towels. I will be adding a small ax and a fold-up shovel to this tote.

The “Cooker” – Lighter fluid, a 2-pack of lighters, a bag of briquettes, and canisters of propane to use with our camping stove in this tote. A skillet I never use and a small pot, along with a spatula, spoon and a manual can opener also went in the tote.

I dug through our shed and found our camping stove, which I discovered, has never even been out of the box. My dad would be so…not proud. But I knew there was no sense in NOT finding the stove, as who knows what the accessibility of the shed would be in a disaster, or the time restraints if we had to leave. I also stumbled across a fantastic little manual water purifier pump which I completely forgot that I had. Unexpected score!

The “Sustenance” – In this tote, I put pancake mix, fruit snacks, cans of soup, ravioli, fruit, chicken and tuna. Also instant potatoes, dried fruit, granola bars (non-melting kinds), and some more hard candy.

I collected all the sleeping bags from the four corners of the house, rolled them up as tightly as I could and put them all together in my storage closet. If needed, I can quickly bag them in the conveniently located garbage bags.

I found a five-gallon bucket, which you can purchase with lids at Home Depot or Lowe’s for a nominal price and I filled it full of bagged toilet paper, along with some smaller sized heavy duty trash bags. It would seem that in an emergency, toilet paper would be one of those creature comforts we would miss first.

Next time, I will be creating individual 72-hour backpacks! Get it done, folks! You won’t regret it, even if all that happens is you have peace of mind.