My mom recently shared a book with me, another anthology of Backwoods Home magazine, one she very much enjoys, as do I. I was flipping through the pages when I came across an article about preparedness. Now, I am not talking about the "Doomsday Preppers" kind of preparedness that is glorified and made fun of in some of the television programs on the network channels, but instead good old fashioned common sense being prepared. Here was the headlining quote:
The article went on to talk about times of plagues, wars, depressions and the like and made some excellent points about how some survived, some even did a bit better than survive and others perished. What struck me about the article was that throughout the mentions of self sufficiency and preparing for the unknown (even a very large winter snowstorm falls into this category) there wasn't much talk in the way of how to make some of the things you need.
I got to thinking about some of the skills I have shared on this blog, many of which come from the "do it yourself" wisdom of previous generations. When I came to the section of the article that had some suggestions about items one might want to have on hands, I think I would do it a bit differently, and I hope my readers would have the same skills. Here is the list of some suggestions:
I got to thinking about some of the skills I have shared on this blog, many of which come from the "do it yourself" wisdom of previous generations. When I came to the section of the article that had some suggestions about items one might want to have on hands, I think I would do it a bit differently, and I hope my readers would have the same skills. Here is the list of some suggestions:
Again, this comes from my fascination of getting to the absolute essence of how do do something but rather than try to store 25lbs of laundry soap, I think I would keep 2 boxes of Borax, 2 Boxes of Arm & Hammer Washing Soda and 6 Bars of Fels Naptha. That would be enough to effectively make laundry soap for my family for at least 2 years and dare I say would likely take up a lot less space.
As for the 12 bars of hand soap, I am glad that I am learning the skill of making my own soap so that storage could easily be replenished, and if lye were not available, I even have books on the skills needed to fashion one's own lye for soap making. Then you only need water and a fat of some kind (lard, coconut oil, cooking oils, etc). Then it would be easy to also make pump hand soap as well.
The deodorant and toothpaste are also things that I have shared recipes for and could easily be made if one already had those ingredients on hand (as we do because we make a myriad of products with the same self care ingredients).
The sanitary napkins are something one could easily make as well and would not take up nearly as much space since they would be washable (tutorial here) if you are curious.
So all in all, though I don't disagree with some of the suggestions I would argue that if you know some of our grandparent's skills of making your own of something, you may do better than to try to stockpile too much.
What are your thoughts on this topic? Please share in the comments section below.
The deodorant and toothpaste are also things that I have shared recipes for and could easily be made if one already had those ingredients on hand (as we do because we make a myriad of products with the same self care ingredients).
The sanitary napkins are something one could easily make as well and would not take up nearly as much space since they would be washable (tutorial here) if you are curious.
So all in all, though I don't disagree with some of the suggestions I would argue that if you know some of our grandparent's skills of making your own of something, you may do better than to try to stockpile too much.
What are your thoughts on this topic? Please share in the comments section below.
